Bennett ready to take ‘thin’ team to season opener

The losses of Assane Sene and Jamil Tucker will make an already thin UVa. frontcourt that much thinner.

“It makes us, I guess, thin, on more of the forward or front-line type of things,” ‘Hoos coach Tony Bennett said on the eve of his first game on the sidelines at the John Paul Jones Arena, Friday night against Longwood.

The announcement regarding Tucker, a 6-9 senior who averaged 7.4 points per game off the bench last season, came down today. Tucker is taking what is being called “an indefinite leave of absence” from the team, according to a statement released by the UVa. athletics department Wednesday afternoon.

Bennett did not address the Tucker departure directly in a news-conference call with reporters later Wednesday afternoon. Sene, a 7-foot sophomore, was suspended for the first three games of the 2009-2010 season “for conduct detrimental to the team” last week.

Audio from Tony Bennett’s news-conference call
______________________________________________________
[audio:http://media.libsyn.com/media/thenewdominion01/ACCVIRGINIA.COM_Tony_Bennett.mp3] ______________________________________________________

With junior Mike Scott coming back from an injury suffered in Virginia’s closed scrimmage with St. John’s over the weekend, Bennett put out there the possibility of going with a four-guard lineup at times early on.

“It makes us, I guess, expand a little bit without that depth. But we move forward,” said Bennett, who replaces Dave Leitao as head coach after leading Washington State to back-to-back NCAA Tournament appearances in 2007 and 2008.

He’s still getting a feel for his new charges in Charlottesville.
“There have been some moments were I certainly have been pleased (with our progress), and there have been some times where we’ve taken some steps back,” Bennett said. “The challenge really for us as we talk about it is not going back to zero. Part of progressing, part of building up, is to improve, to try to be able to sustain a little longer, get some improvement. There are going to be some times where you take some steps back, but to never try to go back to zero, as far as where we started from. We want to keep building on that, knowing there will be some ups and downs.”

　

– Story by Chris Graham

 

[polldaddy poll=2241069]