Blake Burke became Tennessee's all-time home run leader during Saturday's 12-2 thumping of Auburn at Plainsman Park, but it's a race that's far from over.
The junior first baseman opened the fourth inning with a solo shot to left-center field for his 41st career homer, and it extended the lead for the No. 4 Volunteers in their eventual run-rule win to 9-0. Burke broke the mark set by his predecessor at first, Luc Lipcius, who tallied his 40 homers during the 2017-22 seasons.
"Luc was big to me my freshman year, and he was someone I looked up to," Burke said after Tennessee evened the series. "He took me under his arms, so it was cool to watch him break it and then do it myself. Obviously I'm more focused on the 1-1 series and what's coming up tomorrow."
Tennessee bounced back from Friday night's 9-5 setback to improve to 25-6 overall and to 6-5 in Southeastern Conference play. The Tigers fell to 18-12 and to 2-9 within the league.
Burke's homer was his 11th of the season, and the 6-foot-3, 236-pounder from Brentwood, California, is hitting a robust .404 with 17 doubles and 27 RBIs. He went deep 16 times as a sophomore but hit .280 and only had six doubles to accompany his 43 RBIs.
"Last year, I was swinging at everything up there, and I didn't really have a plan," Burke said. "This year, I've tried to have a plan when I get in the box. I've tried to swing at strikes early in the count and battle with two strikes."
Said Tennessee coach Tony Vitello: "He could go down as one of the winningest players in Vol history. I know he wants to win about as much as any player I've ever been around, and the three teams he's been on have obviously seen a lot of success."
Yet Burke is just two homers ahead of junior second baseman Christian Moore, who notched his 39th career blast with a grand slam during Saturday's second inning that staked Tennessee to a 5-0 lead. It was the eighth grand slam by the Vols this spring, setting a single-season standard.
Moore finished 3-for-5 with six RBIs.
"There are slight jokes we bounce back and forth to each other," Burke said of the homer chase. "If he ends up getting it, then he ends up getting it. As long as he's hitting homers, too, I'm happy."
The Vols wound up amassing six homers Saturday, with Dalton Bargo and Dylan Dreiling collecting two apiece. That onslaught was more than enough for Vols starting pitcher Drew Beam, who had a rough outing last Saturday against Georgia but smothered the Tigers by racking up eight strikeouts and holding them scoreless until the seventh and final inning.
"He needed to bounce back from last week, and I know that he had a strong desire to," Vitello said. "He had six innings of just being incredible out there, and the last inning was kind of get it done ugly. He's done both in his career here."
Tennessee's fourth consecutive rubber match to open SEC play is set for Sunday at 2 p.m. Eastern.
Knecht wins award
Dalton Knecht on Saturday became Tennessee's first winner of the Julius Erving Award, which goes to college basketball's top small forward.
The 6-6, 213-pound transfer from Northern Colorado averaged 21.7 points this season and averaged 25.5 in SEC contests. He won the honor over Washington's Keion Brooks Jr., Weber State's Dillon Jones, Creighton's Baylor Scheierman, and David Jones of Memphis.
Knecht is also the first Vols player to win any of the "Starting Five" awards -- Bob Cousy (point guard), Jerry West (shooting guard), Erving, Karl Malone (power forward) and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (center). The Cousy Award was introduced in 2004, while the other four were implemented in 2015.
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com.