New College Tennis Talk Show Debuts with First Guest Bobby Knight; NCAA Denies Request to Drop Number of Sports Required for D-I; Signing and Transfer Update

The above is a screenshot, click here for the full show

Drake men's head coach Davidson Kozlowski (son of Inside Tennis with the Koz's Dave Kozlowski) has introduced College Tennis Talk this month on YouTube, with Bobby Knight of College Tennis Today his first guest. Bobby talks about how he got hooked on college tennis, why he loves it, what he thinks of no-ad, his advice on how to keep college tennis relevant in a community, who he would have picked for the men's NCAA title this year, and many other topics. In the lightning round of questions at the end Knight gives a few answers that surprised me, including best college venue. But after I thought about it, he's not wrong, although personally I would have gone with the more traditional choice.

Chase Hodges, the men's and women's head coach at NAIA powerhouse Georgia Gwinnett, has also recently been a guest on the show.

On Friday, the NCAA announced it would not consider waiving the requirements for minimum sports sponsorship in Division I, which is good news for non-revenue sports like tennis.

“Higher education is facing unique challenges, and the Division I leadership believes it’s appropriate to examine areas in which rules can be relaxed or amended to provide flexibility for schools and conferences,” said Council chair M. Grace Calhoun, athletics director at Pennsylvania. “We will prioritize student-athlete well-being and opportunities balanced with reducing costs associated with administering college sports, but a blanket waiver of sport sponsorship requirements is not in keeping with our values and will not be considered.”

I've been collecting more Division I signings, returning seniors and graduate transfers over the past week. There was also a coaching hire, with Alexander Free named to lead the men's program at Idaho State, and the coaching retirement of Clemson's Nancy Harris. Unfortunately Harris did not get the opportunity to finish off her final year as she had planned.

UCLA senior Jada Hart is returning for the 2020-21 season.

Clemson's Sydney Riley is transferring to Alabama as a graduate student.

New Mexico junior Bronte Murgett is transferring to Missouri.

Princeton's Claire McKee is transferring to Southern California as a graduate student, and five-star recruit McKenna Koenig has signed with the Women of Troy.

Pepperdine has signed Nikki Redelijk, and Lexi Ryngler has transferred to the Waves after a year at Texas. 

Seniors Miranda Ramirez and Guzal Yusupova are returning to Syracuse for the 2020-21 season.

Tulsa has signed Leonor Peralta Dias de Oliveira of Portugal.

Charlotte Russell of England has signed with Tulane.

Carol Lee of the Northern Mariana Islands has signed with Georgia Tech.

Kailey Evans is finishing her junior and senior year this spring and summer and now will be joining Texas Tech this fall after signing last week. I wrote about Evans' choice of Texas Tech last month for the Tennis Recruiting Network.

Clemson's Gabriel Diaz Freire is joining Alabama as a graduate student transfer.

Vanderbilt's Billy Rowe is joining Georgia as a graduate student transfer.

Utah senior Slava Shainyan is returning for the 2020-21 season.

After two seasons at Virginia Tech, Brandon Perez is transferring to Nebraska. 

Peter Sallay of Hungary has signed with Denver.

Guy Den Ouden of the Netherlands has signed with Pepperdine. Den Ouden is currently 46 in the ITF World Junior rankings.