Florida men’s tennis heads to Columbia, South Carolina, this weekend for the Gamecock Fall SEC Shootout, which will take place Oct. 23-25. The team will play against hosts South Carolina along with Georgia and Texas A&M.
The competition will be a round robin format, with each day featuring a new matchup of eight singles matches and four doubles, just as the Gators’ season opener at Auburn.
The Gators last match against Auburn was March 1, in which they defeated the Tigers 7-0 at the Alfred A. Ring Tennis Complex in Gainesville. Florida’s matches against Georgia and South Carolina last year were both canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but the Gators defeated both teams during the 2018-19 season, 5-2 and 6-1, respectively.
The men’s tennis team is coming off a strong performance in their 2020-21 season debut, winning 30 matches against the host Auburn, Ole Miss, Alabama, and Vanderbilt. The team went 24-3 in singles and 6-6 in doubles for the week. Captains Sam Riffice and Duarte Vale won eleven of their twelve total matches, while freshman Ben Shelton started his Gator career off with a perfect 3-0 start in singles and won one of three doubles matches.
“We are really looking forward to the challenges that we will face this weekend,” coach Bryan Shelton said in a release.
“We have the opportunity to make significant gains over the next three days.”
The Gators are scheduled to play the Gamecocks at 9:30 a.m. Friday, the Georgia Bulldogs 1:30 p.m. Saturday and end the weekend with a match against the Aggies 9:30 a.m. Sunday.
Contact Ryan Haley at rhaley@alligator.org and follow him on Twitter @ryan_dhaley.
Senior captains Duarte Vale (pictured) and Sam Riffice won eleven of their twelve total matches in their Fall 2020 debut. They look to ride that momentum into South Carolina this weekend.
Ryan Haley, a UF journalism senior with a sports & media specialization from Jacksonville, Florida, is Summer 2022's Engagement Managing Editor. He grew up playing a bunch of different sports before settling on golf, following Rory McIlroy and all Philadelphia sports teams. He also loves all things fiction, reading, watching shows and movies and talking about whatever current story or character is in his head.
