Josh Sanders and Donny Van Slee’s performance during Monday’s Battle Rounds on The Voice left their coach, Reba McEntire, unexpectedly choked up. 

The country legend teamed. up Sanders and Van Slee for a performance of Luke Combs’ “When It Rains, It Pours.” 

Despite the song’s upbeat nature and the pair’s rousing rendition, something Sanders admitted before they took the stage appeared to weigh heavy on McEntire’s heart.

“‘When it rains, it pours,’ that lyric hits me kinda heavy,” he shared, per Entertainment Tonight. “I’m a dad of four girls. 

We had a son. He was born and passed away on my birthday.”

“It’s such a fun song, and I don’t wanna take it there,” Sanders added.

Fighting back tears, McEntire offered the grieving father a bit of advice.

“Before I go onstage, I ask the Holy Spirit to walk for me, talk for me, speak for me, sing for me,” she told Sanders. “Ask him for that: ‘Put me in the right place for this song.’”

When it came time for the battle, both men delivered. Sanders, however, stood out.

“Josh, your runs, when you hit the high notes, everything was perfect,” McEntire told the North Carolina native. “Whatever you got from this song, it worked for ya.”

She got teary-eyed as she mulled the difficult decision she had to make.

“I feel like I’ve known you [both] forever,” she said. “When we got to be in the rehearsal, I just felt like we bonded, and that was really, really special to me.”

In the end, McEntire picked Sanders to move on to the Knockouts round. “I think America is going to fall in love with Josh,” she explained in a post-show interview.

The Voice airs Mondays and Tuesdays at 8 p.m. EST on NBC.

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Source: USA Today