A few thoughts to jump start your Wednesday morning: MULLEN GETS $1.5 MILLION SALARY BUMP, THREE MORE YEARS So maybe Dan Mullen isn’t in a sink or swim year after all. That’s been the speculation by any number of so-called pundits ever since Florida lost to Oklahoma in the Cotton Bowl followed by a couple of weeks of Mullen to the NFL rumors that never panned out. Obviously, Florida athletic director Scott Stricklin must be convinced that Mullen (a) has the Florida program on the rise and (b) plans to remain a college football coach rather than give the No Fun League a shot. Why else would he give Mullen a three-year contract extension and bump his pay to $7.6 million per year? That, by the way, is more than the Aggies pay Jimbo ($7.5 million) and more than the Poodles pay Kirby ($6.8 million). Only Nick Saban ($9.1 million) and Coach O ($8.68 million) make more among SEC coaches. Nationally, the $1.5 million raise ranks Mullen fifth (Dabo is third and Harbaugh fourth) nationally. Mullen is 29-9 in three seasons at UF, the second best mark in school history for a coach in his first three seasons on the job (Urban Meyer was 31-8 from 2005-07). He’s taken the Gators to three straight New Year’s Eve bowl games and won the SEC East championship last year. That is the best three-year stretch of any UF coach since Meyer departed after the 2010 season. Comment: The timing of the announcement couldn’t have been more strategic. Tuesday was the first day of on-campus recruiting in 444 days. What better way to show the numerous recruits who made their way to Gainesville that UF is 100 percent behind its head football coach than a significant raise and a contract extension? What better way to stick a sock in the negative recruiters than a powerful financial commitment to go with the ongoing construction of an $85 million palace of a stand-alone football facility? MORE UF CONTRACT NEWS Basketball coach Mike White was given a two-year extension that will keep him at Florida through 2027. There was no raise included in the contract which pays $3.083 million next year and $3.208 million afterward. White is 123-73 in six seasons at UF. Comment: Considering he had four years remaining on his contract, the two-year extension is surprising. White is viewed nationally as a bright young coach, but since a second place SEC finish in 2017 the Gators haven’t finished higher than fourth. Even with a roster improved by the additions of four quality transfers, finishing higher than fourth in the SEC might be difficult since the league should be better from top to bottom. Womens basketball coach Cam Newbauer, 46-71 in four seasons, has been given a three-year contract extension designed to keep him at Florida through 2024-25. Newbauer makes $500,000 per year. Comment: LSU just gave Kim Mulkey a 7-year deal worth $22.5 million to deliver NCAA championships. Her record at Baylor speaks for itself. If you want championship-level results, then you need to write championship-level checks. You don’t win championships by going cheap and then giving three-year contract extensions after a fourth straight losing record. Linebackers coach Christian Robinson was given a $100,000 raise (to $400,000). New safeties coach Wesley McGriff will make $460,000 while quarterbacks coach Garrick McGee will be paid $400,000 and corners coach Jules Montinar will be making $260,000. Comment: Football is the engine that drives everything in the UF athletic department. The Gators aren’t going to get back to a championship level by paying assistants low-level salaries. LOOKING AHEAD: LINDY’S RANKS GATORS NO. 12 NATIONALLY Lindy’s preseason college football magazine hit the newsstands Tuesday without anything monumentally different than the one Athlon unveiled last week. Alabama is No. 1 once again with Clemson No. 2 and Oklahoma No. 3. Both magazines are gushing over Georgia (No. 4 Lindy’s, No. 5 Athlon) and both have Florida ranked just outside the top 10. Athlon projects the Gators 11th nationally while Lindy’s ranks Florida 12th. The Lindy’s publication once again rates individual players at each position as well as entire position units. Florida doesn’t exactly fare well in either of those categories with only three players rated among the best at their positions nationally and no unit ranked among the top ten. The Gators have only one first team All-SEC preseason pick and four total on the three teams. Alabama has 12 on the three preseason All-SEC teams while LSU has 10, Georgia nine Texas A&M seven, Ole Miss six and Arkansas and South Carolina five each. Obviously, Lindy’s isn’t all that impressed with Florida’s talent, yet they have the Gators ranked 12th which means they are very capable of supplanting Georgia at the top of the SEC East once again. Go figure. Preseason All-America: Kaiir Elam, CB (second team). Preseason All-SEC: Kaiir Elam, CB (first team); Ventrell Miller, LB, and Brenton Cox Jr., LB (second team); Stewart Reese, C (third team). Lindy’s position ratings: Ventrell Miller, No. 7 ILB; Brenton Cox Jr., No. 4 OLB; Kaiir Elam, No. 3 CB. Lindy’s preseason SEC East: 1. Georgia; 2. Florida; 3. Missouri; 4. Kentucky; 5. Tennessee; 6. South Carolina; 7. Vanderbilt. Lindy’s preseason SEC West: 1. Alabama; 2. Texas A&M; 3. LSU; 4. Auburn; 5. Ole Miss; 6. Mississippi State; 7. Arkansas. Lindy’s preseason top 25: 1. Alabama; 2. Clemson; 3. Oklahoma; 4. Georgia; 5. Ohio State; 6. Texas A&M; 7. Iowa State; 8. Cincinnati; 9. North Carolina; 10. Oregon; 11. Notre Dame; 12. FLORIDA; 13. Wisconsin; 14. Miami; 15. Oklahoma State; 16. LSU; 17. Washington; 18. Iowa; 19. Arizona State; 20. Indiana; 21. Penn State; 22. Southern Cal; 23. Coastal Carolina; 24. Texas; 25. Auburn. WHY TRASK WILL BE ONE OF THE STEALS OF THE 2021 NFL DRAFT The dog days of summer have yet to arrive and preseason training camp hasn’t opened for the Tampa Bay Bucs, but if the early reviews of the offseason workouts are any indication of things to come, then Kyle Trask may prove to be one of the steals of the 2021 NFL Draft. Trask isn’t going to take Tom Brady’s job, but he is already showing why HBC Bruce Arians seriously using his first round pick to select the former Florida QB. When Arians selected Trask in the second round, much to the displeasure of draft gurus like Mel Kiper and Todd McShay, he already knew he wasn’t bringing in a guy with a bazooka-like arm. In the Arians offense, timing and accuracy are far more important than being able to throw a football through a brick wall. It was the gray matter between Trask’s ears that sold Arians then and continues to sell him now. At Tuesday’s workout, Trask showed off the accuracy by completing 15-18 passes in the 7-on-7 and 11-on-11 drills, but what caught Arians’ attention was how easily his rookie QB processes info and then puts it into action on the field. It reminded Arians of 2012 when Andrew Luck was wowing everyone at the Indianapolis Colts’ camp. “Mentally-wise, he’s not far behind what Andrew did in the same offense and what Andrew did that [rookie] year is unbelievable,” Arians told the Tampa Bay Times. “I’m not saying he’s Andrew Luck, but mentally he’s still really sharp.” Quarterbacks who can throw rockets come and go in the NFL. The guys who stick around the longest may not necessarily have the big arm, but they know how to make all the right reads, know where everyone is on the field and get the ball in the right hands at the right time. Trask’s ability to grasp all the mental aspects of the game might make him the perfect successor to Brady, another guy who gets it done as much with his brain as he does with his arm. OVER, UNDER, AROUND AND THROUGH THE SEC Alabama: Alabama is the No. 1 team in the nation in both the Athlon and Lindy’s preseason rankings … Running back Keilan Robinson, who ran for 254 yards and two touchdowns as a true freshman in 2020, has entered the NCAA transfer portal … Junior linebacker Jarez Parks is not listed on the Alabama roster but he has yet to place his name in the transfer portal. Arkansas: In the Athlon preseason rankings the Razorbacks are No. 44 but at Lindy’s they are No. 59. Auburn: Auburn is preseason ranked No. 25 by Lindy’s; No. 29 by Athlon … O-lineman Prince Micheal Sammons, who played in three games in five years, is transferring out. Georgia: Former LSU TE Arik Gilbert and former Clemson CB Derion Kendrick are transferring to Georgia … Georgia has a preseason rank of No. 4 with Lindy’s, No. 5 with Athlon. Kentucky: The Wildcats are projected No. 33 in Athlon’s preseason rankings, No. 47 by Lindy’s. LSU: The Tigers have a preseason rank of No. 16 with Lindy’s, No. 17 with Athlon. Mississippi State: Lindy’s gives the Bulldogs a No. 46 preseason ranking while Athlon ranks them No. 49. Missouri: The Tigers are projected No. 34 in the Athlon preseason rankings, No. 39 by Lindy’s. Ole Miss: Linebacker Jacquez Jones, who led the Rebels with 75 tackles last season, is transferring out … Lindy’s gives Ole Miss a No. 26 preseason ranking while Athlon projects the Rebels No. 27. South Carolina: South Carolina is No. 74 in the Athlon preseason rankings; No. 75 in Lindy’s ... Shooting guard Seventh Woods, who started 13 games in 2020-21 after transferring in from North Carolina, has entered the transfer portal. Tennessee: The Vols are projected No. 56 in the Athlon preseason rankings, No. 58 by Lindy’s … Quarterback Kaidon Salter and linebacker Aaron Willis, who were suspended for the spring, are now back on the UT roster. Texas A&M: The Aggies are preseason ranked No. 6 by both Lindy’s and Athlon ... Defensive back Derrick Tucker, who opted out in 2020, is transferring to Tennessee State. Vanderbilt: First year coach Clark Lea has Vanderbilt cracking the top 100 in both the Athlon and Lindy’s preseason rankings. Athlon ranks the Commodores No. 90 while Lindy’s ranks them No. 96. ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: I can always count on the preseason football magazines for a couple of giggles. I don’t buy them for their predictions necessarily, but they do offer plenty of information about personnel and top 44 depth charts following spring practice, plus it is a chance to see where recruits figure to plug holes in the lineup. My big giggle from Lindy’s was its “Honor Roll” in which Georgia quarterback JT Daniels was deemed coolest in the clutch. Really? He played all of FOUR games last year at Georgia – Mississippi State, South Carolina, Missouri and Cincinnati from the Group of Five … not exactly murderer’s row. In 2018 at Southern Cal, he LOST six of 11 games including four of the last five. Not exactly Mr. Come from Behind. Lindy’s also rates Daniels the No. 3 quarterback in the country, seven spots ahead of Southern Cal’s Kedon Slovis, who is the reason Daniels is at Georgia in the first place. Daniels might prove to be the greatest thing since the ice machine was introduced at stadiums in the south but I haven’t seen enough to merit him being rated one of the ten best quarterbacks in the country, much less ranked third. Lest we forget, Lindy’s had Jamie Newman ranked as its No. 8 QB last year. Just saying.

A few thoughts to jump start your Tuesday morning: GATORS FACE SOUTH FLORIDA FRIDAY AT NOON Florida wasn’t going to be a top eight national seed, but the Gators (38-20) should not be thrilled with a No. 15 seeding handed to them by the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee. The Gators will host a regional beginning Friday that includes No. 2 seed Miami (32-19), No. 3 South Alabama (33-20) and No. 4 South Florida (28-27). The Gators will open tournament play Friday at noon against South Florida with the Miami-South Alabama contest following at 5 p.m. Other than getting swept by No. 1 Arkansas in the final weekend of the regular season, the Gators played well down the stretch. They won five consecutive weekend SEC series prior to meeting up with the Arkansas buzzsaw and that including taking two of three from Vanderbilt when the Commodores were ranked No. 2 nationally. Vandy is still No. 2 in two of the three polls that were released Monday and the Commodores received a No. 4 national seed. It was thought that Florida’s strong showing (3-1 including a 14-1 blasting of No. 7 national seed Mississippi State) at the SEC Tournament in Hoover would move them up in the 10-12 range of national seeds, but No. 15? The committed ranked Old Dominion of Conference USA (11 seed) and East Carolina of the American Athletic (13 seed) higher. ODU played four games against teams ranked in the top 25 RPI and East Carolina played three. Florida played 17. Because of the 15 national seed, the Gators are paired with the Austin regional and No. 2 national seed Texas (42-15). Perhaps the committee thought this would be a better pairing since a No. 14 would send the Gators to Knoxville and a No. 13 would send them to Nashville, but whatever the motivation, the Gators should have been seeded higher than 15. Going 20-14 (counting the SEC Tournament) against Southeastern Conference opponents deserves better than the No. 15 seeding. Baseball America top 25 poll: 1. Arkansas 46-10; 2. Vanderbilt 40-15; 3. Tennessee 45-16; 4. Notre Dame 30-11; 5. Texas 42-15; 6. Arizona 40-15; 7. Stanford 33-14; 8. Mississippi State 40-15; 9. Texas Tech 36-15; 10. Ole Miss 41-19; 11. TCU 40-17; 12. FLORIDA 38-20; 13. Oregon 37-14; 14. Old Dominion 42-14; 15. UC-Irvine 40-16; 16. North Carolina State 30-17; 18. East Carolina 41-15; 18. Florida State 30-22; 19. Nebraska31-12; 20. Louisiana Tech 40-18; 21. UCLA 35-18; 22. Oklahoma State 25-17-1; 23. Southern Miss 37-19; 24. Duke 32-20; 25. Charlotte 39-19. Collegiate Baseball poll: 1. Arkansas 46-10; 2. Vanderbilt 40-15; 3. Mississippi State 40-15; 4. Texas 42-15; 5. Tennessee 45-16; 6. Arizona 40-15; 8. Notre Dame 30-11; 8. TCU 40-17; 9. Stanford 33-14; 10. Oregon 37-14; 11. Texas Tech 36-15; 12. FLORIDA 38-20; 13. East Carolina 41-15; 14. Ole Miss 41-19; 15. UC-Irvine 40-16; 16. South Carolina 33-21; 17. UCLA 35-18; 18. Nebraska 31-12; 19. Duke 32-20; 20. Oklahoma State 35-17-1; 21. Georgia Tech 29-23; 22. North Carolina State 30-17; 23. Arizona State 32-20; 24. Old Dominion 42-14; 25. Louisiana Tech 40-18; 26. Central Michigan 40-16; 27. Virginia Commonwealth 37-14; 28. Miami 32-19; 29. Charlotte 39-19; 30. UConn 33-17. USA Today Coaches Poll: 1. Arkansas 46-10; 2. Tennessee 45-16; 3. Vanderbilt; 4. Texas 42-15; 5. Arizona 40-15; 6. Notre Dame 30-11; 7. Texas Tech 36-15; 8. Mississippi State 40-15; 9. Stanford 33-14; 10. TCU 40-17; 11. Ole Miss 41-19; 12. Oregon 37-14; 13. FLORIDA 38-20; 14. East Carolina 41-15; 15. Old Dominion 42-14; 16. UC-Irvine 40-16; 17. North Carolina State 30-17; 18. Louisiana Tech 40-18; 19. Nebraska 31-12; 20. Southern Miss 37-19; 21. UCLA 35-18; 22. Gonzaga 33-17; 23. Oklahoma State 35-17-1; 24. Florida State 30-22; 25. Charlotte 39-19. LOOKING AHEAD: ATHLON HAS GATORS NO. 11 PRESEASON FOOTBALL Obviously, the people at Athlon Sports aren’t expecting Florida football to fall off the face of the earth just because Kyle Pitts, Kyle Trask and Kadarius Toney have all gone on to the NFL. Athlon projects the Gators as the No. 11 team nationally in its preseason magazine which hit the stands last week, finishing 9-3 in the regular season, second in the SEC East behind Georgia. This is actually a bit better than expected for UF largely based on last year’s defense. Everybody knows Dan Mullen is going to have a productive offense than can score points no matter who is at quarterback, but the defense is a serious question mark after giving up record yards and points last season. For the Gators to make a serious run at winning the SEC East for a second straight year, the defense will have to come through. Athlon probably took that into consideration when it gave UF a No. 11 ranking. That’s not a bad place to be. Not only does it take some of the pressure off the Gators but it gives them a reason to have a giant chip on their shoulders in September. Opposing coaches’ comment about the Gators: “Dan Mullen continues to excel at understanding his personnel on offense and building great plays around them. They got away from the run a little bit, which we assume was a move tailored to their confidence in their quarterback and guys like [Kyle] Pitts. They could just as easily switch back this season based on what they have in Emory Jones and what they lost at tight end and receiver. The speed is insane. You fear it. The receiver speed is unbelievable; it changes how you scheme their entire offense … Where they lacked was the front; it seemed like they didn’t like to get nasty against the run. You could run at their inside guys and have some success. You should not be able to run against a Florida defense that easily … This is a consistent, talented offense that’s transitioning and needs a more effective scoring defense. If they can’t improve on run defense and points allowed, you’ll see a noticeable regression.” Preseason All-America: Kaiir Elam, CB, second team. Preseason All-SEC: Zachary Carter, DE, and Kaiir Elam, CB, first team; Ventrell Miller, LB, second team; Brenton Cox Jr., LB, third team; Emory Jones, QB, and Jacob Copeland, WR, fourth team. Athlon ranks the SEC coaches: 1. Nick Saban, Alabama; 2. Jimbo Fisher, Texas A&M; 3. DAN MULLEN, FLORIDA; 4. Kirby Smart, Georgia; 5. Ed Orgeron, LSU; 6. Mark Stoops, Kentucky; 7. Lane Kiffin, Ole Miss; 8. Mike Leach, Mississippi State; 9. Bryan Harsin, Auburn; 10. Eli Drinkwitz, Missouri; 11. Sam Pittman, Arkansas; 12. Josh Heupel, Tennessee; 13. Clark Lea, Vanderbilt; 14. Shane Beamer, South Carolina. Athlon preseason SEC East: 1. Georgia; 2. FLORIDA; 3. Missouri; 4. Kentucky; 5. Tennessee; 6. South Carolina; 7. Vanderbilt. Athlon preseason SEC West: 1. Alabama; 2. Texas A&M; 3. LSU; 4. Ole Miss; 5. Auburn; 6. Arkansas; 7. Mississippi State Athlon preseason top 25: 1. Alabama; 2. Clemson; 3. Oklahoma; 4. Ohio State; 5. Georgia; 6. Texas A&M; 7. Iowa State; 8. Cincinnati; 9. Oregon; 10. North Carolina; 11. FLORIDA; 12. Notre Dame; 13. Wisconsin; 14. Miami; 15. Arizona State; 16. Iowa; 17. LSU; 18. Southern Cal; 19. Penn State; 20. Texas; 21. Indiana; 22. Washington; 23. Louisiana; 24. Coastal Carolina; 25. TCU. OVER, UNDER, AROUND AND THROUGH THE SEC Alabama: Alabama (31-23) obviously helped itself by winning its first two games in the SEC Tournament. Although most experts had the Tide sitting out the NCAA Tournament, the committee was impressed enough to make them the No. 3 seed in the Ruston regional where they will play No. 2 seed North Carolina State (30-17) in the first round … No. 3 national seed Alabama opens play in the Women’s College World Series with 11th-seeded Arizona at 7 p.m. Thursday … Arkansas: As expected the Hogs (46-11) are the top seed for the NCAA Tournament. The rest of their regional is No. 2 Nebraska (31-12), No. 3 Northeastern (36-10) and No. 4 New Jersey Tech (26-22). Georgia: Georgia will open play in the Women’s College World Series with 5th-seeded Oklahoma State at 2:30 Thursday. Kentucky: Isaiah Jackson (6-9, 210, FR) will forego his college eligibility and remain in the NBA Draft. LSU: Paul Manieri goes out with his boots on. LSU (34-22) is the No. 3 seed in the Eugene regional where the Tigers will face No. 2 Gonzaga (33-17) in the opening round. Mississippi State: The Bulldogs (40-15) are the No. 7 seed, hosting No. 2 VCU (37-14), No. 3 Campbell (35-16) and No. 4 Samford (35-22) in Starkville. Ole Miss: The Rebels (41-19) got the No. 12 seed and one of the tougher regional draws. Joining them in Oxford will be No. 2 Southern Miss (37-18), No. 3 Florida State (33-20) and No. 4 Southeast Missouri State (30-20). Southern Miss has great pitching, Florida State hits plenty of home runs and SEMO State South Carolina: The Gamecocks are hosting a regional, but the top seeded team is Conference USA champ Old Dominion (42-14). South Carolina (33-21) is the second seed and will open play in the Columbia regional with No. 3 Virginia (29-23). The other team is Jacksonville (16-32) which has the worst record of any team in the tournament but somehow won the A-Sun ... Brandon Martin (6-5, 220, RJR), son of South Carolina basketball coach Frank Martin, is transferring in from USC-Upstate to play for dad. Tennessee: The Vols are the No. 3 seed nationally. In the Knoxville regional, they’ll open up with Wright State (35-11). The No. 2 seed in the region is Duke (32-20) and the No. 3 is Liberty (39-14). Vanderbilt: The Commodores (40-15) are the No. 4 national seed, hosting No. 2 Georgia Tech (29-23), No. 3 Indiana State (30-19) and No. 4 Presbyterian (22-21). ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: All hell is breaking loose on college campuses nationwide today as the NCAA moratorium on official visits officially lifts. For the first time in 444 days, recruits will have a chance to meet coaches face-to-face, tour facilities and get a feel for a place they might be calling home for the next three or four years. Just as important, coaches will have a chance to make in-person evaluations, something they weren’t able to do last year. The lack of personal contact makes the football recruiting class of 2021 probably the biggest crapshoot in decades for every single college coach. Unless there was a relationship with recruits prior to the shutdown, coaches were signing kids without having been in their homes or having them in for campus visits. As a result, the choice by the NCAA to forbid official visits as well as in-home visits may go down as one of the more disastrous decisions in decades because barring a miracle of manna from heaven proportions, in the months of September, October and November we’re going to see record numbers of football players asking themselves what the hell was I thinking when I signed with these guys? If you think the NCAA transfer portal is filled to the brim right now, imagine what it’s going to be in January of 2022. Freshmen who never got the chance to spend any time with their new coaches prior to signing their LOI are going to be hitting the portal as they seek a school where they feel it’s a better fit athletically, academically and socially. Now that the NCAA allows a one-time transfer without penalty, a 2021 freshman class that, for the most part, signed LOI’s without ever taking an official visit is going to see a plague of exits.

A few thoughts to jump start your Monday morning: GATORS WILL HOST A REGIONAL Florida was already a lock to host an NCAA regional prior to the SEC Tournament, but the Gators’ (38-20) strong showing in Hoover raised a few eyebrows. Prior to the tournament, the Gators were projected a 13 or 14 national seed. Did Florida’s 3-1 record in Hoover impress the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee enough for a seeding in the 10-12 range? We find out at noon today when the committee announces the seedings and assigns teams to the 16 regionals. D1baseball.com projects the Gators as a No. 14 seed, hosting Miami (32-19) as the No. 2 seed in the region with Fairfield (37-3) as the No. 3 and Jacksonville (16-32) as the No. 4. Florida would face JU in the first round with Fairfield playing Miami. The Gators went 1-2 against Miami in the first series of the season back in February. They were 3-1 against Jacksonville. D1baseball has Texas as the No. 3 seed so that’s where the Gators would head if they win the regional. Baseball America also has the Gators as a No. 14, but projects Miami, Arizona State (32-20) and UCF (31-30) as the other three teams. Florida would face UCF in the first round. Baseball America has Tennessee as the No. 3 seed so the Gators would go to Knoxville if they won the regional. The four-team regional setup should bode well for Florida, which got three consecutive quality starts in Hoover from Tommy Mace, Hunter Barco and Franco Aleman. A team that goes 3-0 at the regional advances so you have to like the Gators’ chances to advance if Mace, Barco and Aleman pitch as well as they did in Hoover. If the Gators have to go to a fourth starter, it appears Brandon Sproat has nailed down that job. At the completion of the regionals the NCAA will announce eight super regional sites from the 16 regional host sites. WALTON GOT THE MOST OUT OF A FLAWED ROSTER Anyone who knows Tim Walton will attest the work began to fix what went wrong in 2021 the moment the locker room emptied at Katie Seashole Pressly Stadium following Florida’s 6-0 loss to Georgia in the NCAA super regional. It’s not that the Gators under-achieved. How can you under-achieve when you win the SEC regular season championship, an NCAA regional and host a super regional? But, this was a flawed team and Walton would be the first to admit it. This wasn’t smoke and mirrors, but for UF to go 45-11 required Walton pushing the right buttons all season long. The Gators had three good pitchers but lacked a Stacey Nelson or Hannah Rogers or Lauren Haeger that could take the ball and blow three strikes by a hitter in a critical situation. Eliazbeth Hightower, Natalie Lugo and Katie Chronister are very good pitchers but they don’t dominate when they’re facing SEC teams. Offensively, there were only three hitters with serious home run power, not enough consistent singles hitters and there was very little speed. Walton had to rely on outstanding defense that rarely made errors and instinctively knew what to do in every situation, pitchers who compensated for a lack of velocity by keeping the ball low to induce ground balls and hitters like Hannah Adams and Charla Echols who were at their best late game when the Gators desperately needed a big hit. It was good enough to get the Gators to the super regional but there was always that concern what would happen if two of the three factors that got UF there didn’t come through. And, that’s what happened against Georgia. Georgia hitters feasted on low velocity pitches that were too high in the strike zone and other than Kendyl Lindaman, no one else in the lineup was able to hit the ball. So where does Walton go from here? Hightower and Lugo will be returning as will lefties Rylee Trlicek and Haley Pittman. Hightower and Lugo aren’t going to overpower anyone. Trlicek pitched very little this year and Walton shut down Pittman, who was overused in high school and in travel ball. Walton signed Lexi Delbrey of Bainbridge, Georgia, the No. 7 rated recruit in the country and considered one of the two or three best pitchers. She regularly throws high 60s, lows 70s and knows how to bear down and get a strikeout when necessary. She figures to be the ace of the staff from day one. Offensively, the Gators should improve with the added offensive punch of Reagan Walsh, one of the nation’s top power hitters from Torrance, California, outfielder Kendra Falby, a leadoff hitter with serious speed who plays for the Canadian (she has dual citizenship) national team, and Skylar Wallace, an Alabama transfer who couldn’t play in 2021 because of SEC rules that prevent intra-conference transfers. Wallace was a member of the US national under-19 team. She is a slick fielding shortstop with gap power who hit .448 for the US team that won the under-19 Women’s World Cup. Walsh probably plays third with Wallace at shortstop, Hannah Adams remaining at second and Charla Echols moving over to first base. That will be a very solid infield with plenty of punch. An outfield of Falby, Cheyenne Lindsey and Avery Goelz should be outstanding defensively and very good offensively. Julia Cottrill is probably the best defensive catcher in college softball right now. Walton thinks she is on the verge of putting up huge power numbers at the plate. Walton’s 2022 recruiting haul includes catcher Sam Roe (Niceville) and outfielder Kaila Pollard (Riverside, CA), two of the top four prospects in the country. GATORS AND THE MLB DRAFT The once 40-round Major League Baseball Draft has been shortened to 20 rounds and with the cutbacks in the number of minor league teams, it is expected that once past the first couple of rounds, more emphasis will be given to college players than ever before. There will also be less bonus money paid out so players who aren’t taken early will have less incentive to sign, another reason why college players will be taken more readily since 21-year-olds will have fewer options and be more likely to take whatever money is offered. Kevin O’Sullivan has signed the No. 1 recruiting class in the country and the shortened draft could help immensely. Perfect Game, which has a rather good track record pinpointing which rounds players will be selected, sees current Gators Jud Fabian going No. 26 in the first round to Minnesota, Tommy Mace going No. 41 to Baltimore and Nathan Hickey going No. 51 to Milwaukee. Of Florida’s high school signees, PG has RHP Chase Petty (6-1, 190, Somers Point, NJ, Mainland HS) going No. 14 to San Francisco, Andrew Painter (RHP, 6-7, 225, Pompano Beach, FL Calvary Christian) going No. 16 to Miami, CF Jay Allen (6-3, 190, Fort Pierce, FL John Carroll) going No. 31 to Miami. ESPN sees Painter going No. 17 to Cincinnati and Fabian No. 21 to the Chicago Cubs. ESPN’s top 100 prospects rate the following Gators or signees: 15. Painter, 25. Mace, 32. Petty, 34. Fabian, 49. Allen, 59. Jac Caglianone, LHP (6-5, 210, Tampa, FL Plant), 72. Phil Abner, LHP (6-1, 220, Charlotte, NC Charlotte Christian) and 94. Hickey. MLB.com’s mock draft sees Fabian going No. 15 to Milwaukee, Painter No. 16 to Miami, Petty No. 18 to St. Louis and Mace No. 28 to Tampa Bay. MLB.com’s top 100 draft prospects rate the following Gators or signees: 17. Fabian, 18. Painter, 25. Petty, 34. Mace, 37. Allen, 61. Caglianone, 98. Michael Robertson, CF (6-1, 175, Venice, FL), 107. Abner, 135. Hickey and 145. Jack Leftwich. Prospectslive.com has a list of the top 450 draft prospects that it updates regularly. Here are where the current Gators and signees rank: 14. Petty, 22. Painter, 41. Fabian, 43. Mace, 50. Allen, 56. Hickey, 59. Caglianone, 109. Ty Evans, OF (6-2, 205, Lakeland, FL Lakeland Christian), 135. Abner, 144. Corey Robinson, OF (5-11, 170, Port Orange, FL Spruce Creek), 157. Robertson, 159. Leftwich, 169. Rene Lastres, C (6-3, 205, Hialeah Gardens, FL Calvary Christian), 177. Brandon Neely, RHP (6-2, 205, Port Orange, FL Spruce Creek), 196. Pierce Coppola (6-8, 215, Verona, NJ), 199. Jacob Young, 259. Jake Fox, 2B/SS (6-1, 180, Lakeland, FL Lakeland Christian), 270. Kris Armstrong, 285. Christian Scott, 298. Franco Aleman, 345. Ben Specht, 397. Deric Fabian (6-3, 180, Ocala, FL North Marion), 413. Jorge de Gotti, SS (6-1, 180, Miami, FL Belen Jesuit Prep). OVER, UNDER, AROUND AND THROUGH THE SEC Alabama: Alabama (50-7) advanced to the Women’s College World Series by taking out Kentucky twice. The Crimson Tide is the No. 3 seed and will face Arizona in the first round. Arkansas: Arkansas (46-10) is all but guaranteed to be the No. 1 national seed after a week in which they knocked off Vanderbilt, Ole Miss and Tennessee on their way to the SEC Tournament championship. Baseball America projects Oklahoma State, UNC-Wilmington and Jacksonville in the Fayetteville regional. D1baseball.com projects the Razorbacks will be joined by Arizona State, Pittsburgh and Norfolk State … The Razorbacks were eliminated in their softball super regional by Arizona. Georgia: Georgia will face Oklahoma State in the first round of the Women’s College World Series … D1Baseball.com projects the Bulldogs among the first five teams out in the NCAA Tournament. LSU: D1Baseball.com has the Tigers in their last five in for the NCAA Tournament, the No. 3 seed in the Ruston regional. LSU is not in the 64-team field for Baseball America … The Tigers lost both games of their softball super regional to Florida State. Mississippi State: Despite going 0-2 in Hoover, Both D1Baseball and Baseball America project the Bulldogs as the No. 8 national seed. D1baseball.com has the Bulldogs hosting Florida State, South Alabama and Southern University in the Starkville regional. In the Baseball America bracket, MSU hosts Georgia Tech, Oregon State and Southern U. Missouri: The Tigers lost two out of three in their softball super regional to James Madison of the Colonial Athletic Association. Ole Miss: D1Baseball.com projects the Rebels as the No. 10 national seed, hosting Southern Miss, Presbyterian and North Carolina. Baseball American projects Ole Miss as the No. 11 seed, hosting Southern Miss, North Carolina and Bryant. South Carolina: South Carolina (33-21) will be a regional host. Will the Gamecocks be the top seed in their region? Baseball America projects South Carolina as a regional host with Old Dominion the top seed joined by the Gamecocks, Virginia and Samford. Tennessee: The Vols are projected as the No. 3 seed nationally by Baseball America and the No. 4 seed by D1baseball.com. Baseball America projects the Vols will be joined by Charlotte, Campbell and Southeast Missouri State in the Knoxville Regional … Defensive back/wide receiver Kenney Solomon has entered the NCAA transfer portal. He is the 35th UT player to transfer out. Texas A&M: Three hot names for the vacant baseball HBC job: Tony Vitello (Tennessee), Jim Schlossnagle (TCU) and Cliff Godwin (East Carolina). Vanderbilt: The Commodores are projected as the No. 2 national seed by Baseball America, joined in Nashville by Maryland, Wright State and Presbyterian. Vandy is the No. 4 national seed by D1Baseball.com, hosting Georgia Tech, Campbell and Southeast Missouri State. ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: The hottest rumor going Memorial Day weekend is that LSU will try to make Florida baseball coach Kevin O’Sullivan an offer he can’t refuse to replace the retiring Paul Manieri. Scott Woodward, the LSU athletic director, once lured Chris Peterson to leave the safety of Boise State for Washington. As the AD at Texas A&M he hired Jimbo Fisher with a 10-year, $75 million contract. He just hired Kim Mulkey as the new LSU women’s basketball coach for seven years at $22.5 million. She was making more than $2 million at Baylor. O’Sullivan is four years into a 10-year, $1.25 million per year deal. Woodward has shown a willingness to write big checks. If he offers O’Sullivan double what he’s making now, will Scott Stricklin be willing to match the offer?

Is Florida a football or basketball school? How about baseball? The Gators have as good a baseball coach as there is in the gamely, Kevin O’Sullivan, and UF has as fine a new ballpark as there is on the planet. And now they’re winning again in Hoover, never having trailed in the first three games as they whacked their way to the semifinals. O’Sullivan shuffled his lineup, the Gator bats exploded and now his team is right in the mix for an SEC championship. Come out, come out! It’s cool to love baseball again! *** I remember the day I got my first real baseball uniform for Little League. They told us not to wear them except for baseball. I was 11. I slept in it. They told us not to wear them on the street, but that night I proudly put on my Exchange Club Giants jersey, pants and green hat with the white “O” on it and paraded outside at dusk. When a car with its lights on turned the corner, I ran into the bushes and hid from the “uniform police,” even though feeling that if I was caught, it would be worth it just to feel like Stan Musial for five minutes. That was my first date of a 10-year romance with America’s Pastime, back when they called it that. Ninety percent of today’s youth will never know that feeling. In fact, 99 percent don’t even care to experience it. They’d rather play a video game. To say baseball was better back in the day, which is what it felt like, would be irresponsibly invoking the cliche that the good old days of less-is-more were better — three TV channels, 25-cent burgers, etc. Not necessarily. Though it may have seemed so to some, there just wasn’t as much else to do in the Andy Griffith-like era when baseball was king. But oh how I loved it. This past two weeks I gorged myself on watching baseball, including the Rays winning 11 straight. I saw almost every game of the SEC tournament and I feasted on Florida’s latest three-game winning streak by O’Sullivan’s team in Hoover. And I tried to remember why I once loved the game so much. Especially playing it. And dreaming of pitching in the big leagues one day. As a youngster I played it, BTW, well enough to be a starting pitcher in Little League, Babe Ruth, American Legion and make their all-star teams. We won a state Babe Ruth tournament. I was captain of my Ocala High School team. And I begged the universe to help me land a baseball scholarship, which was about as likely as me hitting the lottery. I just wasn’t good enough. And baseball scholarships were about as rare as honest politicians. So I gave up my dream, paid my own admission to the University of Florida and walked on to play baseball for the Gator freshman team. I made the cut and pitched one complete game, which we won. Coach Earl Scarborough put me in the outfield on defense late in a couple of meaningless games, like vs. Brewton Parker. It was enough to earn me a freshman letter. And the next year I was on Dave Fuller’s varsity roster for half a season. There were 15 pitchers. I was the 15th best and it was pretty clear I wasn’t and going to get the ball that much, if ever, so I decided it might be important to work on my grades and quit the team before I flunked out. A semester later, I dropped out of UF and came home to Ocala where I applied to the Star-Banner and worked as a journalist. If I couldn’t be a player, at least I could get paid to write about it. Thus ended my less-than-illustrious baseball career, except for a couple games I pitched for the local semi-pro team. A few years later, I made a comeback as I donned a dress and pitched for the Junior Women’s League in a charity game to Ted Williams. (Yes THAT Ted Williams!) The script called for Ted to hit a home for the former Red Sox stars – all in their 60s or older – and win over the ladies. I cannot tell you how frightening it was to be on the mound staring down at The Splendid Splinter in the batter’s box. I was so nervous I almost hit him with the pitch, but finally he tapped a soft liner to right and lightly jogged around the bases. That ended my baseball career. Proud to say No. 9 was my last batter I faced. *** Over the years I’ve covered about eight World Series, followed Hank Aaron’s quest to break Babe Ruth’s home run record, personally met quite a few of the game’s most iconic figures, seen and written about hundreds of baseball games, campaigned in my columns for new major league franchises in a couple of cities and watched rookie Tom Seaver strike out Mickey Mantle with the bases loaded in the ninth inning to preserve the National League All-Stars’ 1-0 victory because Willie Mays stole home in the first inning. Yet I’m not really a “baseball guy.” And my romance with the game ended many years ago. So this interlude with baseball has been invigorating and refreshing, like a reunion with an old friend. I will admit to the fact that I’d been a bit adrenaline-starved by the Pandemic, so maybe having a rooting interest in games as part fan/part journalist had a bearing. It just reaffirmed my conviction that baseball is better savored when it’s a local team. Even though I grew up a St. Louis Cardinal fan only because I could pick up the static-ky radio broadcasts on my father’s giant Zenith console; it was far better when I had every-night radio/TV access to the Mets and Yankees in New York, Rockies in Denver and the Rays in Florida. And now, college baseball has won me back over. The other day I read a Washington Post story about the joy of the communities welcoming back their minor league teams after a year off. I hadn’t thought about how intimate the fans were with some of the teams with those funny nicknames. We don’t have minor league baseball around Ocala/Gainesville anymore. So many baseball fans have reached out to the Gators as their local team. Especially in Ocala, since Jud Fabian, Kirby McMullen, Hunter McMullen and Sterlin Thompson are all from the Ocala area. This was to be O’Sullivan’s big year with the No. 1 ranked team in the country, a first-round prospect in Fabian, several other promising draft picks and a strong pitching staff. The Gators opened the season with a three-game set vs. Miami in the sparkling new Florida baseball park. But things fell apart and the Hurricanes stole the series. It has been a bit of an uphill struggle since. Briefly the Gators righted the ship at season’s send and were set up for a redemption series with No. 1 ranked Arkansas, but got swept. As Sully often does, he fiddled around with his lineup card and put catcher Nathan Hickey at third base so he could get more pop in the lineup. And it worked. After only five hits vs. Kentucky in a 4-1 win, the bats woke up and so did the defense. That and solid pitching propelled them to the semis in Hoover, including the 7-2 win over Alabama Thursday. It started with a solo home run by Jacob Young and Franco Aleman pitched his best game. After three wins in the SEC tournament -- with 32 hits in games two and three -- Florida drew an off day Friday and was poised, perhaps, for another crack at Arkansas. “They are starting to look like a Omaha team,” said the baseball analysts on the SEC Network. At least that seemed put them back on track. Maybe not as a Super Regional Host or a national seed, but back to playing O’Sullivan baseball. They’ve been doing that for 14 years at Florida. And that’s not too shabby. Yet another reason to reclaim your birthright as a baseball fan.

The 2021 Florida Men’s Tennis Team made history Saturday night. The top-seeded Gators defeated the No. 2 Baylor Bears to claim the program’s first ever national title. Florida defeated Baylor 4-1 at the USTA National Campus in Orlando, Florida. How it Happened Despite dropping the doubles point to the Bears, the Gators refused to give up. Florida Head Coach Bryan Shelton’s son clinched the victory for the Gators. It was a storybook ending. It was just after midnight when freshman Ben Shelton beat Charlie Broom in No. 5 singles. He rallied from a first-set loss to clinch the match with a 3-6, 6-1, 6-2 win over grad transfer Broom. His win was the fourth singles win for the Gators in a matter of minutes. Florida senior Andy Andrade beat Baylor’s Sven Lah, junior Sam Rifface took down Matias Soto and senior Josh Goodger defeated Spencer Furman. History Made Bryan Shelton became the first head coach in college tennis history to win both a women’s and a men’s national title. He claimed the women’s championship in 2007 while at Georgia Tech. This was Shelton’s ninth season in charge of the Gators’ program. He took over in 2012 after 13 seasons at Georgia Tech. A national championship marks the end of a remarkable season for the Gators. They finished with a 26-2 overall record and 12-0 in conference. Florida men’s tennis first hit the court in 1940, but the program had never made it past the NCAA semifinals. 2021 is the year that changed that, the year that will be remembered forever. Men’s tennis’ big win on Saturday marks the 42nd National Title in Gator athletics history.The team became the sixth Gator program to claim its first NCAA title in the last 12 seasons (baseball, gymnastics, softball, men’s tennis, men’s indoor track and field, men’s outdoor track and field). What’s Next? Saturday’s win marked the end of the 2021 campaign, but a few Gators moved on to compete in NCAA Individual Championships. Duarte Vale, Sam Rifface and Andy Andrade were selected to compete for the singles title and the combinations of Rifface/Vale and Johannes Ingildsen/Will Grant were selected to compete for doubles. Rifface has advanced to the final of the NCAA Singles Tournament after a 7-6 (5), 2-6, 6-1 victory over No. 1-seeded Liam Draxl of Kentucky on Thursday at the USTA National Campus. The Gator captain's win sets him up for an all-Southeastern Conference matchup with No. 2-seeded Daniel Rodrigues of South Carolina at noon ET on Friday.

“It’s those changes in latitudes, changes in attitudes, nothing remains quite the same” – Jimmy Buffett As long as there have been college sports, players have often felt the best way to adjust attitudes is to change their latitudes, but never have there been so many latitude changes as today in Division I of the NCAA where legislation that eliminates the sit out year for a first-year transfer is turning rosters upside down. The NCAA transfer portal, which is supposed to make it easier on kids who wish to opt out of their current situation, has become nothing more than a way station as more than 3,000 men’s basketball and football players are on the move. The two biggest changes with the enactment of the new transfer legislation are (1) kids no longer feel they need a compelling reason to look for a new latitude and (2) it has changed the way coaches look at recruiting. Playing time still drives players to transfer but it is no longer the dominant reason. Some kids simply decide they would be better off somewhere else and with no one-year penalty for leaving, the floodgates have been opened. When it comes to recruiting, every coach in the country is going to hold spots that used to go to high school or junior college kids and use the scholarship to bring in someone with experience that can offer immediate help. Earlier in the week, Auburn basketball coach Bruce Pearl, who has replaced four transfers with five quality players, discussed how he’s looking at recruiting. Last season the Tigers were one of the youngest teams in the country. Next year, Auburn will have experience at every position. “So when they change the rules and now you have got the transfer portal, and you have got players that are one-time eligible immediately, you can get more experienced or older in a hurry,” Pearl said in a radio interview. Texas State football coach Jake Spavital, whose Bobcats were 2-10 last season, didn’t sign a single high school player in his 2021 recruiting class. All the incoming Bobcats are transfers from either four-year schools or junior colleges. Since the 2020 season didn’t count against eligibility, all the freshmen Spavital signed in his first recruiting class will still be freshmen in 2021 so it’s not like he’s setting the Texas State program back. Last year’s freshmen will be experienced freshmen next season and experienced transfers will plug holes in the roster. Spavital’s situation isn’t going to be the norm moving ahead but plugging holes with transfers is going to be part of every football and basketball coach’s strategy from here on out. At Florida, both Dan Mullen and Mike White have been ahead of the curve when it comes to transfers. In 2021, transfers will figure prominently for both the football and basketball teams. Here are the transfers on the Florida football roster for 2021 (15): Jean Delance, OT (6-5, 307, GR, transferred from Texas); Stewart Reese, OC/OG (6-6, 354, GR, transferred from Mississippi State); Daquan Newkirk, DT (6-3, 318, GR, transferred from Auburn); Antonio Shelton, DT (6-3, 318, GR, transferred from Penn State); Jordan Pouncey, WR (6-1, 212, RSR, transferred from Texas); * Jace Christmann, PK (6-0, 195, GR, transferred from Mississippi State); * Dylan Meeks, LB (6-2, 236, RSR, transferred from Akron); Brenton Cox Jr., EDGE/LB (6-4, 252, RJR, transferred from Georgia); Justin Shorter, WR (6-5, 227, RJR, transferred from Penn State); Lorenzo Lingard, RB (6-0, 206, RJR, transferred from Miami); Diwun Black LB (6-4, 230, RSO, JUCO); Jadarrius Perkins, CB (6-2, 190, transferred from Missouri); * Noah Keeter, LB (6-5, 229, RSO, transferred from UCLA; Demarkcus Bowman (5-10, 187, RFR, transferred from Clemson) * Non-Scholarship Here are the scholarship football players who have transferred out (8): T.J. Moore, OL (6-5, 300, GR, transferred to Charlotte); C.J. McWilliams (5-11, 164, RSR, transferred to Purdue); Quincy Lenton, S (5-11, 205, RSR); James Houston, LB (6-1, 225 RJR); Iverson Clement, RB (5-11, 199, RSO, transferred to Temple); Jesiah Pierre (6-2, 220, RFR, transferred to Texas Tech); Chester Kimbrough, DB (5-11, 170, RFR, transferred to Michigan State); Jahari Rogers, CB (6-0, 170, RFR, transferred to SMU) As many as nine of the football transfers figure to be starters for Mullen. Delance could be starting for the third straight year at right tackle while Reese, who was the right guard last year, shifted to center in the spring. Shorter was Florida’s fourth option as a wide receiver last year but seems poised to have a breakout season. In the backfield, both Lingard and Bowman will be competing with veterans for the starting running backs job. It’s on defense that the transfers could have their biggest impact. Coordinator Todd Grantham should be stronger against the run thanks to Shelton and Newkirk, both of whom can also collapse the pocket from the inside. Cox will find his name on every preseason All-SEC list and a good many preseason All-Americas. Black was originally signed out of Osceola High School in Kissimmee but had to go the juco route before transferring in. He will be an impact player from day one. Perkins, who was a teammate of Black at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College before signing with Missouri, could be the answer for the nickel in the secondary since he’s big enough to handle tight ends and quick enough to handle wide receivers and running backs. Jace Christmann, who kicked for Mullen at Mississippi State and left as the school’s all-time leading scorer, is a non-scholarship graduate who will be Florida’s placekicker in the fall. Mullen will have at least 14 transfers on his 2021 roster. The transfer portal continues to add names and heats up daily. Mullen has as many as two scholarships at his disposal and he has a number of transfers who have indicated they would be interested in coming to Florida. Here are the transfers on the Florida basketball roster for 2021-22 (7): Brandon McKissic (6-3, 195, GR, transferred from Missouri-Kansas City); Phlandrous Fleming Jr. (6-4, 210, GR, transferred from Charleston Southern); Anthony Duruji (6-7, 220, RJR, transferred from Louisiana Tech); Tyree Appleby (6-1, 170, RJR, transferred from Cleveland State); Colin Castleton (6-11, 231, RJR, transferred from Michigan); Myreon Jones (6-3, 185, RJR, transferred from Penn State); C.J. Felder (6-7, 225, RSO, transferred from Boston College) Here are the scholarship basketball players who have transferred out: Noah Locke (6-2, 203, RJR, transferred to Louisville); Osayi Osifo (6-7, 225, transferred to Jacksonville); Omar Payne (6-10, 230, RSO, transferred to Illinois); Ques Glover (5-11, 182, RSO, transferred to Samford) As bizarre as it may seem, Mike White’s entire starting lineup next season could be made up of players who transferred in. The only two players White recruited straight out of high school who could start are Keyontae Johnson and incoming freshman Kowacie Reeves. Johnson will be back but it is unknown if he will be sufficiently recovered from his medical issues to play, much less at the same level he was at prior to his collapse at Florida State back in December. Reeves is a 5-star freshman but with the imported talent, there won’t be any pressure for him to start from day one. Of the seven transfers on the roster, Castleton is the only surefire starter. Appleby started much of last season at the point and Duruji started a lot of games, but was more effective coming off the bench. No one should be shocked if the four joining Castleton in the starting lineup are McKissic at the point, Jones and Fleming on the wings and Felder at the high post. White still has a scholarship at his disposal and it’s unclear at this time whether it will be used for another transfer or a high school big guy. * * * When it comes to transfers in the Southeastern Conference, Florida and Alabama have suffered the least amount of damage outgoing and have strengthened their rosters with incoming transfers. Alabama lost eight football transfers, none of which figured to crack the starting lineup, and didn’t lose a single basketball transfer while adding two potential starters. The Tide landed potential football starters in wide receiver Jameson Williams (Ohio State) and linebacker Henry To’o To’o (Tennessee) and the basketball team landed Noah Gurley (Furman) and Nimari Burnett (Texas Tech). From a football standpoint, Tennessee was hit the hardest with 34 transferring out including stud running backs Eric Gray (Oklahoma), Ty Chandler (North Carolina), linebackers To’o To’o (Alabama), Quavarius Crouch (Michigan State) and DeAndre Johnson (Miami), offensive linemen Wanya Morris (Oklahoma) and Jahmir Johnson (Texas A&M), safety Key Lawrence (Oklahoma) and placekicker Brent Cimaglia (Georgia Tech). In basketball, nobody was hit harder than Georgia. Among its nine transfers were the three leading scorers from last year, point guard Sahvir Wheeler (Kentucky), shooting guard K.D. Johnson (Auburn) and Toumani Camara (Dayton). Here are the SEC teams not named Florida and how they fared in the transfer portal: ALABAMA Football transfers out: 8 Football transfers in: 3 Basketball transfers out: 0 Basketball transfers in: 2 ARKANSAS Football transfers out: 14 Football transfers in: 6 Basketball transfers out: 4 Basketball transfers in: 3 AUBURN Football transfers out: 18 Football transfers in: 6 Basketball transfers out: 4 Basketball transfers in: 5 GEORGIA Football transfers out: 12 Football transfers in: 2 Basketball transfers out: 9 Basketball transfers in: 4 KENTUCKY Football transfers out: 10 Football transfers in: 6 Basketball transfers out: 2 Basketball transfers in: 4 LSU Football transfers out: 12 Football transfers in: 2 Basketball transfers out: 3 Basketball transfers in: 4 MISSISSIPPI STATE Football transfers out: 19 Football transfers in: 9 Basketball transfers out: 5 Basketball transfers in: 4 MISSOURI Football transfers out: 17 Football transfers in: 3 Basketball transfers out: 6 Basketball transfers in: 4 OLE MISS Football transfers out: 8 Football transfers in: 3 Basketball transfers out: 5 Basketball transfers in: 3 SOUTH CAROLINA Football transfers out: 11 Football transfers in: 7 Basketball transfers out: 6 Basketball transfers in: 4 TENNESSEE Football transfers out: 36 Football transfers in: 9 Basketball transfers out: 4 Basketball transfers in: 1 TEXAS A&M Football transfers out: 18 Football transfers in: 1 Basketball transfers out: 8 Basketball transfers in: 5 VANDERBILT Football transfers out: 20 Football transfers in: 3 Basketball transfers out: 7 Basketball transfers in: 3

Scott Stricklin likens it to the first morning in the Colorado mountains. It’s been a couple of years since you last visited, you’ve made the long trip out west, you get there late and even knowing you’ve finally arrived, still feel like you’re waiting; waiting for the moment. Then the next morning, it comes. The sun rises, you step outside, see the mountains and take a deep breath of mountain air. “It’s like ‘ah, that’s right, I love this.’” That’s how it felt for the Florida Gators athletic director to walk into Katie Seashole Pressley Stadium this past weekend. The No. 4 Gators softball team won all three games in their regional, easily advancing to the Super Regional this coming weekend, which they will also host. For a team that’s 45-9, that wasn’t too shocking. But as Stricklin walked back through the gates and was met with a cacophony of noise, excitement and anticipation, it was clear—fans were back in the stands. And that was the moment worth waiting for. "That’s what this feels like it's kind of like, you know that's kind of like walking into the softball stadium last week, is kind of getting reacquainted with that feeling of having people in the stands, and being able to enjoy that.” Stricklin, the Gators AD since 2016, admits he was never truly worried about the possibility of getting fans back in the stands after a year in which the global pandemic COVID-19 shut down spring sports in 2020 and severely limited attendance in fall sports of 2020, continuing into spring sports in 2021. This past weekend at the softball regional was the first Gator athletic event since early March 2020 that has been allowed to host full attendance from fans. “The doctors and everybody were telling us we're going to get there so I don't think anybody was surprised that we're there.” Speaking with GatorBait Magazine, Stricklin recapped getting back to this point, highlights the struggles and successes of the past year, talks the football spring game that didn't happen and finally reflects on seeing the Gators mens tennis team win their first National Championship. GatorBait: When did you realize, ‘hey we can open these games up (softball and upcoming baseball regionals) to full attendance’? Scott Stricklin: I think you know, obviously when the CDC made their changes last week, the ball really got rolling. It seemed like we were gonna be close but weren’t sure we were gonna get there this school year. But once the CDC made that decision…[we knew] it was coming quick. GB: Did you can an appreciation this past year how much of a difference it actually makes having the fans there? Stricklin: I haven’t sat and looked at people's records in a way to see if the home records decreased this year. They probably did because the crowd does make an impact. Anyone who was in the Swamp last fall with limited capacity understands the impact the fans make. GB: What has this past year been like for you, just kind of having to navigate the changing landscape and dealing with the medical aspect of it as well? Stricklin: We were blessed to be able to lean on UF Health and our sports medicine staff, you know Stacy Higgins and Duke Werner and the people working for them did a great job, so we really it was probably the biggest, the biggest challenge we faced from an administrative standpoint was making sure that we were taking care of our people who were kind of on the front line, so to speak, as far as the protocols and the testing and doing everything to keep our athletes safe. And then just the mental grind of everything for everybody. That was probably the most challenging part. We have really talented people and they do a great job and you never doubted that; but it took a toll on me because it was such a unique year and wasn't always a lot of fun. But, you also look back and you see, you know, we played all these sports, and everybody was safe and healthy. We're able to kind of navigate it appropriately. We’re all kind of—pride’s not the right word—a sense of accomplishment that we got through that and gratefulness that we’re on the other side of that. GB: The fact that vaccinations have been going on at the stadium, is that what played into the decision to not have a spring game there? Stricklin: There were so many unknowns. We started spring ball a month before everybody else did so January was when we had to make a decision on what that was gonna look like. And at that time, case counts were sky high. We were hoping to be able to play our spring sports, and all of our focus and energy was on, ‘let’s play games on outside competition that matters.' We're going to have more sports going on at that time of year than ever before because volleyball and soccer had been pushed in addition to everything else. And the stress that took our staff, in addition to the fact that we were using, at that time, our facility was being used at that time for testing and then vaccines. So there was a lot of murkiness. If we had made that decision a month later, we probably would have had a spring game. But in January, when the decision had to be made, it just, it didn’t feel right. If our practice, if our spring practice had been March-April, we probably would have had a spring game. GB: Getting to be down in Orlando this past weekend for the tennis National Champioship, what is it like just to experience the first one for a sport? Stricklin: It's pretty special. It's really special because you're proud for the school but you’re really proud for the people involved, the coaches—Brian, Tanner and then Coach P. And the players, you watch for several years kind of grow and go through last year when they were really good and had their season cut short and didn’t get a chance to come back and be at that stage this year. You saw a lot of, I went down there, and a lot of Gator tennis fans. We've got a pretty good collection of people even that are former players or they just love the sport. People I see at our matches all the time, they’re down there getting to enjoy that, see the team, celebrate with them. That was really special. And they never get old, I don’t care what sport it’s in. You know when you're the last one standing and they bring that trophy out and there's no more games left and you won the last one, that’s a hard feeling to replicate.

A few thoughts to jump start your Friday morning: O’SULLIVAN HAS THE GATORS PLAYING LIKE NO. 1 AT JUST THE RIGHT TIME Kevin O’Sullivan would probably call this a fair trade. The Gators started out as a unanimous No. 1, but in the nearly four months since the season began with two losses in three games against Miami, it’s been a head scratching ride of inconsistency highlighted by too many strikeouts with men in scoring position, too many costly errors that snatched defeat from the jaws of victory and a short-handed pitching staff that has struggled to make the ball avoid contact with opponents’ bats. And yet here we are, three games into an SEC Baseball Tournament in Hoover, Alabama with the Gators looking anything like a team that was expected to make a rather hasty exit back to Gainesville. The Gators aren’t the nation’s No. 1 team but they’ve spent the last three games in Hoover polishing up their image and looking every bit like the team everybody thought they would be back in February. O’Sullivan would probably call this a fair trade. After all, you can’t win a national championship in February but if you’re playing your best baseball of the year in May, you can definitely get on the road to Omaha for the College World Series. Should the Gators continue to play like they have in making it to Saturday’s tournament semifinals, they’ll create a dilemma for the NCAA Tournament Committee. The entire body of work makes the Gators a top 16 national seed which means they will host a regional. If they make it to Sunday’s SEC Tournament championship game unbeaten in four games the committee might have to consider UF as a top eight national seed which would make them a host for both regional and super regionals. Florida (38-19) made it 3-0 in Hoover Thursday with a 7-2 win over Alabama (31-23), a game in which Franco Aleman looked anything like the pitcher whose ERA was 9.00 in his previous four starts. In what was easily his best start of the season, Aleman pitched seven shutout innings, limiting Alabama to just five hits. Aleman (2-4, 5.02 ERA) spent the day throwing fast balls that ranged from the mid-90s up to 98 miles per hour. He only struck out four but his busted his slider in on the fists of the Alabama batters often enough to induce 12 ground outs. In the previous four games he struggled with control. Thursday he was just wild enough to be dangerous but when he needed to bear down and make a pitch, he put the ball where he wanted it. Picking up where they left off Wednesday when they pounded out 18 hits in a 13-1 win over Mississippi State, the Gators were good for 14 Thursday including home runs by Jacob Young (5th) and Nathan Hickey (9th). Young and freshman Sterlin Thompson each had three hits while Cory Acton continued his late season revival with two hits and three RBI. The Gators will face the winner of today’s elimination matchup between Alabama and Tennessee in one of the Saturday semifinals. Arkansas, the SEC regular season champion which is ranked No. 1 nationally, will face the winner of today’s Ole Miss-Vanderbilt game in the other semifinal. Once in the semifinal round, the tournament reverts back to single elimination. Gators in the tournament: Leadoff hitter Jacob Young is 7-13 in the tournament with a double, two home runs and five RBI. He has raised his batting average to .318 … Hickey is 5-12 in the tournament to raise his batting average to .313. Prior to the tournament he was mired in a 5-41 slump … Thompson, now hitting .318, is 6-13 with two doubles, a homer and five RBI … The defensive plays of the game were a nifty pickoff at first base by Aleman in the third inning and catcher Mac Guscete throwing out Peyton Wilson, who was attempting to steal third, in the bottom of the sixth … Florida pitchers have walked only four batters in three games. THE ROAD TO OKC CONTINUES AT THE GAINESVILLE SUPER REGIONAL Tim Walton has taken eight previous Florida softball teams to Oklahoma City for the Women’s College World Series. The Gators (45-9) are two wins over Georgia (32-21) in the Gainesville Super Regional from a ninth trip to OKC in what might prove to be the best coaching job of Walton’s 16-year tenure at the University of Florida. Unlike the previous eight teams that made it to OKC, this one doesn’t have a dominant pitcher that can simply blow three strikes past a hitter on demand, a bunch of big boppers up and down the lineup who are threats to leave the yard and a consistent offense that Walton knows is good for at least five or six runs per game. Instead, he has a by committee pitching staff that doesn’t walk or hit opposing batters and gets a lot of ground outs and a defense that rarely makes an error. The Gators have allowed only 108 batters all season and they’ve hit only 21. The Gators rank ninth nationally in earned run average (1.72) and they’re sixth in fielding with only 27 errors all year. The offense is inconsistent but when the Gators need a big hit, someone typically comes through in the clutch. The Gators have eight walk-off wins and 13 of the come-from behind variety. Florida has hit only hit 54 homers which pales in comparison to SEC teams like Arkansas and Missouri, but UF homers tend to happen late in ball games when the Gators need to come from behind. Charla Echols (.390, 15 HR, 55 RBI), who has struck out only three times all season, is Florida’s most dangerous hitter in late innings. To punch their ticket to the WCWS, the Gators will need to silence the bats of Georgia’s big three – Lacey Fincher (.341, 15 HR, 36 RBI), Sydney Chamblee (.311, 11 HR, 36 RBI) and Sydney Kuma (.300, 14 HR, 37 RBI). The Gators are likely to start Elizabeth Hightower (17-5, 1.51 ERA) in game one. She didn’t give up a hit in 13-1/3 innings in the Gainesville Regional. First pitch for game one at Katie Seashole Pressly Stadium is set for 5 p.m. with television coverage on ESPNU. SAM RIFFICE WILL PLAY FOR NCAA SINGLES TITLE Florida captain Sam Riffice is one match away from becoming the third NCAA tennis singles champion in school history. Riffice earned his way into the championship match Thursday when he beat No. 1 seeded Liam Draxl of Kentucky, 7-6, 2-6, 6-1. The championship match with No. 2 seed Daniel Rodrigues of South Carolina is set for 12 noon today. OVER, UNDER, AROUND AND THROUGH THE SEC Alabama: With their loss to Florida at the SEC Tournament Thursday, the Crimson Tide (31-23) might have some work to do to make the NCAA field. D1Baseball.com has Bama listed in its first five teams out for the NCAA Tournament. Alabama can probably erase any doubt if the Tide can knock off 2nd-seeded and 4th-ranked Tennessee in an elimination game today … Alabama (47-7), seeded 3rd nationally, hosts Kentucky (43-14) in the first game of the Tuscaloosa super regional today. Arkansas: The No. 1 ranked and No. 1 seeded Razorbacks (44-10) joined Florida as the only unbeaten teams in the SEC Tournament with a 6-4 win over Vanderbilt Thursday night in Hoover … The Razorbacks offered a football scholarship to eighth-grader Lance Jackson, a defensive end who is already 6-5 and 242 pounds ... The 6th-seeded Razorbacks (43-14) host No. 11 Arizona in game one of the Fayetteville softball super regional today. Georgia: Georgia (31-25) is projected as the No. 3 seed in the Greenville (NC) regional by D1Baseball.com … will have 100% capacity for football games this fall with concession prices reduced by 50 percent ... Georgia (32-21) travels to Gainesville to face No. 4 national seed Florida in the Gainesville softball super regional. LSU: The Tigers (34-22) are projected to be the No. 3 seed in the Ruston NCAA regional … LSU lost 1-0 to Florida State in the first game of the Baton Rouge softball super regional Thursday. Mississippi State: Two losses at the SEC Tournament have dropped the Bulldogs (40-15) to the No. 8 national seed. That still would allow the Bulldogs to host a super regional if they win the Starkville regional. Missouri: The 8th-seeded Tigers (43-14) will host James Madison in the first game of the Columbia softball super regional today. Ole Miss: The Rebels stayed alive in the SEC Tournament with a 4-0 win over Georgia Thursday, earning a rematch with Vanderbilt. Ole Miss lost to Vandy in the bottom of the ninth Wednesday night … D1Baseball.com lists the Rebels as the No. 12 national seed, hosting a regional in Oxford. South Carolina: The Gamecocks (33-21) are projected to be the No. 2 seed in the South Bend regional in the NCAA Tournament by D1Baseball.com. Tennessee: The 4th-ranked and 2nd-seeded Vols (43-15) won their Thursday elimination game with Mississippi State with an 8-inning, run-rule 12-2 victory. Tennessee will face 10th-seeded Alabama today with the winner advancing to the SEC Tournament semifinals ... D1Baseball lists the Vols hosting a regional in Knoxville as the nation’s No. 4 overall seed. Vanderbilt: Vanderbilt (40-14) will have to emerge from the elimination bracket to have a chance at repeating as SEC Tournament champs. The Commodores will face Ole Miss in a loser goes home game today. ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: Senators Chris Murphy (D-CT) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT) have introduced legislation that would allow athletes to form unions and be considered employees of the school they represent. The bill, entitled the College Athletes Right to Organize, asserts that whether it’s by a scholarship or direct payment athletes are employees who should have the right to organize and bargain. Each conference would be viewed as a bargaining unit and athletes would be allowed to bargain for compensation, working hours and working conditions. It’s interesting that while the bill will make athletes employees of the school, the scholarships will not be taxed nor will they affect the athlete’s federal financial aid (Pell Grant) status. If this bill passes and becomes law, you can all but kiss college sports as we know them good-bye. Back in 2015, when the National Labor Relations Board ruled against Northwestern’s attempt to unionize athletes, it’s 5-member panel ruled that a union would cause tremendous instability to college sports. Instability is an understatement. I know a lot of people who think that if this bill passes we could see a lot of college athletic departments – perhaps even a majority of them – disbanding their entire scholarship programs and either going non-scholarship or eliminating all sports.

Eric Fabian spent his Tuesday morning like any overstimulated, over-anxious and stressed father would: playing a round of golf. “In a single word... chaos,” Fabian said of this past week. “Trying to be in multiple places at multiple times and work and everything else, it’s just been crazy,” Fabian said. “But it’s been unbelievable, nonetheless.” Eric Fabian was playing a few holes in Ft. Myers on Tuesday morning while waiting for his son, Jud Fabian, to take the diamond in Hoover, Alabama for Florida’s second game of the SEC baseball tournament. And after his older son finished up, Eric Fabian would head to Hammond Stadium, home of the Ft. Myers Mighty Mussels, the minor league affiliate of the Minnesota Twins. There, his younger son, Deric Fabian, was playing for a state championship with the North Marion Colts. “Our rule of thumb this year has been go with the high school as much as we can because we can pull the iPad out and watch the boys in Orange and Blue on the iPad,” Eric Fabian said between strokes. And so Eric and Jenny, the husband and wife-duo, tagged along with Deric and the Colts as they tore through the Central Florida area en route to a historic season. North Marion posted a 15-8 regular season record, before peaking at the right time and going on a postseason tear. Heading into the state championship the Colts were riding the wave of a five-game win streak. In Ft. Myers, North Marion played Nature Coast Tech (Brooksville) in the semifinal game, which saw Deric add an insurance run in the top of the seventh inning with a sacrifice flyout deep into centerfield. Deric leads the team with 13 home runs. His deep fly-out would have likely cleared the fence of a high school field. Hammond Stadium’s centerfield fence is 405 feet from home plate. “I was more happy that I got the job done, honestly,” Deric said when asked if he thought the hit was going to leave the yard. Deric and the Colts' season ended on Tuesday night as they fell short in the Class 4A championship game where the North Broward Prep Eagles posted a five-run fifth-inning rally to win the title 8-4. Nonetheless, it was North Marion baseball's first championship game appearance in school history. When Jud Fabian was Deric’s age, he posted an 11-home run season. And as Eric Fabian will tell you, as Deric began closing in on that number, the sibling rivalry-fueled banter intensified. “There was a lot of jawing going back and forth,” Eric Fabian said of his sons. “But at the end of the day, when Deric passed Jud, Jud was the first one to call him.” Next season, Deric’s home centerfield wall will stand 400 feet from home plate – just like his older brother’s did this season. “You know, in high school, they actually were able to play a year together, so that was kinda cool,” Eric Fabian said. “So you got to see them on the same field, in the same lineup together and who knows, if Jud decides to go back to UF, maybe we’ll see that next year.” On the day leading up to Deric’s semifinal game, Jud Fabian, UF’s starting centerfielder, was named to the All-SEC first team. “Yeah, I saw that,” Deric smiled when asked if he had heard the news following North Marion’s semifinal win on Monday night. Deric is committed to follow in his older brother’s footsteps and play for Kevin O’Sullivan in Gainesville. But joining the roster with Jud Fabian is far from guaranteed. In Baseball America’s most recent mock draft, Jud Fabian is listed as a first-round prospect. The current prediction has Jud Fabian getting drafted 26th overall and heading to the Minnesota Twins. Through his 2021 campaign, the Gators’ centerfielder has posted a batting average of .252 and has lifted 20 pitches out of the park. The UF sophomore also boasts a fielding percentage of .984 with just two errors on the year. Jud Fabian’s success is something that’s been talked about since he was a young gun graduating from Ocala’s Trinity Catholic High School, where he played under former UF pitcher, Tommy Bond. There were questions as to if the first of the Fabians would ever step foot on campus, or if he’d go straight to the majors. “There were talks of Jud being a potential first-rounder out of high school... but part of our thought process is it’s about the journey,” Eric Fabian said. “I don’t want to turn an 18-year-old kid on the loose and have no care in the world and money in his pocket and be taken advantage of, so you do have a little bit more of that, I’d say, chance to grow up with someone who’s going to look after you a little bit. We felt it was best to give the boys an opportunity to go and grow up with that tutelage under there.” Those same talks have now encircled Deric Fabian. Fangraphs has Deric ranked as the No. 48 prospect in this year’s draft. The same mock draft has Jud Fabian ranked as the tenth best prospect. So naturally, people are quick to compare the pair of brothers. “One of the things that’s hard for us is when people talk to Deric about Jud... he’s his own player,” Eric Fabian said. “When people realize that, it’s been phenomenal the growth they see in Deric because he’s his own man. It’s a totally different tool bag that he carries with him.” While the eldest brother plays in the outfield, Deric’s post is in the dirt, serving as the captain of the defense. “The differences in their game are night and day, just because it’s two night and day different players,” Eric Fabian says as the noise of him whacking another golf ball echoes into the phone line. “You’ve got a centerfielder, who his bread and butter is he’s going to be in centerfield and get every ball he possibly can. And then you’ve got a shortstop who’s captain of the defense who is going to try to adjust alignments on the infield, talk to pitchers... you know, just a different skillset in itself. They’re both mastered the nuances of what they got and in doing so, they’ve become pretty good at it.” “Pretty good at it” is an understatement, Mr. Fabian. “Your sons could have gone to play baseball anywhere in the country,” I reminded him. Though quick to confirm my statement, he was even quicker to assure me that things worked out exactly as their family hoped. “At the end of the day, when UF called it was close to home, dream school, where they wanted to be,” Eric Fabian said.

A few thoughts to jump start your Thursday morning: THE GATORS CAN’T PULL OFF THE IMPOSSIBLE … CAN THEY? After getting swept by Arkansas in Fayetteville last weekend, no one with a functioning brain would have been shocked if the Florida Gators were one-and-done in Hoover, Alabama. It’s the way the Gators lost three in a row to the Razorbacks that had everyone shaking their head, hoping for the best in Hoover, but expecting the worst. Those were three winnable games that the Gators blew, not exactly the way a team headed for bigger and better things is supposed to be playing at the end of the regular season. Okay, so they beat Kentucky in that first round game, not exactly a monumental achievement but considering the way UF played in Fayetteville and how well they played against Kentucky, it was enough to raise a few eyebrows. After that 4-1 win that was highlighted by exceptionally good pitching, just enough hitting to put the game out of UK’s reach, and defense that for once didn’t do something stupid like commit a stupid error to open the floodgates for a bad inning, folks who do the baseball bracketology were saying the Gators had cemented hosting an NCAA regional. That was about as good as it is supposed to get for the Gators, but a funny thing happened on the way to a second round loss to a Mississippi State team that has spent the majority of the season ranked among the top five teams in the country and a team that has a shot at the NCAA record for most strikeouts per nine innings by a pitching staff. The Gators (a) didn’t lose, (b) struck out only three times, (c) ripped and shredded five MSU pitchers for 18 hits, and (d) run-ruled the Bulldogs. The Gators (37-19) led 13-1 after seven innings so by SEC Tournament rules, mercy was declared and there were the Gators, looking in Hoover like they were supposed to look back in Gainesville when the season began back in February when everyone with a vote and opinion had UF ranked No. 1 in the nation. And now, instead of a tail-dragger of a loss to Mississippi State (40-14) that puts UF in the elimination bracket, the Gators find themselves on day three with a date to play Alabama (31-22) of all people. Alabama wasn’t supposed to survive day one much less knock off 4th-ranked and 2nd-seeded Tennessee 3-2 in 11 innings on day two. Instead of an early morning elimination game, the Gators and Alabama will play at 5 p.m. In beating Mississippi State, Florida got the best pitching performance of Hunter Barco’s career. The second-year freshman lefty (10-2, 3.81 ERA) gave up Mississippi State’s only run in the bottom of the first and then shut down the Bulldogs the rest of the way. He gave up only four hits, didn’t walk a batter and needed only 91 pitches in going the seven-inning distance. Barco struck out only two hitters, but he got 13 groundouts including a double play grounder to end the sixth inning. By going the full seven innings, Barco gave Florida’s bullpen a day of rest, something that could come in handy against Alabama this afternoon. While the Bulldogs kept beating the ball into the ground against Barco, Florida hitters were spraying line drives all over the yard. Josh Rivera had the first 4-hit game of his career. Nathan Hickey, who got the surprise start at third base, went 3-5 and Chris Armstrong drove in four runs with two singles and a double. Freshman Sterlin Thompson hit a second inning homer and drove in three runs. All nine starters had at least one hit. When the SEC Tournament began, D1Baseball.com projected the Gators as a No. 14 NCAA seed, hosting a regional and moving on to Austin for the super regional. It’s still a longshot for UF to host all the way through, but with a win against Alabama, the Gators will advance to the Saturday semifinals against a team that has had to stave off elimination. By going 2-0 in Hoover, the Gators certainly won’t host a super regional, but if they are 3-0 heading into Saturday, they will definitely be in the hunt. If Florida was to somehow pull off the grandest of miracles by going 5-0 in Hoover to take the SEC Tournament, it might be impossible for the NCAA selection committee to keep UF from one of the top eight national seeds. Against Alabama, Florida will go with righthander Franco Aleman, who has given up 23 earned runs in 23-1/3 innings over his last four starts. Aleman (1-4, 5.61 ERA) has had some quality starts like the one against Auburn when he allowed only six hits in five shutout innings back on April 23, or against Tennessee back on April 10 when he allowed only one hit and two runs in five strong innings. The key with Aleman, it seems, is knowing when to lift him as he always seems to mix three or four dominating innings with one or two bad ones. Alabama is expected to go with hard luck junior righthander Dylan Smith (1-7, 4.04 ERA). Smith has 100 strikeouts in 82-1/3 innings this season in 14 starts. In Smith’s 14 starts, Alabama has averaged only 2.95 runs per game. Sam Riffice to NCAA tennis semifinals: Sam Riffice marched into the NCAA tennis singles semifinals Thursday with a 6-3, 6-0 quarterfinal win over Texas A&M’s Valentin Vacherot. The 6th-seeded Riffice will face Kentucky’s Liam Draxl, the No. 1 seed, at 2 p.m. today. Riffice is attempting to become just the third Gator to win the NCAA singles title. Mark Merkelein won the singles championship in 1994 and Jeff Morrison did it in 1999. TJ Moore transfers to Charlotte: Offensive lineman TJ Moore, a 4-star prospect who never panned out at Florida, is transferring to Charlotte where he will have one year of eligibility remaining. Moore played in 19 games at Florida including all 13 in 2019, but he was never a starter. Gators ranked seventh by Pro Football Focus: In their preseason college football rankings, Pro Football Focus places Florida seventh nationally with a three percent chance to win the national championship and a 10 percent chance to win the SEC. Emory Jones is rated Florida’s highest grading returning player. TREVOR LAWRENCE ON TIM TEBOW Despite all the criticism that Tim Tebow is going to give poor Trevor Lawrence some kind of inferiority complex by being a bigger than life personality in Jacksonville, the rookie quarterback and expected savior of the Jaguars seems to think Tim will be a perfectly good teammate. Speaking to Eric Edholm of Yahoo! Sports, Lawrence said, “The first thing that jumped out to me was the person. Just his character. What he brings to the locker room. A guy you want to be around. He just does things right. I think coach [Urban] Meyer and the staff knew that, bringing him in … It’s been cool to see, and obviously, it’s still really learning and just coming in later than some other guys for the install, so he’s just getting his feet wet. But man, he’s doing great.” And, speaking on the AP Pro Football Podcast, Lawrence said, “He's just a guy that you want to be around. Character is awesome. Had a few conversations with him and I can already tell, and [he's] just a hard worker. No one is going to work harder than him. Those are the kind of guys you want in your locker room and you want to be around every day. And then I'm excited to see what he can do on the field as well. We got in a few days and he looks great. He's in awesome shape." OVER, UNDER, AROUND AND THROUGH THE SEC Alabama: Alabama’s football season opener with Miami in Atlanta has been cleared for a full capacity crowd at Mercedes Benz Stadium … Pro Football Focus has Alabama ranked No. 1 with a 23 percent chance to win the national championship in 2021 and a 51 percent chance to win the SEC. Arkansas: Left Lael Lockhart had a perfect game through 6-2/3 innings Wednesday when he allowed a single by Georgia’s J McCallister. The perfect game gone, Lockhart gave up a 2-run homer to C Collins but he finished with a 2-hitter with 11 strikeouts. Next up for the Razorbacks is Ole Miss, which beat Vanderbilt Tuesday night … The Hogs are ranked 53rd for 2021 by Pro Football Focus. Auburn: Basketball coach Bruce Pearl, who has mined the NCAA transfer portal for five players, commented why he will take advantage of new NCAA rules that allow immediate eligibility to first-time transfers: “So when they change the rules and now you have got the transfer portal, and you have got players that are one-time eligible immediately, you can get more experienced or older in a hurry.” … Pro Football Focus has Auburn ranked 15th nationally for 2021 with a one percent chance to win the SEC. Georgia: Justin Kier, who averaged 9.5 points, 3.7 rebounds and 2.4 assists last season, will be a grad transfer to Arizona. Kier spent one year at Georgia after transferring in from George Mason ... Georgia (31-24) will face Ole Miss in an elimination game at the SEC Baseball Tournament at 10:30 a.m. … Georgia is ranked fourth with a seven percent chance to win the national championship and a 24 percent chance to win the SEC by Pro Football Focus. Kentucky: Kentucky is the latest SEC school to announce football games at Kroger Field will be played before a full capacity crowd in the fall ... Pro Football Focus ranks Kentucky 27th for 2021. LSU: The Tigers are the 10th-ranked team for 2021 by Pro Football Focus. They’re given a two percent chance of winning the national championship and a six percent chance of winning the SEC. Mississippi State: Third-seeded and 8th-ranked Mississippi State (40-14) will face 2nd-seeded, 4th-ranked Tennessee at 10:30 in an SEC Tournament elimination game ... The Bulldogs have the No. 55 national ranking for 2021 by Pro Football Focus. Missouri: The Tigers are ranked 41st by Pro Football Focus for 2021. Ole Miss: Ole Miss (39-18) will face Arkansas this evening in an elimination game in Hoover … Ole Miss is ranked 40th by Pro Football Focus for 2021. South Carolina: Pro Football Focus gives the Gamecocks the No. 73 national ranking for 2021. Tennessee: The Vols (42-15) face Mississippi State in a 10:30 a.m. elimination game in Hoover … Pro Football Focus ranks the Vols 45th for 2021. Texas A&M: Pro Football Focus ranks the Aggies sixth with a two percent chance to win the 2021 national championship and a five percent chance to win the SEC. Vanderbilt: The Commodores (40-13) are in the winner's bracket against No. 1 Arkansas after beating Ole Miss ... Vandy couldn’t crack the top 100 for Pro Football Focus for 2021. The Commodores are ranked 106th. ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: The research varies on the subject, but most who have crunched the numbers say a college basketball player has a less than one percent chance of being drafted by an NBA team. Imagine what the odds are for kids who are still in high school. It’s worth bringing this subject up because something called the Overtime Elite pro league is getting kids to forego their last couple of years in high school, promising six-figure salaries, health care and as much as $100,000 toward college costs should kids decide they need an education. Matt and Ryan Bewley are 6-9 twins who have just finished their sophomore year at West Oaks Academy in Orlando. They have drunk the Overtime Elite Kool-Aid. They are skipping their JUNIOR AND SENIOR seasons to play in the league, believing people who really don’t have their best interests in mind that this is the way to go. I know all the stories about Moses Malone, Kevin Garnett, Tracy McGrady, Kobe Bryant and LeBron James going straight from high school to the NBA but those were athletic freaks of nature who would have been that one percent with or without college. I don’t know about the Bewleys other than to say someone isn’t being honest with them and it isn’t just about basketball. It’s about life and this league isn’t going to prepare these kids for the real world. Kwame Brown had all the talent in the world when he went straight from high school to the NBA. He made several million dollars, most of which hangers on spent for him. He was an NBA bust, not because he lacked talent, but because he was too immature and unprepared for the realities of life. I seriously doubt anyone is telling the Bewley twins or any other kids stupid enough to take the Overtime Elite bait about Kwame Brown.

A few thoughts to jump start your Wednesday morning: GATORS GET JUST ENOUGH OFFENSE TO KNOCK OFF UK, ADVANCE IN HOOVER Florida pitchers Tommy Mace, Trey Van Der Weide and Jack Leftwich spent much of the day Tuesday pitching from the stretch. Kentucky touched them for 11 hits but the Wildcats (29-23) could only produce one run in the first round of the Southeastern Conference Tournament in Hoover, Alabama. Florida (36-19) managed only five hits off four Kentucky pitchers, but that’s all they needed to take a 4-1 win over the Wildcats to advance to the second round. Mace (6-1, 4.32 ERA) went five innings to pick up the win, giving up seven hits and one run while striking out eight, walking two and hitting two batters. He allowed at least two baserunners in four of the five innings he pitched. Van Der Weide went 2-2/3 innings, giving up two hits and a walk while uncorking a wild pitch. Leftwich got his fifth save with 1-1/3 innings in which he allowed two hits and pitched his way out of a second and third with one out jam in the ninth. Jacob Young staked the Gators to a 1-0 lead when he hit the first pitch of the game over the left field wall. Sterlin Thompson delivered a run-scoring single later in the inning. In the fifth, the Gators answered Kentucky’s only run, scoring two on a Cory Acton single and a fielder’s choice grounder by Mac Guscete. Now that the Gators have advanced to the second round, the tournament goes to double elimination. Florida faces 3rd-seeded Mississippi State (40-13) at 9:30 a.m. today with lefty Hunter Barco (9-2, 4.04 ERA) getting the start for the Gators. If they win, they face the winner of Alabama-Tennessee Thursday. If the Gators lose tomorrow, they face the loser of the Alabama-Tennessee game Thursday morning. A COUPLE OF THINGS THAT MAKE ME GO HMMM … 1. At some point during the summer, the Supreme Court of the United States will issue its ruling that will determine if scholarship athletes are employees of the university they attend. When the Supreme Court heard arguments back in March, attorneys for a group of athletes held that by the NCAA limiting them to a scholarship that includes tuition, room and board and cost or attendance, the NCAA is illegally capping the money schools can spend on athletes, therefore eliminating competition for their particular skills. Previously, there was a ruling by the National Labor Relations Board that called scholarship athletes at Northwestern employees of the school. At the hearing in March, it seemed that the Supreme Court was leaning toward agreeing with the NLRB. Should they rule this way, it would seem that scholarships and cost of attendance stipends are taxable income. If that’s the case, an athlete whose scholarship is valued at $75,000 would be responsible for something in the neighborhood of $19,000 in taxes If athletes are ruled to be employees and they are given tax exempt status, I can only imagine the lawsuits that will follow. 2. The new transfer legislation that has basically made college athletes free agents and name, image, likeness (NLI) have the potential to be a real Pandora’s Box for the NCAA in more ways than one. Already a number of coaches are of the opinion that the transfer legislation has opened the door for tampering and this is before NLI goes into effect where athletes can negotiate deals and be compensated for endorsements. Once NLI becomes universal, what will stop boosters or unscrupulous coaches from approaching a kid on scholarship at another school and offering cash, cars or whatever if the athlete will transfer? Is it my imagination or has NCAA president Mark Emmert been biting his tongue about this possibility? 3. In 2019, Major League Baseball players hit for a .252 average. At their current rate, they will average less than .240 in 2021 and for the 13th consecutive season they will set a record for strikeouts. A couple of weeks ago I asked 11-year Major Leaguer and Gainesville resident Rick Reichardt why there are so many strikeouts. He theorized that it has everything to do with velocity. The Washington Post reports the average Major League fast ball for 2019 was an 93.1 miles per hour. Average. “When I played you may have three or four pitchers on a team who could routinely throw in the 90s,” Reichardt said. “Nowadays, you have entire pitching staffs where everyone can throw in the 90s. And, you don’t see complete games anymore. Managers pay attention to the radar gun and as soon as they see the velocity slowing down, they bring in a guy who can throw in the 90s and they might bring in five or six guys just about every night. “It’s even that way in college. You go to a college game and everyone is throwing in the 90s. Strikeouts are up, batting averages are down.” At least one minor league is experimenting with moving the pitcher’s mound back one foot as a way to cut down on strikeouts and get more offense in the game. I think a better idea would be to reduce the strike zone a few inches. It’s been done before and each time the change has resulted in more runs scored. STEVE SPURRIER ON FACILITIES Back when Steve Spurrier was the football coach at Florida, the higher ups told him he didn’t need an indoor practice field or good facilities. It’s Florida, they argued. When he got to South Carolina, Spurrier was a driving force in the upgrading of football facilities, going so far as donating a chunk of money to the indoor practice field named after Steve and Jerri Spurrier. Speaking to Bruce Feldman of The Athletic, Spurrier talked about the importance of upgraded facilities: “I think it’s just the way it is for college football because schools bring in so much money from the sport of football. I heard someone say that South Carolina’s building is about the fifth-best in the nation. My son Steve Jr. was up there about two weeks ago, and when he was there he toured the building and he said, ‘Man, you can’t believe this place they’ve got at South Carolina.” I said, “Oh, I’ve been up there.’ He was really bragging on how facility-wise they are right up there with the best in the nation. There’s no excuse on facilities now, that’s for sure. When I got there, I think (then athletics director) Eric Hyman said the only school we are ahead of is Vanderbilt in facilities. It’s not everything, but I think it is important. Down here at Florida, we’re building a big, big building similar to the one at South Carolina now. You’ve got to keep up.” BOBBY BOWDEN ON FSU TURNING DOWN THE SEC Back in 1991, Florida State was being courted by SEC commissioner Roy Kramer, who had the go-ahead from the 10 presidents and athletic directors of the Southeastern Conference to expand. FSU turned the SEC down, which led to South Carolina joining Arkansas to expand the league to 12 teams. Speaking to Brandon Marcello of 247Sports, Bowden explained the decision to say no. “They did want us, they did invite us to join the SEC. Everybody thought we would join. In fact, I thought we would but our administration – the president and others – wanted the ACC, which really was better for us. It would have been hard wading through that SEC. Too many good teams in there, boy. Oh, gosh, Oh that would have been some great ball.” From the standpoint of winning conference championships and being in the yearly hunt for the national championship, the move to the ACC was a good one for FSU. From a financial standpoint, it’s a disaster. The ACC just distributed $30 million for the first time to its member schools. The SEC will be distributing between $46-50 million the next two years before the new ESPN contract kicks in, which will increase the yearly distribution by at least $20 million per team. OVER, UNDER, AROUND AND THROUGH THE SEC Alabama: The Crimson Tide (30-22) got a first round win over South Carolina at the SEC Baseball Tournament. They face 4th-seeded Tennessee (42-14) today in a game that could determine if Alabama makes it to the NCAA Tournament. As of Monday, D1Baseball.com had Alabama among its first five out. Arkansas: Arkansas will throw lefty Lael Lockhart when the No. 1 seeded Razorbacks face Georgia today in Hoover. Lockhart hasn’t pitched since May 16. Auburn: Auburn (27-30) saw its season come to an end with a 7-4 loss to Ole Miss. Georgia: Georgia (31-23) solidified its chances to make the NCAA field with a 4-1 win over No. 9 LSU Tuesday. Georgia is currently projected the No. 3 in the Charlotte regional. Kentucky: Barring something unfathomable, Kentucky’s baseball season has come to an end after the Wildcats (29-23) lost in the first round in Hoover to Florida. LSU: Despite the loss to Georgia in Hoover Tuesday afternoon, the Tigers (34-22) are expected to make the NCAA field easily. D1Baseball.com projects LSU the No. 3 seed in the South Bend Regional. Mississippi State: Lefty Christian McLeod (5-3, 3.14 ERA) is the likely starter for the 2nd-seeded Bulldogs (40-13) when they face Florida at 9:30 a.m. Missouri: Jalen Knox, who caught 77 passes for 1,031 yards and four touchdowns in his career, is no longer with the Mizzou program. Defensive back Chris Mills and offensive lineman Mike Ruth, both career backups, are also no longer on the roster. Ole Miss: Ole Miss (39-17) ended Auburn’s season, XX, Tuesday evening in Hoover. The Rebels will face Vanderbilt this evening on day two. Just a couple of weeks ago, Ole Miss took two out of three from the Commodores. Currently, Ole Miss is projected to be a No. 13 national seed. South Carolina: South Carolina (33-21) is solidly in the NCAA field despite the loss to Alabama Tuesday. D1Baseball.com projects the Gamecocks the No. 2 seed in the Greenville (East Carolina) regional ... Small forward Trey Anderson is transferring to San Jose State. Tennessee: So far, 23 football players have transferred out and four freshmen have been released from their national letters of intent. Texas A&M: Now that Texas Tech baseball coach Tim Tadlock has been given a lifetime contract, the Aggies will be turning elsewhere to find a replacement for Rob Childress. The leading candidate at this time appears to be Tennessee head coach Tony Vitello, who has ties to the state of Texas from his days as an assistant at TCU. Vanderbilt: Seventeen freshman football signees arrive on campus to begin classes next week. ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: Big bad Brooks is back to his old self once again, which means he’s once again feuding with Bryson DeChambeau. Koepka was caught on video rolling his eyes and cursing DeChambeau during an interview at the PGA Championship, just the latest in their ongoing catscratch. To say Koepka and DeChambeau don’t like each other would be quite the understatement. To say it’s bad for golf would also be an understatement, particularly since Tiger Woods’ career is probably as good as over and Phil isn’t likely to go on a winning tear even after his feel good PGA win. The game needs something to spark the imagination of its fan base and there is nothing like a good old fashioned feud between two young guys who could win big and win often in the future. I know it’s supposed to be a gentleman’s game, but a little hate isn’t going to hurt.

A few thoughts to jump start your Tuesday morning: ERIK PASTRANA IS A SOLID HIRE FOR MIKE WHITE Mike White filled one of the two vacancies on his coaching staff Monday when he announced the hire of Erik Pastrana, a Florida native known as an outstanding recruiter. A native of Miami, Pastrana has worked for Frank Martin (now HBC at South Carolina), for Brad Underwood (now Illinois) at Stephen F. Austin and Steve Forbes (now Wake Forest) at Northwest Florida State College. He has also worked as an assistant at Florida International and Florida Atlantic as well as head coach at Daytona Beach State College. This is a solid hire for White, who hasn’t fared well on the recruiting trail in the state of Florida, landing only three freshmen (Tre Mann, Omar Payne, Eric Hester, Gorjok Gok) from the state in his six years on the job. Mann, who expects to be among the first 15 players selected in the upcoming NBA Draft, is the only Floridian White has recruited who didn’t transfer out. Pastrana has extensive connections at both the high school and junior college levels. He was instrumental in Oklahoma State landing Cade Cunningham, expected to be the first player selected in the NBA Draft, from Montverde Academy. GATORS OPEN SEC TOURNAMENT AGAINST KENTUCKY The 6th-seeded and 12th-ranked Gators (35-19) will send Tommy Mace (5-1, 4.48 ERA) to the mound today when they face Kentucky (29-22) in the first round of the SEC Baseball Tournament in Hoover, Alabama at 10:30 a.m. Kentucky will counter with Sean Harney (3-1, 3.86 ERA). Mace and Harney opposed each other three weeks ago when the Gators staged a 4-run rally in the top of the ninth inning to knock off the Wildcats 8-5 in Lexington, a game won on a 3-run homer by Kendrick Calilao. Mace went seven innings in that game, giving up eight hits and four runs but didn’t factor in the decision. Harney gave up six hits in five innings, two of which left the yard off the bat of Jud Fabian, who drove in all three runs Harney allowed. The winner of today’s game advances to the second round to face 3rd-seeded Mississippi State (40-13) while the loser goes home. Florida is almost certain to host an NCAA regional no matter what happens in Hoover. Kentucky, on the other hand, will almost certainly have to win one or two games to have a shot at an NCAA bid. Once into the second round, the tournament goes to double elimination so Tuesday’s winners will all be guaranteed two more games in Hoover. Accolades: Center fielder Jud Fabian was named first team All-SEC and to the All-SEC Defensive team … Named to the Newcomer All-SEC team were catcher Nathan Hickey and pitcher Hunter Barco … Outfielder Sterlin Thompson was named to the All-SEC Freshman team. Collegiate Baseball poll: 1. Arkansas 42-10; 2. Vanderbilt 39-13; 3. Mississippi State 40-13; 4. Texas 40-13; 5. Tennessee 42-14; 6. Arizona 38-14; 7. Notre Dame 29-10; 8. TCU 36-16; 9. Stanford 31-13; 10. Oregon 35-13; 11. Texas Tech 35-13; 12. FLORIDA 35-19; 13. East Carolina 38-13; 14. Ole Miss 38-17; 15. UC-Irvine 36-16; 16. South Carolina 33-20; 17. Georgia Tech 28-21; 18. North Carolina State 28-15; 19. Arizona State 32-17; 20. UCLA 32-18; 21. Miami 32-17; 22. Oklahoma State 32-16-1; 23. Charlotte 39-17; 24. Nebraska 29-11; 25. Fairfield 35-1; 26. Michigan 26-15; 27. Louisiana Tech 36-16; 28. Virginia Commonwealth 34-14; 29. Gonzaga 32-15; 30. UConn 30-16. Baseball America poll: 1. Arkansas 42-10; 2. Vanderbilt 39-13; 3. Notre Dame 29-10; 4. Texas 40-13; 5. Tennessee 42-14; 6. Mississippi State 40-13; 7. Texas Tech 35-13; 8. Arizona 38-14; 9. East Carolina 38-13; 10. Stanford 31-13; 11. Ole Miss 38-17; 12. FLORIDA 35-19; 13. Oregon 35-13; 14. UC-Irvine 36-16; 15. North Carolina State 28-15; 16. Charlotte 39-17; 17. Florida State 29-21; 18. Old Dominion 38-14; 19. Nebraska 29-11; 20. Gonzaga 32-15; 21. TCU 36-16; 22. Louisiana Tech 36-16; 23. Southern Miss 35-17; 24. Miami 32-17; 25. South Carolina 33-20. D1Baseball.com poll: 1. Arkansas 42-10; 2. Texas 40-13; 3. Vanderbilt 39-13; 4. Tennessee 42-14; 5. Texas Tech 35-13; 6. Arizona 38-14; 7. Notre Dame 29-10; 8. Mississippi State 40-13; 9. Stanford 31-13; 10. Oregon 35-13; 11. East Carolina 38-13; 12. Ole Miss 38-17; 13. FLORIDA 35-19; 14. Gonzaga 32-15; 15. TCU 36-16; 16. North Carolina State 28-15; 17. UC-Irvine 36-16; 18. Louisiana Tech 36-16; 19. Southern Miss 35-17; 20. Nebraska 29-11; 21. Arizona State 32-17; 22. Charlotte 39-17; 23. Florida State 29-21; 24. Old Dominion 38-14; 25. Maryland 26-15. USA Today Coaches poll: 1. Arkansas 42-10; 2. Texas 40-13; 3. Vanderbilt 39-13; 4. Tennessee 42-14; 5. Texas Tech 35-13; 6. Mississippi State 40-13; 7. Arizona 38-14; 8. Notre Dame 29-10; 9. Oregon 35-13; 10. East Carolina 38-13; 11. Ole Miss 38-17; 12. Stanford 31-13; 13. FLORIDA 35-19; 14. TCU 36-16; 15. UC-Irvine 36-16; 16. Southern Miss 35-17; 17. North Carolina State 28-15; 18. Gonzaga 32-15; 19. Charlotte 39-17; 20. Louisiana Tech 36-16; 21. Old Dominion 38-14; 22. Florida State 29-21; 23. Arizona State 32-17; 24. South Carolina 33-20; 25. Nebraska 29-11. OVER, UNDER, AROUND AND THROUGH THE SEC Alabama: Catcher Sam Praytor was named first team All-SEC ... The 10th-seeded Crimson Tide (29-22) face Georgia at 2 p.m. today in Hoover in the first round of the SEC Tournament. Arkansas: Second baseman Robert Moore, designated hitter Matt Goodheart and relief pitcher Kevin Kopps were named first team All-SEC. Kopps was named SEC Pitcher of the Year and Dave Van Horn was named Coach of the Year. Auburn: Former LSU quarterback TJ Finley is transferring to Auburn. Finley threw for 941 yards and five touchdowns in five starts for LSU last season. Georgia: Point guard Aaron Cook will be a grad transfer to Georgia. Cook, who started his career at Saint Louis, averaged 4.2 points, 1.6 rebounds and 1.7 last year for the Zags, who finished NCAA runner-up to Baylor ... The 8th-seeded Bulldogs (30-23) will face 9th-seeded LSU at 5:30 p.m. in the SEC Tournament in Hoover. Kentucky: The 11th-seeded Wildcats (29-22) will face No. 6 Florida in the first round of the SEC Tournament in Hoover at 10:30 a.m. Former Kentucky D-lineman Jerquavion Mahone is transferring to Temple. LSU: Nicholls defensive back Quinton Page, who was a D1AA freshman All-American, is transferring to LSU, where he will have four years of eligibility remaining ... The Tigers (34-21), who are seeded 9th, will face Georgia in the SEC Tournament today. Mississippi State: Outfielder Tanner Allen was named first team All-SEC and SEC Player of the Year. Missouri: Defensive back Jarvis Ware, whose only interception in 2020 came against Florida, has entered his name in the NCAA transfer portal. Ole Miss: How much of a difference did Lane Kiffin make for QB Matt Corrall? Writes Matt Hayes for Saturday Down South: “After one season with Kiffin, he was completing 70% of his passes, and his numbers rocketed in every category. In 10 games last season, he accounted for 3,843 yards and 33 TDs – his first full season as a starter.” … Starting pitcher Doug Nikhazy wa named first team All-SEC … Fifth-seeded Ole Miss (38-17) will face Auburn in the opening round of the SEC Tournament at 9 p.m. today. South Carolina: The Gamecocks (33-20), who are seeded seventh, face Alabama at 2 p.m. in Hoover today. Tennessee: Shortstop Liam Spence and third baseman Jake Rucker were named first team All-SEC. Texas A&M: Wide receiver Camron Buckley, who caught 62 passes for 877 yards and four touchdowns in three seasons, is transferring to Indiana. Buckley missed all of 2020 with an injury. Vanderbilt: Starting pitchers Kumar Rocker and Jack Leiter and outfielder Enrique Bradfield Jr. were named first team All-SEC. Leiter was named Newcomer of the Year and Bradfield was named Freshman of the Year. WHAT THEY’RE SAYING ABOUT PHIL From Michael Rosenberg, Sports Illustrated: “Anybody could have won the first major with a throng of fans since the country shut down last year. Koepka, who led with 17 to play, could have done it. Louis Oosthuizen who was one lousy swing on No. 13 from possibly tying Phil, could have won his second major. But Phil was most deserving, and not only for his play all week, or even for his play since he turned pro in 1992, the year Koepka turned two. He deserved it because he stopped needing a last name half a lifetime ago. Nobody since Arnie embraced the public life of a pro golfer more than Phil. “… After it was over, as fans roared, Phil stood in the sun by the 18th green, hands on his hips, scorecard signed, waiting for the Wanamaker Trophy presentation – quite a ceremony for a man who is supposed to be a ceremonial golfer. PHIL MICKELSON will be engraved on the Wanamaker twice now, and Phil will be engraved in our memories, not just for how much he won, but for how firmly he believed he could.” From Dan Wetzel, Yahoo! Sports: “On the back nine Sunday, when he should have been his most fatigued, hammered a 337-yard drive on 15 that rolled past playing partner Brooks Koepka, who is nearly two decades his junior. Then on 16, he wailed one 366 yards, the longest by anyone all week.” From Daniel Rapaport, Golf Digest: “How easy would have been, in that moment, with a cacophony of overserved well-wishers ringing in your ears and history at your fingertips, to let it all spiral out of control. Instead, 50-year-old Phil Mickelson calmly traipsed up toward Kiawah’s 18th-green and two-puttied for the W. It was the summation of his multi-year crusade against the proverbial setting sun. This time, for once, Father Time finished second.” From Bob Harig of ESPN: “The game is too deep, the young players too seasoned, the physical skills too demanding for AARP members to remain factors. And yet here is Phil, nearly a decade after going into the World Golf Hall of Fame, finishing above them all, including Brooks Koepka, the four-time major winner who seemed poised to steal Mickelson’s brilliance.” ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: Without question, name, image and likeness (NIL) is going to change college sports forever and probably not in a good way. If you love college sports, then this quote by North Carolina head football coach Mack Brown (from a column by CBS Sports Dennis Dodd) should send shivers up and down your spine. “Our [athletic director], Bubba Cunningham, came over and talked to our team about NIL a year ago … In the end he said, ‘Do you have any questions?’ Sam Howell stood up and said, ‘I don’t like it because I’m going to make more money than anybody else in here being a quarterback. That’s not good for our locker room.” Howell wasn’t boasting when he made that statement, just laying out the facts. Because he is the face of the UNC program and quite possibly the No. 1 draft pick when the NFL selects in April of 2022, he is going to have opportunities that aren’t available to other starters. No parameters have been set for how much money a player can make so Howell could be at the center of a bidding war between boosters. A few dollars here and there probably won’t matter much, but what happens to the rest of the team if a Mercedes dealership offers Sam Howell a $130,000 automobile? The NCAA has a hard enough time enforcing rules when a basketball coach like LSU’s Will Wade openly brags about offering thousands upon thousands of dollars. Once NIL is in place, how will the NCAA prevent a big time booster offering a stud recruit six figures to represent his business if he signs an LOI? This is a time when college sports are desperate for leadership from the NCAA but unfortunately, the airhead in charge (Mark Emmert) is clueless. As we steamroll down a highway that crosses dangerous and uncharted territory, Mark Emmert is sitting in his office wondering if his brain does something other than part his ears.