The last time the Gators were here, things were different, but the same.
The 2005 team that stormed all the way to the championship series in the College World Series wasn't expected to make it that far. That squad was picked to finish third in the Southeastern Conference's East division.
Instead, all they did was win the regular-season SEC title and sweep their way to Omaha, Neb., college baseball's Promised Land.
This year, with a new coaching staff in place and only three players remaining from that CWS team, the Gators were picked to finish fifth in the SEC East and 11th overall in the conference.
Instead, the young team finished third overall in arguably the nation's toughest conference.
But ask these Gators if they think they've exceeded expectations, and the answer is a resounding no.
"Not in our eyes," said senior designated hitter Bryson Barber, one holdout from that '05 team. "When we saw our collection of players at the beginning of the year, we knew we had a good shot of getting to a regional. From the outside looking in, maybe you didn't see it, but everybody here expected us to."
Stephen Locke, a freshman midweek starter then and the scheduled game one starter now, agreed.
"Even though a lot of people didn't expect us to be there, I think there's a pretty good group of us that expected to be in the mix toward the end of the year," he said. "We knew we were a capable team."
It is a team just as capable as the 2005 Gators, but perhaps in different ways.
"Back in 2005, we were a long ball team, and now we steal bases," Barber said. "Different players, different system…everything's different."
So as UF prepares to face Tulane, the three remaining veterans are stressing the lesson they learned three years ago to their teammates.
It's a tired baseball cliché, but one that especially holds true this time of year.
"We're telling these guys you just have to take it one game at a time," Barber said. "If we do that and play our game, we have a good shot of looking up and being in Omaha."
Senior first baseman Brandon McArthur, the starting third baseman on that CWS team, pointed to the path those Gators took to Omaha as an example.
"In 2005 when we had Stetson, they played with us every game that year," McArthur said. "It wasn't like it was a cakewalk to move on. Luckily we were able to pull that one out, and the next night we faced hometown Andrew Miller [of North Carolina]."
Miller is with the Florida Marlins now, and was the Tar Heels ace back then. The Gators will face a similar task when they go up against Tulane's Shooter Hunt. Just as they wouldn't look past Stetson to facing Miller then, they won't look ahead to potentially playing Florida State until after they've faced Hunt and the Green Wave.
"You've got to take it game by game," McArthur said. "You can't look ahead and you can't look behind you. You've got to play for that moment because in the long run, you can look back and regret some of the things that you did while thinking about the future."
For Barber and McArthur, and perhaps Locke, the future does not hold more college baseball. The three veterans were excited to be back in the postseason one final time, but they aren't satisfied yet.
"The honor of getting into the postseason is pretty meaningful," McArthur said, "just knowing that all of the hard work you've done and the games you played throughout the year have somewhat paid off. But our job isn't over. We've got to keep working and going at things."
He paused, then added with a smile: "Hopefully we can keep playing for another month."
