Hogs Play Host to Two Top 10 Teams This Weekend

Drew Watzke March 24, 2022

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – Arkansas Men’s Tennis (10-8, 1-4) is welcoming two top 10 programs to the Billingsley Tennis Center in Fayetteville this weekend. The No. 2 Florida Gators (14-2, 6-0) visit the Hogs on Friday and the No. 6 South Carolina Gamecocks (15-5, 4-2) come to town Sunday.

Florida is one of the most consistent teams in the nation, perfect in conference play thus far, with the only blemishes on the Gator schedule being 4-3 losses to then-No. 5 (now No. 1) TCU and No. 14 (now No. 10) Texas. Arkansas Head Coach Andy Jackson was the head coach at Florida from 2001-2012 and is looking to beat his former school for the first time since 2014.

South Carolina has one of the biggest wins of the season, taking down then-No. 1 Tennessee on the Volunteers’ home court on March 11. The Gamecocks have totaled four top 25 wins this season but are coming off a 4-1 loss to NC State on Wednesday.

Both teams bring a load of ranked players to Fayetteville.

Florida stuffs the rankings with six singles players, most notably the No. 1 ranked player in the country in Ben Shelton, and three ranked doubles teams.

South Carolina boasts the No. 3 singles player in the country in Daniel Rodrigues, as well as No. 57 Toby Samuel and the No. 13-ranked doubles combo of Rodrigues and Connor Thomson.

Arkansas’ Melvin Manuel will look to build on his 11-1 singles record this season while Adrien Burdet is coming off a win over No. 84 Trent Bryde of Georgia on Friday.

The Gators and Hogs will face off at 4 p.m. Friday and the Gamecocks will take on Arkansas at 1 p.m. Sunday.

Cracked Racquets will offer its whiparound coverage of SEC tennis on Friday. The link to view the broadcast is on the Arkansas website here.

MATCH INFO-

Opponents: No. 2 Florida Gators and No. 6 South Carolina Gamecocks

Dates: March 25, March 27

Times: 4 p.m. (March 25) & 1 p.m. (March 27)

Location: Fayetteville, Ark.

Live Stats: FLA: bit.ly/357vjEE SCAR: bit.ly/3tDHMt2

Live Stream: bit.ly/3AlZqnb

For updates, follow @RazorbackMTEN on Twitter.