It took a grand total of eight extra innings in the final two games of the Southern Conference championship for Georgia Southern to come out as the winner.
    Compared to what the Eagles are about to see, that was nothing.
    The Eagles will begin play in the 2013 NCAA tournament at the Gainesville, Fla., regional.
    They earned the No 3 seed in a bracket with South Florida, Hampton and the tournament's No. 2-overall seed, the Florida Gators.
    Play begins today at 3:30 p.m., against South Florida.
    The Bulls (43-14) won their first-ever Big East title this season and boast pitcher Sara Nevins, a hurler with a sub-one ERA and 255 strikeouts in 201 innings.
    For Georgia Southern (32-28), it's all about taking the offense as it comes.
    "When you're facing a pitcher with a 0.97 ERA, you have to have good at-bats," said GSU coach Annie Smith, who led GSU to the NCAA tournament for the second time in as many years at the helm of the program. "You have to be aggressive early, but you have to be smart. You have to be able to make adjustments. We've got to make sure not to fish. The ball is going to break late and it makes it a little harder. All I ever talk about is having good at-bats. If you come back to the dugout or you get on base, you did your job."
    The Eagles scored three runs in the last 22 innings of the SoCon tournament — both wins. They'll look for low-scoring games in the regionals, too.
    "Honestly, when you get to the regionals, everyone's got good pitching," Smith said. "That's how they got there. It's going to come down to that. Everyone knows how to win."
    The winner of GSU's game with South Florida will face today's winner between Hampton and Florida, on Saturday at 1 p.m.
    The losers will face off at 3:30 p.m., facing elimination in the double-elimination bracket.
    Hampton is a newcomer to the NCAA postseason.
    "It's the first time they won the (Mid-Eastern Atlantic Conference)," Smith said about Hampton. "They're scrappy, they run a lot, they've got a lot of stolen bases and they're aggressive. They take their hacks."
    Georgia Southern will put back-to-back Southern Conference Pitcher of the Year Sarah Purvis on the mound during the USF game. She'll be available Saturday, too, but Smith has other options.
    "We'll just have to wait and see how the first game goes," Smith said. "We're fortunate. When we lost to Charleston in that first game (of the SoCon semifinals), I knew I was throwing Brooke (Red) in the second game. That was always in my mind that we'd be able to do that. I'm comfortable putting someone else in."
    Florida is the regular-season and tournament champion of the Southeastern Conference, which got an eye-popping 11 teams into the 64-team NCAA tournament.
    The Gators (52-7) are in the top-10 in the nation in ERA (1.78) and scoring (6.7 runs per game) and have hit 79 home runs this season. They're 43-29 all-time in the NCAA tournament.
    Georgia Southern is 1-4 all-time in the NCAA postseason.
    All games in the Gainesville regional will be available for viewing online at GatorZone.com

    Matt Yogus may be reached at (912) 489-9408.