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What UVa. football, Mike London, can learn from UVa. basketball, Tony Bennett

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Mike-LondonPlenty of talk swirling around Wahoo Nation these days about what Mike London can learn from the success of the UVa. basketball program under Tony Bennett.

Five years ago, Bennett took over a reeling program from Dave Leitao, who had run the brand name into the ground after a brief flurry of success early in his tenure, a situation not unlike that faced by London, who took over a reeling UVa. football program from Al Groh, who had run that brand name into the ground (and then backed up and ran it over again for good measure).

Bennett, in his fifth year, is now in his second NCAA Tournament, this year as a #1 seed. His first appearance was two years ago. The program finished the regular season ranked #3 in the national polls. Looking back at what had looked to be a step-back year in 2012-2013, Bennett’s fourth year, in retrospect it’s clear that the just-missed NCAA bid (Virginia ended up in the NIT) was the result of Bennett not having arguably his best player, swingman Malcolm Brogdon, available due to a season-long injury.

The ship has been righted. The future is bright for Virginia basketball, perhaps brighter than it’s ever been, including the Ralph Sampson era, which many in Wahoo Nation thought was an era that could never be replicated, because when would UVa. ever again be able to recruit the nation’s best player, and keep him on Grounds for four years?

The future is brighter not because of one player; it’s brighter because Tony Bennett has a system, and recruits to that system. He doesn’t need Ralph Sampson to rematerialize; he has the Pack Line, the motion offense and the promise of playing time in a system that goes nine deep, and gets contributions from all nine (see Nolte, Evan).

What does Mike London not have? Any of that, especially in the form of any kind of system. What does Virginia football do on offense? London has dabbled in the spread, the pro-style, and now is trying to build a power running attack. Nothing has stuck. What about on defense? Jim Reid’s Ds did a fair job of keeping opponents off the scoreboard, but the system was more read-and-react, and that didn’t sit well with London or his higher-ups, so now Jon Tenuta is trying to blitz the heck out of opposing offenses.

How do you recruit to all that change? London has recruited reasonably well, as did his predecessor, Groh, whose program faltered in the end because he couldn’t get a grip on what he wanted to do on offense. As Bennett’s success would suggest, though, results on the court or playing field are as much a function of the system as they are the talent in the system.

Bennett will be able to replicate his success in future years because you have to assume that his ability to recruit is only going to get easier now that the program has had the results it has had this year, and thus the talent at his disposal to run the Pack Line and the motion offense is only going to get better.

London likely doesn’t get a chance to see past his fifth year in Charlottesville. After a 2-10 fourth year in 2013, he faces one of the toughest schedules in the country in 2014, and you have to assume that anything other than a .500 record (which would give him four losing seasons in five years) gets him bounced.

He’ll only have himself to blame. As the head coach of a major college program, your primary responsibility is to lay the foundation for what you want to do to win games, and then build on that foundation. Four-plus years in, and we still have no idea what Mike London has in mind in terms of what he wants to do to win games, other than recruiting talent to wear the orange and blue.

– Column by Chris Graham

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