Over the past few weeks, we’ve seen many of the women’s top-40 recruits make their commitments, but the men, for the most part, have taken their time and pondered their choices.
Things started to pick up over the weekend when two top-40 recruits made their college decisions with verbal commitments top top-10 programs.
The first was Nick Alexiou, who trains under the famed coach Randy Reese at the Clearwater Aquatic Team in Florida. He is the #6 recruit in the state of Florida, but is headed out of state to the University of Virginia.
He’ll fit in very well with the Cavaliers as a middle-distance swimmer, and is an extremely important signing for coach Mark Bernadino. The Virginia 800 free relay finished 2nd at NCAA’s in 2011, but they graduated two members of that relay before this season (Matt McLean and Scott Robison) and will graduate the other two after this year (David Karasek and Peter Geissenger). Alexiou already has gone a 1:37.0 in the 200 free, and is the heavy favorite to win the Florida 3A State Championship this year. He’s also the defending Junior National Champion in that race.
His other best races are the 500 free (4:25.51) and 200 back (1:49.52). He’s not as diverse as some of the other top recruits in the class, but in his primary events, there are few better.
The other commitment is Adam Bull out of Dallas, who is rated by collegeswimming.com as the #7 recruit in the state. He’s going to be headed to the Sunshine State to swim for Gregg Troy and the University of Florida. Bull, like Alexiou, is also a very strong middle-distance swimmer. His best freestyle race is the 500 (4:29.40), and is also a pretty good 200 butterflier (1:49.9).
But his true future in college seems to lie in his versatility. As a junior last year, he won the Texas 4A-and-under championship in 1:49.59, which was the 3rd-best time overall between the two Texas State Championship meets. He’s also a very good 400 IM’er, with a best of 3:54.17.
The most exciting thing about Bull is his potential. He’s made huge leaps forward over the past year, with 5-and-8 second time drops in the two IM distances, respectively. He trains at a small program, City of Richardson Aquatics (COR), and doesn’t have a whole lot of swimmers to push him in practice. When he gets into the highly-competitive, highly-professional training environment in Gainesville, where he’s going to be pushed in practice every day, he could soar even higher.
Bull committed early like another Florida Gator commit, Arthur Frayler, after the pair shared a recruiting trip. Bull also took trips to Virginia and Michigan.
“At Florida I really felt at home and I felt that it was the place where I could grow the most as a student and as an athlete,” Bull said of his decision. “I really connected with the team and the coaching staff and I’m excited to spend the next 4 years of my life in Gainesville. Go Gators!”