With their victory against South Carolina last Saturday, the SEC race has found itself in a three-way tie.
UF (15-6, 10-1 SEC) will look to win its upcoming match against the Kentucky Wildcats (14-7, 6-5 SEC) along with the following match against the Vanderbilt Commodores (17-3, 10-1 SEC) to attempt to earn the top seed in the upcoming SEC tournament. South Carolina and Vanderbilt sit tied with the Gators in conference play.
Should Florida lose any of its upcoming games, the Gamecocks or the Commodores could take the the No. 1 seed when the SEC Tournament comes around. While Florida would have head-to-head priority over South Carolina should the two teams win out, a Vanderbilt win against the Gamecocks on Thursday could result in a winner-take-all scenario for the top spot when the Commodores and Gators meet on Saturday.
Kentucky has lost four out of its last seven matches and will come to the Ring Tennis Complex on Thursday to face a Florida team that hopes to carry its momentum from its upset win over the Gamecocks through the final parts of the regular season SEC race. Although the Wildcats are 4-4 on the road, they’ve dropped their last three home meets while the Gators have yet to lose with home-court advantage.
The Commodores are no strangers to UF, as they defeated the Gators in a 4-0 sweep earlier in the year during the ITA National Team Indoor Championships. Avenging that loss will be no easy task, however, as Vanderbilt is currently sitting on a six-game winning streak and has only lost three times since it met Florida at the ITA indoor championship.
The Gators will host Kentucky at 5 p.m in Gainesville and then play Vanderbilt for the last match of the season on Saturday at 11 a.m.
Follow River Wells on Twitter @riverhwells and contact him at rwells@alligator.org.
UF women's tennis coach Roland Thornqvist is from Sweden and said that being from outside the U.S. helps him recruit international talent. “I think that I understand what (international players) are going through when they get here,” he said.
