This is a special treat, certainly for me, and hopefully for those reading as well. I sat down for a little roundtable text chat with both StLouHoo and SeattleHoo!
If you’re unfamiliar with either, SeattleHoo started Hoos Place back during the 2015-2016 season as an online video repository for UVa sports. The site expanded to full text articles in 2017 and ran through 2023. StLouHoo was a main contributor to the site and kept it running after SeattleHoo (I’m going to start abbreviating as “SH” and “STL” from here) stepped away around 2020. Sadly, the site is no longer around, but it was a great space for detailed UVa sports analysis for the better part of a decade. I got a chance to play around in the video repository when I was first starting this site, and I have to say that was a deep and really cool feature.
Interestingly, I connected with both independently of one another and with no connection to Hoos Place. When I was first starting out Cuts, SH reached out to offer encouragement and we would chat about the team. Back then, I was Cutting up games by short coding links to YouTube videos, which was a slow process and often crashed the site due to the number of active links (this still happens with the Tracking a Transfer pieces). SH, on his own time, coded the program I use now to Cut my videos; simply because he wanted to help me/the site out. And, if we’re honest, the site probably wouldn’t still be going if it wasn’t for this time save/relief on the bandwidth of the website. SH eventually stepped away from following the team as closely to focus on other things, but we reconnected after hearing this news.
STL, on the other hand, worked with SH for years on Hoos Place – but he and I weren’t in touch until this offseason as he was looking for an outlet to write (a passion we both share) without having the time to continue running a website. I’d honestly never considered having other people write for the site, but I’m glad that I did and consider STL a contributor for as long as he so chooses. It made me reconsider what this site could look like and the different kinds of content we could put out while still being under the thematic umbrella of deep dives on the team (and topics adjacent).
So, I was thrilled to be able to nab time with both to do something I’ve never done on the site before – have a more casual chat about the current state of the team with two experienced fans who have been analyzing and writing about the program for a while. Without further ado, here was that discussion:
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Cuts: Alright – thank you both for joining up for a little UVa b-ball chat. A much different outlook and lens of conversation than when we’d initially planned this (STL and I were going to do this together before the retirement news); but hopefully we can get into some thoughts on the retirement, the upcoming season, and the outlook for the future. I wrote a thing the other day just on Tony’s time with the program itself and the impact on me – but what have been your initial thoughts and reactions?
StLouHoo: I think it’s fair for fans to feel a multitude of ways right now.
Of course, any rational Wahoo is immensely grateful for the 15 years Tony Bennett gave us. Not just for the highest of highs in April of 2019, not even just for the run of banners hung starting in 2014, but for the way in which it was all accomplished. UVA’s players didn’t merely pay lip service to the Five Pillars; they overwhelmingly embodied them, both on the court and in the classroom and community. It wasn’t merely that they won so consistently, it was that this program was so easy to get behind and root for. And being appreciative of that culture of winning the right way all traces back to being appreciative of the man who built that culture from the ground up.
We can also be sad that it ended. Of course it was never going to last forever. I think most plugged-in UVA fans knew over the last couple years that Bennett was going to be closer to Jay Wright and Gary Williams in terms of post-title career trajectory than to Jim Boeheim. He just didn’t give off the “coaching well into his 70’s” kind of vibe. I was hoping he’d feel renewed enough to give us a few more years, of course. Perhaps the challenge of reinventing the offense and bouncing back from the whimpering finishes of the last few seasons would give him fresh purpose. I was, as was everyone else, floored by last week’s sudden news, and feeling shock, sadness, rejection, and frustration at that sudden loss is unavoidable. (This of course acknowledges that sports-fandom is oftentimes irrational, feeling emotional connection to coaches and players we don’t even personally know, but it is what it is, and it’s why the championship was so cathartic.)
I always hate the saying “don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened,” because it tries to deny an individual their right to process grief, whether strictly through the Kubler-Ross process or on whatever path they need to take. By all means, one should attempt not to wallow in the loss, and ultimately seek to get through to the other side, but feelings are natural and unavoidable.
The last area that fans may ultimately have conflicting feelings about is “the state of the game,” the quickly shifting landscape around NIL income, revenue, and the Transfer Portal that Tony Bennett referenced both in his retirement presser as well as in his interview with Matt Norlander. The increasingly “transactional” nature of the player-school relationship. Debating the changes to that landscape could fill multiple graduate theses, and this isn’t the venue to do so. But at the same time, I think it’s fair to acknowledge that alongside processing our feelings about Bennett’s retirement, many of us are also pondering what this says about the current and future state of the game, as well as our individual relationships with it.
SeattleHoo: Hi guys, glad I found my way here.
I can feel Tony because very similar things led me to quit following college basketball altogether back in March, and it was only news like this — the shocking nature of the timing — that could make me interested again. I’m grateful for this invitation because I have 44 years of UVA hoops fandom before I pulled the plug because, as I told Cuts in a DM last March, “I’m too old for something that makes me this angry.” I feel the same as Tony about the transition of college hoops from a [hybrid] personal development model to a strictly transactional model. I hate it, and I can tell Tony does too. I can almost hear him saying, “If I wanted to coach pros I would have an NBA team.”
I think having to rebuild a whole new roster every year was too much for him. I coached youth soccer for years at the premier level and that need to constantly re-recruit your own players and especially their parents really wore on me and was the biggest factor behind me quitting. The heartbreak every time you lose a player for reasons other than matriculation really grows.
I think Tony’s timing was because he really should have retired last March but got swept away and he just finally realized he could not do it anymore.
I think giving Ron an opportunity to show what he could do was a bonus, but I reject the premise that he calculated this timing to force Carla’s hand. If he did, it failed, because she said that the University will conduct a national search at the end of the season and Ron will have to show he really is the best man for the job. I have severe doubts about that given his mediocre track record at a good mid-major.
It did not shock me that Tony retired, but that he did so this close to the season. I was saying privately last spring that UVA would be looking for a new coach within 5 years, and I’m glad they will be doing it because Tony retired of his own free will. Otherwise, it would have been an ugly separation, because I became more and more convinced over the last two years that on-court results were not going to match the recruiting successes. Since 2020, he has brought in more consensus top 100 players more consistently than he did before the championship. The incoming talent level has been higher than ever while the results have been sliding.
That is mostly a function of running a basketball system predicated on experience in an environment where every year is a new start.
Ironically, it is the Dukes and Carolinas of the world who are more likely to have roster stability because their players can make more money at the school than in a pro league.
If you are playing Sides and Pack Line with first and second-year players against an opponent with third and fourth year players, you are going to be in trouble. We saw it often. We also saw that now that Tony is elite, and UVA is not a lower tier afterthought, more and more coaches have designed tactics specifically to defeat our system. That means the basketball system needed to be jettisoned and I just never believed that Tony would be willing to really commit to doing that.
Tony’s intent on doing things “My Way” serves him well in everything that is important in life and makes him a great leader, but it is fatal tactically when an environment changes completely.
Cuts: That’s a really great point about the Dukes and Carolinas of the world actually improving their stability in this environment. Obvious players like Bacot and RJ Davis but even less obvious ones like Proctor who might have previously bolted, coupled with them hitting the portal and still pulling top-end high school talent has tipped the scales back in their favor.
If you jettison the complexity and mastery of system on our end due to the roster fluidity, what path forward to you have to create a unique systemic advantage like Tony did when he first started? What does that look like for us in this new era now?
SeattleHoo: I think the only path forward is to find unique ways to use the moves and patterns the players have been learning their whole lives.
Tony tried to replicate that approach by recruiting guys who were playing for high school coaches who played Sides or Pack Line, but it didn’t really work because there aren’t enough of those.
StLouHoo: One does have to wonder if there might be some degree of Portal activity settling down in the coming years. First, there’s been a degree of novelty for players finally being “freed,” and there’s been a quick overreaction from players and their inner circles (perhaps parents and HS/AAU coaches) to think that there’s greener grass elsewhere. Perhaps a few years of seeing mixed results has the community largely rethinking that premise, and at least a little more often players being willing to stay the course where they’re at. (I’ve always been a believer in the thinking that often, the grass is actually greenest where you water it.)
A bigger factor in the Portal mania quieting will hopefully be the end of the COVID-eligible player base. The HS class of 2020, entering their 5th seasons of college basketball this year, is effectively the last class to be eligible for the COVID bonus year, and the presence of these players over the last four years has created a surplus of players both on rosters and in the Portal, all fighting for what was the same fixed number of rotation spots on the same number of teams as before. Maybe this is just naive hope, but it is possible that Portal activity could decrease as a result of this glut of older players finally aging out. (Bennett mentioned this specifically at his ACC Media Days presser.)
That said, ultimately a coach is going to have to really think hard about the players he’s recruiting and what his short- and long-term plans are for developing them. Win now coaches will continue to be tempted to grab immediate impact transfers to over-recruit their young homegrown guys who may still need some seasoning. We’ve seen Bennett do this to some degree over the last 3-4 seasons even. The temptation to grab the next Sam Hauser when a Justin McKoy is on the bench is always there, and then you end up a season or two later with Jayden Gardner (love his effort, but we have to acknowledge his generally low ceiling) forcing promising rookies like Isaac Traudt and Igor Milicic to ride pine.
UVA moving forward, whether with Ron Sanchez this year or a potential replacement next season and beyond, will have to have an existential debate about whether to prioritize internal development (with the rocky learning curves that entails) or go for broke every season by chasing a fresh crop of veterans in the Portal, the latter of which ultimately becomes a tough year-over-year cycle to break.
Cuts: Yeah, fair. I’m not as optimistic about the portal slowing down and so a big part of the answer has to, at least for now but probably for the foreseeable future, be willing to play in that space. It does sound like we’ve been pushing hard in that direction from an administrative standpoint.
But the other element that has to be there is through the head coach. You need someone who is going to be a draw in and of themselves, and ideally who does something that can elevate on court performance more than most coaches out there. Really, Tony was the perfect person to fit that mold if he had been willing to be malleable in other ways. He had a gravity about him in terms of drawing interest, and Tony coaching the Pack Line is still a huge weapon for a program; even if it’s not as big of one as using it with players who had been playing it for 3 and 4 years. If you make more adjustments to execution where needed and let guys play through more mental mistakes… you’re still in great shape.
So, with that gone – where do you turn? I have some skepticism that you get what you need there by simply turning to your assistant coaches and am probably more inclined to try to find the unique advantage that was Tony Bennett again, just perhaps with a different system or philosophy. But I suppose that’s the silver lining of this upcoming season is that you get to see it firsthand and assess that yourself. At least the on-court element.
What do you guys make of the timing and how that plays out for all parties involved (administration, coaches, players, program as a whole)?
SeattleHoo: Can we make a run at Dawn Staley? If I had one dream successor, it would be Dawn Staley.
StLouHoo: The bottom line is that Tony’s choice of timing doesn’t really leave a lot of room for any of the AD, the coaches, or the players to make any meaningful moves at this juncture.
From Carla Williams’ perspective, all she can do is get the search firm queued up (which it may have been already given Tony’s uncertain feelings last spring) and wait for March to do anything else. About the only other thing on the administration’s plate is to keep the donors warm and try to rally fan interest in the program post-Bennett, but that was coming soon anyways.
For the players, it’s effectively too late to transfer for this upcoming season. They’ve got about two weeks to make a very hard choice whether to play for Sanchez or shut their season down proactively, preserve the year of eligibility, and go through the transfer process next spring. I don’t envy any of the players in this instance; they all committed to play for Bennett, and they’re within their right to feel victims of a bait-and-switch. I will be on pins and needles for the next two weeks waiting to see if anyone on the roster ultimately doesn’t make it to opening day on Nov 6th.
For the coaches (both Sanchez and his assistants), the team’s been practicing the Pack Line and the new-look offense for a while now, so it’s too late to make any wholesale changes to systems. Sure, there can be tweaks based upon scrimmage results and player development, but I doubt there’s room to do much beyond refinement ahead of the start of the season.
However, the coaches do need to finalize starting and rotation decisions, same as Bennett was going to have to do. Aside from maybe Saunders and McKneely, there was already a ton of uncertainty on starting lineups at this stage. Looking at the other “starters” from the Blue-White Scrimmage: Blake Buchanan has had trouble staying healthy this Summer and Fall, Jalen Warley plateaued at FSU as a replacement-level starter in the ACC, and TJ Power is basically a 5-star rookie. Plenty of (mostly obvious) questions surround everyone else on the roster.
On one hand, the abundance of youth (or more accurately, the lack of proven veterans) on this team basically guarantees Sanchez is forced to play talented underclassmen for better or worse. Sanchez is in as “win now” a state as a coach can be, being an interim coach with one season to prove himself, so the earlier discussion about prioritizing veteran transfers over younger talent for at least this season is kind of moot. But on the other hand, the lack of proven veterans near guarantees a rocky ride that could ultimately submarine any chance Sanchez otherwise had of securing the job long term.
Regarding coaching candidates for next season, I hesitate to consider any coach who’s arguably in “too good a situation to leave,” whether that’s Shaka Smart on the men’s side or Dawn Staley on the women’s. But regardless, so much can change on that front over the next 5 months, it’s tough to consider any specific candidate over the field.
Cuts: That’s the crux – will anyone go, if so, how impactful will it be for this season? Because really there’s so much at stake this year now – probably between whether our program remains in the same image or looks entirely different come next.
SeattleHoo: With Dawn the key questions would be: How ambitious is she? and How confident is she?
Sorry, but I think this year just became a throwaway season and if I were in Sanchez’s position, that would be my message to the players.
StLouHoo: You would tell the players “This year is a throwaway, consider this an audition opportunity for next year’s Transfer Portal?”
Cuts: I love the idea of Dawn. She is so good at what she does and bringing her back to the school would be wonderful. I would absolutely love to see her be the first to cross-over, and I think she would be one of the few who could generate true excitement in the wake of Tony. That being said, there’s way more resistance to that idea than I expect wherever I see it discussed, which is discouraging.
I don’t actually much care, though, and think it would be worth it.
To STL’s point, I don’t think Sanchez can afford to position it like that considering this is his tryout season.
SeattleHoo: I would tell the players, “This year is a throwaway, we’re screwed anyway, so just play for your love of the game and to develop your game.”
“And for each other…”
Cuts: I would try to find a way to have the players rally around each other, yeah.
SeattleHoo: The future is now and all we have is ourselves.
Cuts: Back to Dawn for a second – I’m not sure what she would have to gain, either. She could stay at SC and dominate for as long as she wants, it seems, but I love the idea of her being a trailblazer and think that would be really exciting. Plus, it would be swinging really big in the wake of Tony – which is where my head is – we should swing big.
SeattleHoo: I think talking about Dawn is a diversion here – and yes I know I brought her up – but I just want to say that if she is the type of person who wants new challenges, taking the chance to succeed at a new level and to make history, then it would be attractive, maybe even more attractive than staying at SC.
Cuts: Agreed – not the most realistic but a fun thought. I’m also not at the point of wanting to go through a list of coaching options next offseason either. Cross that bridge. It’s more of a “keep or search” decision at some point probably around February or March.
So that brings us back to this season under Sanchez. What does success look like? What would you guys need to see to feel comfortable that removing the interim label is the best option rather than conducting the full national search?
SeattleHoo: I have no real knowledge or interest in this season, but as to the second question, NOTHING would make me comfortable removing the interim label and just giving him the permanent job. He could win the national championship and it wouldn’t tell me he is ready to be the leader of a flagship program. There is so much more to it than taking a set of players you were handed and doing great things in one season.
Regardless of what happens this season, I would want the University to conduct a thorough search and compare Sanchez to other possible candidates.
Cuts: Agreed on the second point because you need to know what options are out there regardless and sustaining a program is a different question. But, practically speaking, we know that there will be a lot of pressure to carry on Tony’s legacy and wishes if Sanchez is able to put some wind in the sails and if he were to have some postseason success. So, in a hypothetical world where they evaluate the season, still conduct a search, but select Ron, what would you need to see from the team to buy into that decision/feel good about it?
StLouHoo: I think ultimately early season struggles would be forgivable. Games in November and December are effectively house money games given the upheaval. Obviously, no one wants to see us go 0-6 against our early-season high-major opponents, especially not if many of those losses are blowouts, and we especially don’t want to see a game dropped to one of our six buy-game opponents. But really the key is going to be how well Ron can get the team to rally back from early season struggles in a way we used to see Tony able to do.
As such I don’t necessarily think making the NCAA Tournament is a non-negotiable threshold Sanchez must reach, much less winning a game or two in it. I do believe he can at least make a solid case for himself if we miss the Dance but at the same time see the team really coming together down the stretch in ACC play, especially if a lot of that is on the back of a core of young players committed to coming back to play for him again in ’25-26.
I’m not saying that alone guarantees him the job long-term, mind you, especially if other “better” options are legitimately available. But I do think that at least gets him due consideration in the wider hunt.
Of course, then you have to ask what kind of result would effectively win him the job going into the offseason, where he enters a wider search with the job as his to lose. That I’m not sure about, but probably requires the kind of Top 4 ACC finish / wins in the NCAA Tournament results that frankly I think were a longshot for this team even with Bennett at the helm.
SeattleHoo: I want to build on what my good friend StLouHoo said here. I think what he says about season success is rational and relevant.
StLouHoo: (Laughs)
SeattleHoo: And I think that “due consideration” is all he should be able to earn with results this season. I would be disappointed in the decision-makers if he were able to effectively win the job.
I just have a very hard time getting over his Charlotte results, especially when you have a guy like Bucky McMillan at Samford in – I believe – that same conference.
Cuts: Yeah, I think it kind of speaks to the challenge ahead of Sanchez here that I’m in a similar boat where it would be hard to convince me that if you open a national search that our best option is already in house; despite the legacy of it all. Plus, Carla has signaled that she feels similarly.
SeattleHoo: But let me say that I have like three biases working against Sanchez in my estimations: 1) I don’t like the strong Christianity angle, never did, tolerated it because Tony was so unique; 2) I don’t like the Pack Line/defense dominated basketball philosophy; and 3) I don’t like legacy hires. I like to see new thinking and one thing I have thought lately is that Tony’s coaching staff and collective thinking got stale.
Kind of like Duke, it just got too in-house for my taste.
StLouHoo: I do agree that the staff had become a little too much of an echo chamber for my liking under Bennett. It started with the hire of Brad Soderberg in 2015 to replace McKay; going back to the Dick Bennett coaching tree to fill a staff vacancy. We would later see internal promotions of guys like Orlando Vandross and Kyle Getter [who had been under McKay at Liberty prior] and former players turn GA turn assistant in Chase Coleman and Isaiah Wilkins. This came to a head last offseason when Getter’s vacancy was filled not with an outside voice but with the return of Sanchez, and this offseason saw Kyle Guy take a spot on the bench despite having no coaching experience prior.
I get that there’s a degree of hypocrisy in criticizing legacy/nepotism hires when Dick Bennett doing the same 20 years ago is a big part of the reason why we have a national championship banner hanging in JPJ today. But I still struggle with them, as it can long-term create a “yes man” culture and eliminate the opportunity for fresh new perspectives to be injected to help the organization mature, evolve, and compete. One thing I always respected about Nick Saban was his willingness to go get outsiders and disruptors for his coordinator hires rather than merely promote from within.
Cuts: I think all of those three points that SH mentioned can be either strengths or weaknesses of a program depending on how you handle it – but I do think it’s hard to replicate a program exactly the way such a special coach like Tony could without that special person around. It’s a challenge to shake certain habits or thought processes without fresh perspectives and there’s a real threat to fall into a “lite” version of what the program was. That’s a big part of what I’ll be keeping an eye on this coming season re: how different does it all really look/feel under Sanchez?
Familiar isn’t bad, but the more different and refreshing probably the better for him.
I should add that I am very interested in the upcoming season for that very point and that will be the main factor that helps my comfort level if we do end up selecting Sanchez permanently. How much does it feel like distinctly his program and in what ways have we evolved – because we will need to evolve to thrive and to make a compelling case for the future.
StLouHoo: At the end of the day, a couple results will matter most over the next five months: wins and losses, team chemistry, and support of the fans and donors. I have zero idea how those things turn out; but will be on the edge of my seat watching to find out.
SeattleHoo: Yeah, let me be clear, I’m really not that interested because I remain firm in my decision to walk away. Life is less stressful, I’m a better husband, I have other interests, and I just am not interested in sports for money, so I won’t be watching and have nothing more than the “like to see my community be successful” interest in it. Most of this is just an intellectual exercise for me. What is of interest to me is reflecting on what Tony’s tenure meant to me, because it did mean a lot and was an amazing experience until it was not.
Maybe if we did get Dawn to come home I would stick around, but….
I would like to say a few words about what Tony’s tenure meant to me.
The twelve years from 1996 to 2008 were tough on me as a die-hard Hoo fan. First the Jeff Jones regime imploded, then Pete Gillen flopped and Dave Leitao flamed out, each resulting in acrimonious coaching change arguments. So much bad luck and so many bad apples, that when the Leitao era came to its ignominious end I decided I needed to step back to protect my heart. This Tony Bennett guy sounded like a good guy but was certainly controversial, and after the failed hires before him, I was going to need proof before I got excited again.
January 2014, I had moved to Seattle and lost my family, and UVA had just lost to Duke on a fluke last second shot in Cameron, and a UVA game was on TV. This was before the days when all the games were streamed and getting a game in Seattle was not a given. I watched and became instantly excited by what I saw. The players were obviously well coached, executed the fundamentals flawlessly, and the motion was exquisite. Watching that team was like watching the old Dean Smith teams; just a well-drilled group of young men confident in their patterns and working together. After years of watching scrappy UVA teams battle better-coached opponents, the Hoos were the better-coached team game in and game out.
There was a real sense of mission during that time from 2014 through April 2019, especially after Myron Medcalf wrote his article in January 2015, “Is Virginia Bad for Basketball?” and it seemed like it was the whole college basketball world against Virginia. Every victory, every banner, every triumph was vindication – and every heartbreaking tournament loss was a burr in the saddle. Running Hoos Place, breaking down video, archiving highlights and generating stats was a labor of love and felt like contributing to something.
The best thing Tony Bennett did was give us a team for which it was a joy to root. Such great young men who represented what we hoped we could be, out there fighting with their whole soul to represent, it felt good to be a UVA fan. No matter the prospects, even with bitter losses, it was always a pleasure to watch them play. That was the main thing: I loved watching them play. You always knew they would never stop battling, and at the end of the game, regardless of outcome, you would know they had done the very best they could.
So many great moments over five years, even when the season ended badly, you could go back and enjoy the journey. That 2018 team that lost to UMBC was right up until that very day one of the best, most dominant teams in ACC history. Epic wins and epic moments like Dre Hunter’s dunk on Carolina and Ty Jerome’s dagger in Cameron.
The 2019 NCAA Tournament was one of the most amazing experiences of my life, and I was blessed enough to be in the building when Tony earned his first trip to the Final Four, bringing Virginia back to the Promised Land for the first time in 35 years. I watched in despair as Purdue gathered the offensive rebound to go to the line and make an insurmountable lead, then burst into tears when Jerome missed the free throw and it was over — but no! Undersized freshman Kihei Clark ran the ball down and fired a perfect pass to Mamadi Diakite of all people for the tie at the buzzer. The most amazing play in tournament history to end regulation in one of the best games ever played. Literally from agony to ecstasy in a second. I knew the Hoos would win in overtime. Then I was there to watch Tony cut down the net and issue his barbaric Yawp to the world. He yawped for all of us that night. The Final Four was almost anticlimactic.
Almost.
Nobody will ever be able to take that National Championship away from us and Tony gave it to us. For that and for the five-year run I will be eternally grateful. The five years since then were difficult and mostly disappointing; but you still knew you were getting the very best effort and a group of fine young men were putting their hearts and souls into it. Always easy to root for, to the very end, even if that end was so heartbreaking.
The game has changed. Tony was master of a different era. He was Obi-Wan; a master and teacher in a more civilized age. He is out of place in this mercenary game, and I am happy for him. I will always be grateful for the chance I had to have just a tiny part of something Great and something Good. It’s just so rare in this world. As rare as Tony Bennett.
Cuts: That’s an awesome note to wrap on. One thing I’ve seen and felt, heartwarmingly so, after writing my piece on his retirement, is that SO many fans have stories like this about what Coach Bennett meant to them. I really appreciate you sharing yours and couldn’t agree more.
Alright, I want to thank you both so much for taking the time to sit down and chat with me – and on a personal note – for the support you’ve given to me and the site over the past few years. I enjoyed the discussion and hope that we can do it again sometime.
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Thanks to everyone for reading – am interested in opinions on the format or any recommendations on how to shape content line this in the future. You can reach any of us here:
Cuts: @CutsfromCorner
StLouHoo: @HoosPlace
SeattleHoo: @SeattleHoo
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