Blaise Bicknell

Blaise is no longer with the Gator men's tennis team. He has entered the portal and will be moving on after two outstanding years at Florida, that included a National Championship.

 

It is always tough to lose a player, for whatever reason, to transfer who would have been an integral piece of this year's team. However, as you say, the depth on this year's roster will adequately replace this loss. As for next year, you will find that the incoming crop of recruits who will sign in November will make everyone who follows men's tennis happy. Life goes on and sometimes fans lose sight of the fact that these kids are living life away from the playing fields and courts, and this is something every coach at Florida has to deal with on a daily basis.

 

Big recruiting weekend for tennis when Alabama came to town last Saturday.

 

The school never goes public with recruiting news as they are prohibited from doing so by the NCAA. Outside news agencies are the ones who make recruiting news public before a letter of intent is signed by the student athlete.

 

The Tennis Recruiting Network does a decent job, but they only have info from patrons of the site and individual families that update their players for them. Many players do not want that type of info out there about where they are leaning etc. Florida is in position to have a very good recruiting class. That does not mean that many of those interested in the Gators are going to sign. Some will decide to turn pro out of the juniors and others will not be able to get the amount of money they feel they deserve. This is due to the ridiculous limit of 4.5 scholarships for division one tennis programs. It becomes one of the most difficult decisions a head coach needs to make. Where should the money go and to who in what amount? Many good players would like to go to Florida or where ever but decide to go eleswhere because university A or B has more money available. I can tell you this, many good junior tennis players are a bit timid of coming to Florida right now because of the high level of competition. I can also tell you the best juniors nation wide are listening to our coaches about the availability of scholarship money next season with the large number of departures at the end of this season. Coach Shelton and his staff are not only looking for "great" tennis players, they want players who fit the culture they have developed at Florida. On the other side of the coin, if a player comes to Florida and can't live up to the positive culture they will be heading elsewhere.

 

There is always a back story and much more than meets the eye. I am not at liberty to talk about situations like this.

 

things happen and in this case Blaise Bicknell was in the middle of "things". Tennessee will have a good team this spring and yes they will have four top forty players. However, we could very easily have four top twently players at the top of our lineup. Riffice, Vale, Shelton, and Andrade. We will be fine.