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As I write this the University of Florida baseball team is set to begin postseason play, first in the SEC Tournament and then in an NCAA Regional and the Gators have a good shot at hosting that regional.

I would not have thought that in the beginning of the year. Florida did not play defense well, its hitting was spotty and the pitching was inconsistent. Then came the SEC opening series with Arkansas and the Razorbacks immediately put the Gators in a hole with a sweep of three games in Fayetteville.

But give Florida credit; it never got rattled and it came right back the next week to sweep Tennessee and right the ship. The return to the team later of senior lefty Stephen Locke gave Florida a lift and a veteran guy who knows SEC hitters that could pitch on Friday nights. Since his arrival, the entire pitching staff jelled and pitchers began to know their roles. Even without a dominant starter, the Gator pitching staff earned run average was a very good 4.20 heading into the SEC Tournament, the second best mark in the league.

The deep and talented bullpen became the strength of the pitching staff and Billy Bullock went from a struggling starter to a dominant closer, saving 11 games with a 1.51 earned run average.

The Gator hitters, last in the SEC in hitting when the conference season began, suddenly found their groove and ended up hitting a respectable .306 as a team heading into postseason play. Freshman Preston Tucker, the Co-SEC Freshman of the Year, is a budding star who hit .338 with 11 homers and a rookie record 71 r-b-i in the regular season.

So what are Florida's chances of making a nice run in the postseason? I believe Florida has earned the right to host an NCAA Regional, and if that happens, a likely opponent would be old nemesis Miami, a team that swept the Gators in Gainesville earlier this year.

Florida certainly has the pitching staff that is built to win an SEC Tournament or NCAA Regional type of format. In a short series, like a Super Regional, without a dominant starter, that could be another story. But I like the way Florida scraps and knows its identity and I truly believe the Gators have a chance to advance to a Super Regional.

I think Florida's success, like many others, will come down to getting decent innings from its starting pitchers and good hitting from its lineup. Good pitchers have tended to shut down Gator hitters this year and Florida will see many good arms in a regional so the hitters must manufacture enough runs to help out its pitching staff.

It has been a bit of a roller coaster ride for Gator baseball this year but in the end, Florida won the SEC East, was a two seed at the SEC Tournament, and is poised to host an NCAA Regional.

And the good news is that more talent is on the way as head coach Kevin O'Sullivan and his staff have recruited well and a lot of the pitching staff that has been good is very young with freshmen like Alex Panteliodis, Greg Larson, Nick Maronde, and Anthony DeSclafani coming back next year with a lot of valuable experience gained this season.

There is little question that the Gator baseball program is headed in the right direction; what is needed now is consistency in the program and a winning tradition as opposed to the often up and down nature of this sport at Florida.

We'll see if that gets started this postseason.