Tony Bennett renews his roster-building philosophy and picks up the pace – The Cavalier Daily

This season ACC Basketball Tips Media day came with all the familiar trappings. There were the same pit stops in the radio row. The same shouting from the reporters. The same coach Tony Bennett who is up there on the podium dispensing wisdom.

However, there was something wrong with his words. They sounded different. Strange. Even strange. It was clear that changes had occurred on an unprecedented scale.

Take this answer from junior guard Isaac McKneely in response to a question about offensive changes.

“We’re pushing the transition a little bit,” McKneely said. “We try different things. I think we have a really good staff this year, a lot of guys that can stretch the floor and shoot.”

Pushing the transition, trying different things and stretching the floor? That sounds like an abomination. Virginia is said to be stubbornly rooted in her style and resistant to change. Not anymore, it seems.

“You have to look at your model and adjust it a little bit,” Bennett said.

This is the matter-of-fact, unceremonious admission that many have been waiting for for a decade. Some, fans and foes alike, have always scoffed at the slow pace and commitment to developing lower-ranked recruits over a period of three or four years.

But the victories continued, the program achieved elite status and a national title followed in 2019 – a lasting endorsement. However, things have changed. Virginia has not won an NCAA tournament game since the national title.

Last season, Bennett's 15th at Virginia, invited some serious introspection. Virginia fell in a First Four game to Colorado State and then put up 42 points in a standalone game. Bennett asked a question about his system after the game.

“It’s painful to get to this point and not move forward,” Bennett said. “So of course we have to continue to add good players. We certainly need to look at things from a systems standpoint. Absolutely.”

That comment sparked speculation that the coach was finally adjusting his system. The rumblings grew as the offseason wore on, a quiet but increasingly intense whisper that something had indeed changed after all these years.

The Blue-White Battle on October 5th seemed to confirm It. The attack looked noticeably different – the shots were fired faster, the guards initiated the attack earlier. But hearing it from the mouths of players and coaches is something completely different.

“It was exciting,” senior guard Taine Murray said. “Changing parts of the offense but also maintaining the foundation of the program is important, especially on defense by taking good shots and taking care of the ball.”

Of course, some things never change. Defense still comes first. That fact will always be true for a Bennett-led team.

“You can expect a tough, determined defensive team like we always are,” McKneely said. “But I think you’re going to expect a different type of offense this year.”

More than just the pace of the game changes. Bennett has also adjusted his player development model Changes The changing landscape of college sports has forced coaches to rethink how they build their rosters.

Bennett has always been an oddity among elite program administrators in the way he recruited. Most target the highest-profile recruits in a one-and-done model and build rosters that change every year.

Virginia was different. Bennett has never been a five-star recruit out of high school. He preferred the model of keeping the players he believed in for four years and developing them during that time. Now he thinks differently.

“We’re thinking in two-year increments with this team,” Bennett said. “You can’t say we’re going to develop guys for three, four, five years.”

The reason for this are changes to the transfer portal. That's because of the rise of “name, image and likeness” that has turned college sports into what Bennett calls the “wild, wild West.”

Bennett knows players may be fleeing for greener pastures. But he hopes to keep the tentacles of his development model and shorten it to two years while entering the transfer portal.

“Of course the boys could be upset at the end of the year? “Could one or two people go?” Bennett said. “Maybe. But if you manage to keep a nucleus together for at least two years and look at it like that, then it develops.”

The whole view changes. This also applies to Virginia. It remains to be seen how well the changes will play out in reality, but for now, even as words at a media event a few weeks before the season, they herald a new era.