People are sending me texts and emails suggesting that there’s something wrong with the planned celebration of legendary UVA Basketball coach Tony Bennett set for next month.
Seriously, folks, y’all need to get over yourselves.
One person specifically had a problem with a banner being raised at halftime of the Feb. 8 home game with Georgia Tech to honor Bennett.
“Not sure if I’m up for putting up a banner for Tony Bennett in the midst of our worst basketball season in decades, which many people blame him for,” one person texted.
“Many people.”
Sounds Trumpian.
Many people are saying the stollen election was about Hillary’s hacked emails …
“This is just trying to generate ticket sales,” one of my emailers wrote.
News flash: everything is about trying to generate ticket sales.
This one, with Bennett, is also about doing the right thing.
Before TB arrived, UVA Basketball had been lost in the wilderness, starting with the fall-off at the end of the Jeff Jones era (two losing seasons in three years), the entirety of Pete Gillen (a bunch of NITs, one NCAA Tournament first-round exit), the disaster that was Dave Leitao (he only got four years, lost at home to Liberty in the last one).
When I was working on the book on the history of University Hall in 2006, the chapter on the Ralph Sampson era was the toughest to write, because it was hard at that point to imagine UVA Hoops ever getting back to that level again.
ICYMI
The Embrace the Pace era reached full form in the aftermath of a Dec. 31, 2013 blowout loss at Tennessee. Virginia won its next three, lost in the final seconds at Duke, then ripped off 13 straight wins, beat Duke in Greensboro for the program’s first ACC Tournament championship in 38 years, and the next decade was glorious.
The 2014 season ended with a heartbreaking Sweet Sixteen loss, the 2016 team flamed out in the second half of the Elite Eight, UMBC happened in 2018, and then came the redemption of 2019, with nets being cut down in Minneapolis.
Bennett’s UVA teams won six ACC regular-season titles in his final 11 years – which is a lot, you know; doing the math, more than half of ‘em dating back to the night that Joe Harris got in his truck after getting back from Knoxville.
Yes, this season isn’t going well.
It happens.
Coach K and John Calipari both missed the 2021 NCAA Tournament (Duke was 13-11; Kentucky was 9-16).
Roy Williams was 14-19 when COVID hit in 2020, and Hubert Davis was preseason #1 going into 2022-2023, and that team didn’t get an NCAA bid.
Look, we’ve been spoiled, one, and two, we’ve been wronged.
Who woulda thunk back in 2019 that Tony would be sitting on his front porch in a rocking chair in 2025?
ICYMI
But also: who woulda thunk back in 2019 that the college basketball business would be in 2025 what it is now?
I get an up close and personal look at this stuff because of my job, and I’ll tell you, I wouldn’t want the job of a college football or men’s basketball coach for any amount of money.
It’s literally a 24/7/365 enterprise; what you see when you watch games on TV is just the tip of the iceberg.
Even during the season, coaches and their assistants are making touches with prep recruits, checking in on their guys, around babysitting their current roster, breaking down film, game planning for the next opponent.
It used to be, before the NIL/transfer portal era, that you’d get a break when your season is over, but now, the end of the season is the start of the portal season, which stretches into mid-May now.
Your guys are in summer school in June, and you’ve got the summer recruiting circuit to work, ahead of practice starting in October.
Rinse, repeat, and after a while, I don’t know how you don’t burn out.
When I said above that we’ve been wronged, it wasn’t Tony Bennett that wronged us.
No one person or entity did; it’s just, stuff happens.
ICYMI
Tony Bennett was the perfect coach for the University of Virginia, and then everything changed.
That just is what it is.
The part I wrote about us being spoiled, that’s because Tony was good at what he did, and we came to expect being in the mix in January, February, into March.
It’s fun cutting down nets, getting double-byes, #1 NCAA seeds.
This year is the first in forever when it feels like there’s nothing to get excited about.
Because of that, some of y’all – too many of y’all, if you ask me – want to raise a stink about honoring the guy who hung a national championship banner in our home arena.
Maybe just don’t go that day, would be my suggestion.
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Chris Graham
