Posts tagged Tony Bennett
UVa Hoops picked to finish 11th
Oct 26th
Tony Bennett’s men’s basketball team has been picked by the media to finish next-to-last in the ACC this year:
Duke and North Carolina tied for first place in the voting by media representatives participating in the preseason poll with 545 points. Duke had 25 first place votes, North Carolina 20, Georgia Tech two and Wake Forest had one first place vote. Clemson was third in the poll with 409 points followed by Georgia Tech (387), Maryland (378), Wake Forest (315), Florida State (314), Virginia Tech (273), Boston College (251), Miami (135), Virginia (116) and NC State (76).
Duke’s Kyle Singler was the selection as the conference’s preseason Player of the Year and Georgia Tech’s Derrick Favors was selected as the ACC preseason Rookie of the Year.
The five-man preseason All-ACC Team included Greivis Vasquez (Maryland), Trevor Booker (Clemson), Kyle Singler (Duke), Malcolm Delaney (Virginia Tech) and Ed Davis (North Carolina). Virginia’s Sylven Landesberg finished sixth in the voting.
Frankly, I’m pretty happy with the 11th place prediction. I am surprised the Hoos aren’t picked to finish dead last. Last night, I read the annual Sporting News college basketball preview magazine, and they had Virginia finishing 12th.
Look, low expectations are great for Coach Bennett. I will go on the record now, however, and predict that there’s no way in the world UVa finishes 11th or 12th in the ACC. I expect the Hoos to outperform expectations. They aren’t going to be in the top half of the league, but I think they’ll finish ahead of Miami and NC State, at least. The Hoos are going to surprise a few folks with their tenacity on the defensive end.
Also nice to see Sylven Landesberg get some love. No, he wasn’t named to the preseason All-ACC first team, but to finish sixth as a sophomore from the team picked to finish 11th…well, not bad. It will be interesting to see how Landesberg improves as a leader with this crew in 2009-10.
I think we’re going to have lots of fun watching the Hoos this winter, if we aren’t expecting miracles from the new coach.
Defense?
Oct 22nd
Every time I read another article about the beginning of basketball practice for Tony Bennett’s team, I get more excited for the season to finally tip off. The latest is from Michael Phillips in the Richmond Times-Dispatch:
Tony Bennett has been running basketball practices at U.Va. for a week now. In that time, and since workouts started this fall, the players have learned a few things about him.
The 40-year-old coach is a big fan of the movie “Rocky,” and says he wants to install a “bulldog mentality” among this year’s Cavaliers. He’s old enough that he’s taken up golf, but young enough that he carries around an iPod. He also remembers what it’s like to be a player, and plans drills accordingly.
But above all, the players have learned this: They will play strong defense this year.
Defense? What’s that?
Go read the entire article and see if you can avoid getting a bit excited to see what the Hoos are going to look like on the court this season. It’s going to be a new-look squad, and I think people are going to be happy.
Basketball practice begins
Oct 18th
Video from the first men’s basketball practice is up now at VirginiaSportsTV.com. I’m really looking forward to seeing the Tony Bennett era begin at JPJ. Bennett was an inspired hire, and I think he’s the perfect fit for Virginia.
Time will tell.
