AM850.com

The University of Florida closes out its regular season this weekend with a three game series that starts tonight when Vanderbilt comes to town. AM 850 will have live coverage starting at 6:30pm.

Florida (31-20, 14-13 SEC) is looking to get enough wins this weekend to earn a trip to next week's SEC Tournament and to an NCAA regional as well. Vanderbilt (37-15, 15-11 SEC) is looking to do the same but most believe the Commodores are a lock for both the SEC Tournament and a regional already.

Privately, Gator players and coaches feel they need to win two of three this weekend to remove any doubt they belong in the postseason and that quest starts tonight as Billy Bullock (4-3, 4.11) faces sophomore lefty Mike Minor (5-3, 4.07). Stephen Locke (4-2, 2.99) faces freshman righty Caleb Cotham (7-3, 3.28) on Friday and Patrick Keating (8-0, 3.27) faces junior righty Nick Christiani (5-3, 4.37) on Saturday.

Offensively, Vandy is a club that does not have a lot of power but outfielder Ryan Flaherty does have 12 home runs and 53 r-b-i to lead the team. David Macias (.375) leads the team in hitting and Dominic de la Osa (.310, 23 steals) has been a spark since coming back from an injury.

For Florida, Avery Barnes (.383) is the leading hitter, and Matt Den Dekker (.315) is riding a 10 game hitting streak. Steady Brandon McArthur (.348) has also hit in 20 of his last 22 games as Florida comes in hitting .305 as a team.

The key to the series could be pitching however and of late in SEC play the Florida bullpen has not been good. Florida blew two late leads last weekend in Alabama and the Gators are now 0-7 in one run games in SEC play.