GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Four trips in five seasons later, Super Regionals feel different for Kentucky softball.Unprecedented success has led to unprecedented expectations for the Wildcats. What once was a destination has become something of a birthright.”If you took this team and it was five years ago everybody would think we were great,” UK head coach Rachel Lawson said.With her team set to take on top-seeded Florida (53-6) in a best-of-three series beginning at 1 p.m. on Saturday in Gainesville, Fla., Lawson thinks of another team back home on UK’s campus in the way success is now defined for her program. “It is kind of like Kentucky basketball,” Lawson said. “If Kentucky basketball just gets to the Sweet 16, it is just an OK season. Kentucky basketball is expected to be in the Final Four and win the national championship.”Lawson knows her team has a long way to go to match its counterpart on the hardwood – eight national titles, for starters – but the comparison holds water nonetheless.”We are not Kentucky basketball, but we are definitely in the realm where we are only one of nine teams that have been to three straight Super Regionals,” Lawson said. “So it is one of those things where now when you are as good as you are everybody expects you to go the World Series all the time.”Kentucky (32-24) made its first Women’s College World Series trip a season ago, but a second straight trip seemed unlikely as recently as a week ago. The Cats limped into the NCAA Tournament on a seven-game losing streak, but swept through the South Bend Regional, knocking off overall No. 16 seed Notre Dame in the process.”It was fun,” third baseman Nikki Sagermann said. “It was great to get back on the field and get the team back on track and win some ballgames. It is always good when you are winning.”That’s especially true with frequent losing still so fresh in your mind. But rather than letting that derail their confidence, the Cats got to work in a crucial week of practice following a loss in the Southeastern Conference Tournament.”We weren’t making good pitches or if we did make a good pitch we wouldn’t make a good stop,” Lawson said. “We just weren’t very good at that time. I think now with some work I think they feel confident that they are back to doing what they do well.”UK will need every ounce of that confidence come this weekend against the defending national champion Gators. Florida will have a home crowd on its side, not to mention an offense led by SEC Player of the Year Kelsey Stewart and a pitching staff anchored by SEC Pitcher of the Year Lauren Haeger. The Gators are hitting .312 as a team and boast an earned-run average of 1.73.”We have already faced them this year so we know that environment with the fans and we have a lot of experience with that,” said Sagermann, who hit two home runs last weekend and is on a career-best 10-game hitting streak. “They are a very good team and we are going to have to be on our A game to get out of there with two wins.”The Gators swept a competitive three-game set against UK in April, winning games by one, two and three runs. Outside of a six-run inning against sophomore Meagan Prince in game two, the Cats allowed just three runs all weekend.”Well, I thought that we played pretty well that weekend,” said Kelsey Nunley, who pitched all but two innings of UK’s three regional wins. “We didn’t get the results that we wanted, but we fought pretty hard and played good defense and made some good contact at the plate. I hope we can carry what we learned from those loses into this weekend.”Though Florida is the top seed, UK has experience taking down a favorite in Supers. The Cats won at No. 3 seed UCLA last season.”This is our seventh straight postseason and every year we seem to be the underdog so that is a role that we are used to,” Lawson said. “Florida is a very good team. It is different in the standpoint that we are both very familiar with each other because playing an SEC team is a lot different than going out of conference. So it is a similar scenario in that we are the underdog and are going to have to do something pretty exceptional in order to win.”Exceptional, sure, but not impossible.”They are a higher seed than us and we are obviously pretty low seeded,” Sagermann said. “We are just going to go out there and play our game and put no pressure on us. We are out there just to have fun and get two wins.”

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