The Gamecocks are preparing for a return to campus next month, but one of Frank Martin’s players is already in Columbia.

Alanzo Frink is on campus now rehabbing after having knee surgery a few weeks ago, a bond he shares with Martin, who had knee replacement in early June.

“He’s doing all his rehab with Mark. I told him that makes two big old slugs that both have bad knees at the same time in him and me,” Martin said. “We just need him to stay in shape and not get him into my shape. He’s great; he’s in great spirits.”

Martin announced right after the season Frink would have surgery on his knee, but it took a few weeks to get with Coronavirus putting pressure on hospitals this spring.

Frink had his surgery in early June, Martin said either the 5 or 6, and it was just a minor cleanup surgery to fix some lingering problems that had been nagging him during the season where he averaged 5.3 points and 3.7 rebounds.

Before his freshman season Frink had a more major surgery on his knee, which sidelined him for about six weeks, but this was a much more minor procedure.

“Unfortunately, he just got nicked up during the season. It wasn’t severe enough to need the surgery right away,” Martin said. “It’s more of a tune up or clean up that repairing anything. He’s in a great place.”

College basketball’s oversight committee approved this week a plan to allow teams to resume in-person workouts at eight hours per week starting July 20 and are allowed to go for eight weeks.

The original plan for the basketball team was to arrive back on campus at the end of June for Coronavirus testing and workouts but that’s been scrapped and the Gamecocks now will wait a few more weeks to bring their players back.

“It’ll be later. Instead of coming back sooner it’ll be later with the plan that once our guys get here they won’t leave and we’ll keep working out until the beginning of school,” Martin said. “That way we don’t have to leaving, coming back and testing and all the stuff they’d have to experience."

The Gamecocks are coming off an 18-13 season where they finished 10-8 in the SEC and were going to be in either the NCAA Tournament or NIT before the season was canceled because of COVID-19.

If AJ Lawson, who’s testing NBA Draft waters, returns to school, they’ll have eight of their 10 leading minute getters and scorers coming back for next season.