MACON, Ga. — The Auburn baseball team left little room for doubt in its 18-6 win over Mercer on Tuesday night.

The Tigers, paced by an 11-run fourth inning, improved to 28-25 on the season and now head home to face LSU in a three-game series, beginning Thursday, to end the regular season.

Auburn’s hopes of making the SEC Tournament, which hasn’t happened since 2003, are still slim. The Tigers need to sweep LSU — winners of nine consecutive SEC game — and have help from Tennessee and Mississippi State to be one of the eight team to advance to Hoover.

Tuesday, however, Auburn took care of business.

The 11-run, fourth-inning, was highlighted by home runs by Matt Hall, Joseph Sanders and Kevin Patterson, as Auburn sent 14 hitters to the plate. Michael Hurst threw a career-long five innings to pick up the win for Auburn.

Auburn finished the night with a season-high 18 runs on a season-high 19 hits, and the three homers gave Auburn 53 dingers on the year, the 10th-most in a single season in Auburn history.

The Tigers also hit seven doubles on the night to up its total to 129 on the year, the eighth-most in a single season with three regular-season games to play.

Sanders finished the night a perfect 5-for-5 with two singles, two doubles, a home run and a walk with five RBI.

“This was a night where things were going well,” Sanders said. “Hitting is contagious and I was seeing it real well and getting good swings at the plate tonight.”

Auburn’s big fourth started with a Sanders double, which was followed by Hall’s blast. David Cunningham singled to keep the rally going and that was followed by back-to-back-to-back walks to Patterson, Tony Caldwell and Trent Mummey.

Brian Fletcher then singled to keep the bases loaded and Hunter Morris’ two-run doubled to put Auburn up, 7-6, as Mercer had not recorded an out and changed pitchers three times in the inning.

A sacrifice fly by Mike Bianucci made it 8-6 before Sanders walked up to the plate for the second time in the inning and belted his third home run in as many games. Two batters later, Cunningham singled again and then Patterson hit a laser out to right to cap the scoring and complete Auburn’s biggest offensive explosion since April 14, 2000, when the Tigers scored 14 in the first inning of a 19-2 win over Mercer in Auburn.