The I Love CVille Show With Jerry Miller! - Ryan Odom Announced As UVA Head Coach; Thoughts On The Ryan Odom Press Conference

Episode Date: March 25, 2025

The Jerry & Jerry Show headlines: Ryan Odom Announced As UVA Head Coach Thoughts On The Ryan Odom Press Conference Longwood Coach Griff Aldrich Hired At UVA Will Odom Retain Current UVA Assistant Coaches? STAB’s Chance Mallory Recommits To Wahoos 6 Hoos In Transfer Portal, Including McKneely Is Odom’s First Year Projected As A Rebuild? Who Will UVA Target With NIL & Transfer Portal? Read Viewer & Listener Comments Live On-Air Jerry Ratcliffe & Jerry Miller were live on The Jerry & Jerry Show! The Jerry & Jerry Show airs live Tuesday from 10:15 am – 11:15 pm on The I Love CVille Network. Watch and listen to The Jerry & Jerry Show on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, iTunes, Apple Podcast, YouTube, Spotify, Fountain, Amazon Music, Audible and iLoveCVille.com.

Good Tuesday morning, guys. My name is Jerry Miller, and thank you for joining us on the Jerry and Jerry Show, an hour talk show that highlights spotlights and showcases the Virginia Sports Hall of Famer Jerry Hootie-Rackliff. He just concluded his 51st straight ACC basketball tournament. His website, jerryrackliff.com, is exploding with web traffic. And that usually happens when you officially hire a new head basketball coach. And that's what happened at the John Paul Jones Arena, a press conference that kind

of dotted the I's and crossed the T's, if you may. Ryan Odom slips and slides down Interstate 64, comes to Charlottesville, and in a sharp suit, ladies and gentlemen, wearing a UVA tie with the creme de la creme of Virginia basketball in attendance, Ryan Odom just absolutely, I think, hit a grand slam with his press conference. He was telling stories of his time growing up from third grade to ninth grade at U Hall.

His father, Dave Odom, an assistant coach under Terry Holland. He was talking about ball-boying and kind of peeking into the huddle of Dean Smith in North Carolina, how he lived two doors down from Terry Holland, and how his father Dave didn't like that the house had no air condition. So they had to get window units because Dave got hot in the Charlottesville summer. And how he had to spend the nighters at Jim Laranaga's house.

And Coach Laranaga, an assistant under Terry Holland, would bring in some popcorn and some movies. I mean, it was just a trip down memory lane. I thought a special time for someone who's followed the Virginia program, like all of us. We're going to highlight Hootie here. You, the viewer and listener, I see 15 states on the show. If you have a question, put them in the feed

and we'll pass them along to the Virginia Sports Hall of Famer. We give props to Judah Wickauer, the Elmer's glue of this team. He's the man. He is an absolute man. If you can go to the studio camera and welcome, I don't think I've ever seen him wear the US Open quarter zip over here. He's looking quite good over here.

OK. Hootie Radcliffe, good to see you. Good to see you too. You're on the Jumbotron. You get the first question of the media. The first question was Jeff White, but he works for the athletic department. First question from the media was for you.

Scatter shooting, we start open ending. what did you make of the press conference yesterday? I agree with you. I think he hit a home run that he said all the right things, had great answers to every question and he got them all smoothly and intelligently and eloquently, and I thought, I don't think he could have done any better, really. I thought it was a perfect press conference, and it was great to see. Who'd you see? Give us the who's who of who you saw.

Well, I didn't get to see everybody, obviously, because I was working and trying to get some interviews after. I saw a lot of former Virginia players there. Ricky Stokes, Ralph Sampson, Jimmy Miller, Jeff Jones. Of course, Craig Littlepage was there. Wally was there. Wally Walker, Barry Parkhill. I'm sure I'm probably leaving somebody out, but there were tons of people. I talked to Griff Aldrich. I talked to Dave Odom and his wife,

who reads my website, which if she reads it, you guys should read it. Ryan Odom, when your name was highlighted, that you were going to ask a question, he perked up. He knew exactly who you were. You were exactly your brand, your media, everything. Yeah, he said, oh hey. Yeah. And his brother, Elaine, was there. I talked to him. Gosh, so many people from the past. Sports information director, Rich Murray and his wife,

lovely wife, Joe. Rich, great guy. Yeah. Robert Hardy was there. Joe Geek, Sally, his wife. Joe was there. Yeah. Love Joe Geek. And his wife Sally.

Cowboy boots. Cowboy hat, cowboy boots. Some things never change. That's right. So many former Virginia sports connected people, and it was glorious to see them all. It was like a reunion. It was fun.

It was fun to watch. It was fun to see you on the- Chance Mallory was there. I was going to ask you. Fun to see you on the Jumbotron. Judah Wickhauer, we got a lot of headlines that we're going to have to rotate on screen as Hootie and I hop around here on what was an historic day for Virginia

basketball. All right, the Ryan Odom news, I think it's fantastic. I wish him nothing the best. This was a secret that was out there. Not a very well-kept secret. And maybe it had to be out there. And maybe that's the first question. Maybe the secret had to be out there to get a recommitment from Chance

Mallory, Judah. Chance Mallory headline on screen. Did the secret have to be out there to get Chance Mallory to stay here in Charlton? Well, I think it certainly was a key in convincing Chance Mallory to change his mind and recommit. Talking to his coach, Damon Altizerizer after his press conference last Saturday over at St. Anne's, Damon said I was openly a BYU fan last Thursday hoping that VCU would lose so that Ryan Odom would be available to let, you know, so something would happen because... I think every Virginia fan wanted VCU to lose. Every VCU fan.

Not because it's VCU, but just because of the timing. Because of this. Because if they had kept winning and he couldn't accept the job unless they were doing something behind the scenes, Chance had to make a decision. And well, he didn't have to, but he had set his mind to. So I got the, I got the idea from Damon that had that drug on that, and Chance didn't know who the coach was going to be he might have gone elsewhere even though he didn't want to go elsewhere.

Right he wanted to say in Charlottesville a couple interesting things came from the Chance Mallory commitment. First he offered his commitment to not only the team but the commitment to Charlottesville as a city and as a community. He was very proud of Charlottesville. Very proud of Charlottesville. And I as a fan and someone who under you, when I work for the Daily Progress for you, you sent me all the time to cover St. Ann's-Belfield, an athletic department with legacy and lineage

and talent and a hall of fame that would make a lot of schools jealous. And for a young man who is a hop skip and a jump literally from the John Paul Jones Arena where he's playing basketball, I mean, he could walk there to stay in Charlottesville. That is a big time story. And I also want to highlight this, and I hope the viewers and listeners that gave me some friction and some resistance, because I've questioned some of the decisions

that Carla Williams has made, the athletic director. Chance Mallory highlighted that athletic director Carla Williams was an important aspect of his commitment or recommitment to UVA Hootie. Yeah, yeah, give her props for keeping him at bay and trying to keep him interested in the program. She did an excellent job with that and I'm not afraid to say that. She's also done a good job in trying to raise the, and we'll talk about this later, but the NIL funds over there just making the

commitment or convincing the powers of B to make a commitment and turning Barry Parkhill loose to raise the money. And he's done an incredible job bringing in funds for the NIL. But yeah, she did a great job. I don't know if babysitting is the right word, but she did a good job of recruiting, recruiting and keeping Chance in the fold. And I'm sure that Chance's parents, Joe and Dory, were very appreciative of that. Renee Pettiford, she's one of our top fans on the program. She says she loves Ryan Odom, she loves Carla Williams. She says he's from my hometown of Durham.

She's so happy that Chance committed, or committed to Virginia recommitted. John Allison watching the program, he's got a comment. I like the Ryan Odom pick. His first recruiting pick up will be fun to watch and build the rest of the roster and staff. He highlights Chance a comment. I like the Ryan Odom pick his first recruiting pickup will be fun to watch him build the rest of the roster And staff he highlights chance Mallory. I mean you could build a program around chance Mallory. Absolutely I mean this guy especially the style of play that Odom likes to play Why don't we start open ended with Chance Mallory the question in today's era and I don't think it's uncouth

To ask the question or have the conversation And I don't think it's uncouth to ask the question or have the conversation. How much is a guy like Chance Mallory making? Anthony Colandrea, 800K to quarterback a subpar Virginia football team in front of an empty stadium. Chance Mallory's got to be making more than that. I mean, you would think so. We're not privy to that information.

But if Anthony Colandrea was worth 800,000, certainly Chance Mallory is worth more than that. Right. And I don't know how they determine those figures. I'm going to have to ask somebody, some of the coaches or people over there, how you evaluate that. And but I would say he's being rewarded handsomely and should be under today's standards.

He highlighted Chance Mallory after making his announcement that he loved the style of play that Ryan Odom was going to roll out. He said it's going to be a lot of pressing, a lot of up tempo, a lot of three-point shooting, a lot of little guard play. Chance Mallory's words, obviously words that he's heard from Coach Odom. How does that style of play differ?

And I think I know your answer for the current style of play. And then a better part question would be, how does that style of play? Is it conducive with the current roster? Yeah, well, those are good points. And my good friend Scott German said that even though Ryan Odom plays a much faster pace and presses defensively, if you look

at the number of possessions, and I haven't done this but Scott did there's not that many more possessions by VCU than there was by Virginia, but it's just a style play Ryan Explained yesterday how when he was a player at Hampton, Sydney under Tony Shavers, who went on to coach at other schools. William & Mary, Virginia legend in basketball. Yeah, really good coach, who learned under Dean Smith and fell in love with fast paced basketball and that's still what Carolina plays. But still what Carolina plays. But it will be a much faster pace,

and there will be pressing on defense, which leads and bleeds into the next question that you had about the current roster. You have to ask if some of these guys can play that style of basketball. And that may be a determining factor on whether or not they stay or transfer, or even whether Ryan Wood wants them to stay or not. He and Aldrich, Kyle Guy, Isaiah, Chase Coleman, and

Mike Curtis, the strength coach worked those guys out yesterday a couple hours before the press conference in the practice gym at JPJ. So he wanted to get a close up look at those players and see what they're made of. And that's got to be a factor in the weather, their decisions and his decisions on who stays and who goes. Jeremy Wilson is watching in Tennessee, I believe. Is that correct, Mr. Wilson? He asked this question. Will Tony Bennett play any role with this program? The torch has been passed. This is not a Tony Bennett program anymore. Tony Bennett helped build the brand

and that brand is being utilized to raise NIL funds. And all of us are waxing nostalgic of what the program did, in particular 2019, a national championship. And that brand equity is leveraged by Park Hill and his staff to raise money to pay these players. He's the Hall of Famer. I am the guy that's lucky to sit

next to him here. From my standpoint, it seems that the torch has been very well passed to Ryan Odom. And he even acknowledged this in the press conference. I thought his answer was great. He said, I embraced the pressure of following Tony Bennett. Yeah. And that's big. That's big. Because usually the guy who follows a legend, it's tough to live up to that kind of reputation. But he did embrace it and he does love the challenge. To answer his question, I don't think Tony Bennett will have much to do with the program, actually. He'll always be welcome, obviously, over at JPJ, and to practices or games,

or drop by and see Ryan and his staff, or watch practices or whatever. I'm certain that he's always welcome with open arms. But as far as any kind of interaction with the program in terms of suggestions or planning or any of that stuff I seriously doubt that would happen I really don't see that happening. Most coaches, once they retire, they kind of keep an arms length away and they don't want to seem like someone hovering over the new guy's shoulder and I'm sure the new coaches always appreciate that. I mean there's been a lot of former coaches who have lived here

over the years and they just kind of keep their distance. Questions coming in here. Mr. Allison, let us know where you're watching the show from. We'll mention it on air. Every Wahoo wants to know does any of the coaching staff convey? Does Isaiah Wilkins convey? Does Chase Coleman convey? Does Kyle Guy convey? Heck, does Jason Williford, one of the most loyal guys in Virginia basketball Heck, does Jason Williford, one of the most loyal guys in Virginia basketball history, a friend of the show, Jason Williford convey? Great guy.

A great guy. This question was asked, I believe, by David Teal. And Ryan had kind of sidestepped that answer a little bit. Yeah, I mean, he mentioned that he has kept his staff together from UMBC to Utah State to VCU and he said he would like to keep them together for here. Now certainly you can have some larger staffs now than you used to be able to have. He said that when he came to VCU, he infused a couple of coaches from there with his staff, and it worked out very well, and that he would like to do the same thing here. But he's going to have more staff than players. Yeah, how many? Well, sometimes you look down

at Virginia's Beach bench, and there's more guys with suits on than there are uniforms on. But how many from the Virginia fold might be kept? There's no indication of that yet. But I'm sure somebody will be. I don't know how many. And that's going to be something he has to determine. and that's going to be something he has to determine. You know, I don't know how many vacancies he might have. The transfer portal is red hot and it's tough.

So we're 500 in the first, very first day yesterday. It's bananas right now and more are coming. This is just the first wave, the portal of folks that want to be kind of knocking on the door first. But the portal, as it's open, only gets more people into the pool, if you may. For Virginia basketball, you've got six guys. Blake Buchanan and DeDe Ames, last week, yesterday, four more jumped into the portal swimming pool. And the one that's stinging the fan base the most is Isaac McNeely.

Now, he has left a back door to return to UVA. We'll get to that here. But we got Blake Buchanan, Day Day Ames, Isaac McNeely, Andrew Rodey, TJ Power, Anthony Robinson. I love Anthony Robinson. He's so much upside with an NBA body with Anthony Robinson. I mean that's a man playing college basketball right there. Six guys in the portal. Open headed question to start. Where do you want to go? Well Ryan Odom has to recruit all over again to try to retain who he would like to keep off of that roster and he may be perfectly fine with some of these guys,

excuse me, some of these guys leaving because again, whether or not they fit his style of play. He mentioned yesterday it's hard to play 30 minutes of basketball in his constantly moving fast paced offense and defense, some of these guys might not be able to do that. You know what's really interesting of the portal? Day Day Ames seems to fit his style of play. Yes he does. And Day Day Ames, a lot of people were throwing shade on Day Day. I'm not happy with some of the fan base that is literally saying good riddance to some

of these players. I mean these are like, you have a son, I have two sons. I mean, if it was me as a father and my kids on a team and grown adults are throwing this kind of nastiness and they're justifying the nastiness to these players by saying good riddance, we don't need stuff like that. Oh, they're paid. Now we can say this to them. That ain't right. Not right in my book. Yeah, there's still kids. And you know, I think De De really, once he finally fell into the role that he was comfortable and familiar with, was an effective scorer. I mean, the last 10, 12 games of the season, he was averaging around 15 points a game and making a high percentage of shots and doing everything

that we thought he would do when he first got here. It just took a while for that to happen. I think next year he's going to be a solid scorer for somebody. If it's not Virginia, it'll be somebody else. I agree. I think he would be a really good fit into Ryan Odom's style of play. McNeely, I know he's a fan favorite. His style really does not fit Odom's style. It'll be harder for him. Yeah.

I think he could make the transition, but it'll be harder. He does, this past year, he's gotten to the point where he runs constantly to get open and coming off screens. I think he could make it. I'd like to see him finish out his career here but. Same. You and I talked about it I think on last week's show or maybe it was two weeks ago that, you know,

if he's not going to make it into the NBA, he might decide to go for a big paycheck somewhere. And I can't blame him for that. And I owe eyes. Yeah, if guys, I, you know, love to see Isaac McNeely return for his fourth year. I would do. He's, he's a, he's a great kid and a great from a great family. And I would love to see him return for one more year. Could we fault a young man who has one year of college eligibility left to chase a one million

two million dollar payday? Maybe more than that. Maybe more than that and Isaac McNeely who's on a blue blood or a top 10 top 15 program where he's got a point guard or a slasher that can break and collapse defenses and he just has to stand behind the arc and shoot threes open threes. I mean this guy could be an extremely effective score. Well he's gonna have a point guard next year. Yeah he'll have a point guard next year he'll have a freshman point guard. Yeah. Be a freshman point guard and a brand new system with a brand new coach.

That's a perfect segue is the expectation a rebuild in Ryan Odom's first year. Well it depends on how many people end up leaving and it depends on I mean it could be a roster rebuild. You as you mentioned there's six guys in the portal right now that's and all those are pretty much starters, right? Yeah, yeah. And then we're hearing Scuttlebutt with Kofi entering the portal. So you could have your top at least seven of your top eight or nine players gone. Tame Murray's exhausted eligibility. Yeah, for the third year in a row. So it could be another

rebuild but in this day and time that's not foreign and I'm sure Odom is as well aware of that and well equipped to go out and find the right pieces. There's a lot of people to choose from and if you, again, if you've got the war chest that apparently Virginia now has, you can go out and get who you want. We got folks sharing some info from a friend of the program Marty Huntlaw. Yeah Marty's a good guy. Marty's a good guy. Used to work with Marty. And in a recent report that he has done, he alludes that that guy is coming back and that Wilkins is coming back and Curtis is coming back. We'd love to see an official announcement from that. We do know that Odom has- All great guys. Yeah. Yeah. We do know that Odom has

kept VCU staff talent in play when he segued over to Richmond. This team is a team that's in transition. Who do you build the program around and what is the brand identity of this program moving forward? It's not going to be the five pillars. It's not going to be a control tempo, win the game in the 50s brand identity. What is the brand identity? Run, run, run. I think that's going to be their identity. I think it's going to be a fast-paced basketball and in-your-face defense full court and

it's going to be very physically demanding to be able to do that. You're going to have to have some depth I think to be able to to play that style because I don't know if anybody can play 30 minutes of basketball like that without getting some breathers but I think that's definitely going to be their identity and again it depends on who he's able to keep and who he wants to keep. There he wants to keep, there's probably, there might be a few guys on there that he knows that can't play in his system.

And he's gonna have to go out and get people that can play that brand of basketball and play it well. Because they, he said yesterday, we wanna be a top 10 program. And you can't do that without top 10 talent and that's going to take money and they've got the money and they've got the know how. They just got to go out and get them.

What do you make, Jude, as we're rotating the Griff Aldrich headline on screen, the Longwood head coach comes to Charlottesville, Griff Aldrich, longtime ties to Ryan Odom, a senior captain at Hampton City under Tony Shaver. Ryan Odom, also a senior captain, classmates, friends, a guy who has a law degree from Virginia, Griff Aldrich, a guy who went into the private sector for 15, 16 years, worked as a lawyer, worked as a businessman,

recruited out of the private sector by Ryan Odom to go to UMBC with him where he was in charge of player development. Had tremendous success at UMBC. Parlayed that into a head coaching job at Logwood. Now comes to Charlottesville where he's going to be the associate head coach, Judy. Yeah, I had never met Griff and talked to him yesterday and was very impressed. I'll write a little bit about this today on the website. Just talked to him about how they interact as coaches and he said, well, I'm actually the, a lot of people think I'm the quiet one

and Ryan is the more aggressive guy. He says actually the other way around since Ryan has to calm me down sometimes in a bad cop, good cop, bad cop kind of scenario. So I think he's going to bring a lot more fire than people might expect. But solid basketball coach, he's done a really good job at Longwood. And very smart guy, well put together. I think it's going to be a nice tandem to lead this program. What do you make of the news that was fresh to a lot of people, maybe not fresh to you, but fresh to a lot of people, that Virginia

this past season had a general manager not only for the men's basketball team, but also the football team and the women's basketball team. Wally Walker, almost in an interim role, was the general manager for the men's team. They also had a GM that was kind of like under the radar, off the record for football women's basketball. What do you make of that? What do you make of the future of the position? Yeah, well, I'm not surprised. I mean, I always kind of considered Wally as sort of an unofficial GM, and he certainly has the background for that. He was a GM for the Seattle Supersonics and the women's WNBA team out there during his time in Seattle and had been president of the club at one

time. Has a good solid business background, very successful businessman, knows hoops, knows people, brilliant guy and I kind of felt like he was in an unofficial capacity with that to begin with. I think we were all surprised that football had a general manager and we didn't know about it. And it wasn't publicized. And the women's basketball team now has one. I think that was just recent, which I don't think was publicized either. But the intent to hire a general manager now, I don't think it will be Wally. I guess it

could be. I'm not sure that's his intent. Ralph Sampson wants the job. Carter Staples wants the job. Yeah. Anthony Solomon would be good at that. There are plenty of candidates out there who would be really good in that role. It just depends on who Wally and Carla feel like would be really good in that position and somebody that Ryan Odom is comfortable and can work with. Michael Murphy watching the program. He is watching in Ocala, Florida. Yeah. Beautiful place. He says thanks for the show. Great way to keep up with Charlottesville News. He appreciates what we're doing here. He also has questions about the general manager.

A lot of questions, in fact, about the general manager right now on the show here. Does the GM need to be a coach? Is the GM more a lawyer or a businessman? Is it more of an agent? Here's an interesting record. Friend of the program, Elliot Harding, St. Anne's-Belfield graduate as well.

Played football for John Blake, now an attorney here in Charlottesville, enjoy a cold beverage or two with Elliot from time to time. He is actively, and he talks about this on social media, so I'm not speaking out of term, he's actively working alongside of Kamara Johnson of the women's basketball team, helping create NIL partnership opportunities with her. So we have this landscape where it's not just a general manager is the gatekeeper for the NIL

and the funds that come with it, but he or she is the gatekeeper for the, helping the transfer portal and interacting with third parties. I mean, with McNeely's announcement to enter the transfer portal, he mentioned, the announcement included a mention of his agent and his agent's firm in the transfer portal announcement. I mean, that's the world we're in right now.

Yeah, sadly, but it's true. And that's just part of the world we live in and it's not going to go away. I think the GM in college is a little different than it is in the NBA or the NFL or whatever. They still have to work closely with the coach and probably closer in college than in professional sports because they've got to be on the same page, particularly with the NIL stuff. I don't think you necessarily have to have a coaching background, but it probably helps,

or at least a great working knowledge of that sport. But you also have to have the business side of it too. You can't just be all basketball or all football and not have a good business sense. You have to be multifaceted and have to wear a few different caps. I don't know that the general manager in college will have the authority and power that you do

in professional sports. I think you're gonna be more under the wing of the head coach than you would be in professional sports. So I think it's a little different. the general manager, it seems like in college is going to be a subordinate of the head basketball coach. I think so. We're in professional sports and a lot of ways is the boss of the coach. Yeah.

Yeah. Unless it's a very high profile coach. Right. I agree 100% with you there. Talk NIL, talk war chest, talk budget. Carla Williams references to this. I'll applaud her again. She's done a hell of a job with creating a war chest of money.

Yeah. And she said that, you know, I don't know who the discussions were with. I guess the powers would be, and there was a determination made that if Virginia is serious about wanting a top ten basketball program, then you're going to have to pay for it. And that doesn't come easy. And so some people had to make commitments. And let them know the Bruce Pearl comment that you said earlier in the program. Yeah, I heard Bruce Pearl the Auburn coach

Talking on a radio show yesterday That in order to be in his estimation in order to be a top 10 basketball program today in college Basketball it requires a $20 million award chest. I don't know how much Virginia has, but Carla told us yesterday that when they decided to do it, she said, she told Barry Parkhill, go get it. And he did. And they made a significant, she said significant, significant jump in the NIL world for basketball. So apparently they're well armed going into this portal and looking for talent.

And Ryan Odom's not afraid he will go after some really high quality basketball players. If you want to be a top 10 program you got to have the talent. What do they need to rebuild this team? You got a point you got a point guard here but it seems like you need a help a lot more depth in the backcourt and it seems like the front court is a front court with Ryan Odom style of play that is going to be way more athletic, way more leapers and high risers. Yeah. Guys that can prioritize getting baseline to baseline or slashing to the rim as opposed to potential post-up type guys.

Where you want to go with this? Well, you got to have a point guard and you do. You got to have a rim protector and if Anthony Robinson is leaving, which we don't know for sure, he is in the portal you said, they'll have to go out and find one because there's no others on the roster. You gotta have shooters. And right now, from the only guys not in the portal, Sharma is the only one, I think, that's a shooter. So those are three key elements you've gotta have.

And it would be nice to have a defensive stopper like they're accustomed to having with the Bigmans and Ryan Duns of the world and those type guys. They don't have any of those on the roster even before. I'm sure those will be things that he's looking for, but you're right. They're gonna have to be athletic leapers and people who can straight line drive to the basket and create and score. They're gonna have to, I know he likes the defensive pressure and turning people over and getting easy baskets

that way but you got to have scores today to be able to compete on that elite level. Absolutely. James Watson we're gonna get to his comment. Thank you for watching the program Mr. Watson. He says we've talked about this for years but now that we're evolving on the business side of basketball the University in the city should really be thinking about hosting a first about this for years, but now that we're evolving on the business side of basketball, the university and the city should really be thinking about hosting a first run of the NCAA tournament. Guaranteed economic blast for the city of Charlottesville and Almarra County, and we definitely have more hotels now than we used to, including the new Darden Hotel. I love

the comment from James Watson. I love the vision from James Watson there of hosting a first round here in Charlottesville Hootie. You could answer this question probably more than anyone. Why has that never happened? Well, the excuse used to be that there were there weren't enough hotel rooms. That's certainly not a problem anymore Probably the I guess the number of hotel rooms in this city has probably doubled in the last Eight to ten years and so I wouldn't think that would be an issue at all. Shouldn't be any barriers now. You got a 14,000 plus seat arena, public transportation, hotels, restaurants.

I don't see anything blocking them from doing it if that's something they would have a desire to do. Marcus Washington, thank you for watching the program. Hugh Haynes, thank you for watching the program. Viewers and listeners, put your comments in the feed. I will relay them live on air. Would love to see the team, the program host guys, a first round of the NCAA tournament.

Sadly, I think it's sad. March Madness is now in the Sweet 16. All the teams in the Sweet 16 from the power conferences. The Cinderella story in this year's dance is zilch zero nada. I wonder if that might be a result of the NIL and transfer portal to where the Cinderella's are going to be less and less now because they can't keep up talent wise. And I have a strong feeling that's probably the case. 100% that's the case. And think about it this way if you're a mid-major star at one time if you were a mid-major star you know you

would stay with the program from freshman to senior right and then as a mid-major star when you're a junior senior the Herald arsenals of the world with Weber State they would stay and they'd upset North Carolina and it'd be a memorable, it's still in the March Madness pre and post game build-up, Harold Arsenal. Now if you're Harold Arsenal at Weber State, you're gonna go chase a million dollars, two million dollars in a bag and go play for a power conference team. And a lot of those guys leave after a really good freshman. Right. I mean you got a kid from Michigan, Scottie Pippinson, that entered the transfer portal while Michigan's

still in the tournament. That is insanity. It truly is. I don't know. I just throw my hands up sometimes when I hear this stuff, but it's just what we have to live with now. I don't know if it's ever going to change or not. It may even get worse instead of better. Yeah, I mean, I can understand the frustration of a mid-major coach because it's so hard for them to compete now. They don't have the kind of money to retain players if somebody's waving cash in front of a really good freshman or sophomore, or even a senior on their team. It just puts them behind an eight ball and I don't think there's an answer for it. Another question you have going on when you look at the tournament, goodness gracious,

how far has the ACC dropped? Tremendously. Besides Duke, I mean this is a southeastern conference, Sweet 16. And we've talked a lot about that all year long, about how the SEC is the new ACC. Yeah. I noted that in the recent thing with the ACC commissioner when he talked down in Charlotte that he was telling the ADs that they need to put a stronger emphasis and more money into basketball because they see us falling so far behind. There's a new infusion of coaches in the league, which with a lot of promising coaches, that could make a difference in building those programs back

up again. Well, we've got at least four new coaches right now, right? Florida State, Miami, NC State, and Virginia. I don't know that there'll be any more this year, but probably will be next year. I mean, Hubert Davis is going to be coaching for his life. We even mentioned that to Dave Odom yesterday and he just, you know, he coached in the ACC for so long and grew up in the ACC like we all did. And it breaks his heart to see the ACC. I don't think the ACC is the top four conference in basketball anymore. No, not right now. They're not. And he said the same thing the commissioner did, that

they have, the ACC is going to have to put much more emphasis on basketball. Even though football is the engine that drives the train, it's a basketball conference. It's known to be a basketball conference and they're taking some serious back seats now and they're yeah well they have three teams, four teams in the NCAA and they all lost early and Louisville Clumps and North Carolina Duke. Their only hope is that Duke can make some noise and so yeah they're gonna have to pour more money into it, just like Virginia is planning on doing, and hire some really good young coaches to try to turn things around. Southeastern Conference, guys, has seven, count them, seven teams in the Sweet 16.

The most of any conference ever. Which breaks a record set by the Atlantic Coast Conference nine years ago. The Atlantic Coast Conference guys has, from my standpoint, not even a top four basketball conference anymore, which is disheartening to say. The Southeastern Conference, listen to this statistic for you. The league, the SEC dominated November and December in a way very few conferences have. The SEC won 88.9% of its games against other conferences and amassed a 58-19 record against the other Power 4 conferences.

58-19, ladies and gentlemen. 14 of the Southe Eastern Conference's 16 teams received a bid on Selection Sunday. 14 of 16. That's unbelievable. That's unbelievable. And now seven are left in the sweet 16. The ACC's only hope, and granted it's a fantastic hope,

is Cooper Flag, John Shire, and Duke, who's got two guys on the roster that are projected to be top seven, top ten lottery picks here. And there's some scuttlebutt that Cooper Flagg, I don't see him doing this, but there's some scuttlebutt that the NIL is so appealing and opportunistic that Cooper Flagg may say no depending on how the ball bounces in the lottery to being the first pick and comes back to Duke. Yeah, I can see that happening.

Depending on who gets the first pick. Right. Because the money will always be there unless he gets hurt. You go to Lloyd's of London, you get the insurance policy on the body and then you come back to Duke, make some more money, you're the big man on campus and you could potentially avoid going to the doldrums of the National Basketball Association if the ball bounces the wrong way in the lottery. Absolutely. And that's been done before.

100%. And I wouldn't be surprised if it happened again. Who wants to play for a lousy NBA team? Rob Neal watching the program. He's a diehard college athletics fan. He's putting up a lot of weight in the weight room right now. I'm a bit impressed with what he's thrown up in the weight room, guys.

He says, not only none in the sweet 16 for the ACC, but no 13 to 16 seeds won a first round game. Yeah, that's pretty pathetic. Clemson lost to McNeese, right? Viewers and listeners, maybe I'll ask you this question. Does anyone know where McNeese is located? I think it's in Louisiana. You got it right.

I knew you would get it right. 100% right. It's Louisiana. Yeah. So McNeese is located. They lost to McNeese. Well, it was Will Wade. It was Will Wade.

The guy I can coach. Former LSU head coach. You know he's a little bit of a shady character. Will Wade can coach. When the FBI is looking into you, you know something's awry. The FBI was investigating Will Wade. But he did get McNeese past Clemson and it was a loaded team. A lot of people say Louisiana on the feed right there. Shows you the power of doing well in March, what it can do for a school's brand overall. Oh yeah, yeah well you know sports can be a magnet for students. I remember back when George Welsh was here and they were attracting the sons and daughters,

particularly sons of a lot of famous celebrities and athletes into the football program and into the school. And he said, we're consider what they now call, and this was a long time ago, a hot school. Because we're winning in football, we've got big player, big time players, and people wanna be part of that. They wanna be part of those festivities and excitement. Edward Jenkins watching on Hootie's Twitter account

over here, he says he's live from San Antonio, Texas. You can go ahead and put the name plates on screen. The lower thirds for us. That's one city I want to go to. I've never been to San Antonio. I've been all over Texas but never San Antonio. This is I find one of the most impressive stats I've heard that Hootie Radcliffe has been to 51 straight ACC basketball tournaments.

That's impressive. How many states you've been to 51 straight ACC basketball tournaments. That's impressive. How many states you've been to? I'm seven shy of all 50. So you've been to 43 states? Yeah. That's impressive. How many how many countries? Not that many really. Just Mexico, Japan, and Canada if you want to call the 51st state, and Puerto Rico, which is really a U.S. territory. Territory. Yeah, I haven't traveled around the world like I'd like to. College, being a sportswriter, guys, an award-winning sportswriter like Hootie takes you all over the country, 43 states.

He asked this question, kind of shifting gears, may not have this answer, I don't have this answer. He says, how come the women's basketball program did not play in any postseason tournaments? Were they not invited or did they turn down invitations? Edward Jenkins in San Antonio. I don't know that. I don't know if they had an opportunity. I know they were talking about a potential NIT bid, but I don't know whatever evolved with that.

I'm assuming that they just didn't get a bid. Because I would think that she would have probably taken one had they gotten it just so that they could get more play for some of the younger players. Yeah, 100%. Get more run. Comments are coming in, guys. We'll get to as many of these as possible. San Antonio is getting a lot of props on the feed here

from the viewers and listeners here. Not just from Hootie, but from other viewers and listeners. This is coming on the feed here. Is chance going to be the undisputed face of Virginia basketball? If Isaac McNeely doesn't return, yes, he will be. I'll ask a follow-up question to the commenter's question. Unless they bring in some super stud that we don't know about right now.

Even with Isaac McNeely returning, I still think Chance is the face of basketball. He could be because he's a local kid. Yep and he's got the upside of multiple years in the program where McNeely's got one left. Yeah. And he also has that you know you know it's like the Steph Curry effect and his game's not like Steph but why a lot of people love Steph Curry is because Steph Curry is like a 6'1", 6'2", 6'3 guy, right? He's not like a seven footer. Like Chance Mallory is a five foot nine point guard.

And a lot of- He's a really confident kid. Really confident, but a lot of people can relate to five foot nine, where they have a hard time relating to like 6'10", you know, 6'8", 6'9". So I think if, you know, a knockout would 6-9. So I think if, if, you know, a knock on wood here, I'm not even sure if this is wood. This might be a knock on wood.

Looks like wood. Maybe it's wood. If the cards play correctly and he has success, we could have one of the bigger stars in potentially program history because of the local ties, because of the fact he plays point guard, and because of the fact he plays with flair. He's an exciting player. No question about it. And he can shoot to three. They had him shooting NBA threes a couple years ago, even beyond. So he certainly has the range. And

he's been a kid who learned early on that size doesn't matter because he has learned to. He's got so many different ways of finishing. Floaters and push shots, goes under the rim and uses the rack to protect himself from Biggs blocking his shot. He's got a teardrop. Yeah, yeah he's been able to overcome that with angles and etc. but so I don't think the size is gonna be a problem for him. Rob Neal says Chance

Mallory is absolutely worth the price of admission. Such a fun style of play and he knows the St. Ann's Athletic Department and its sports teams extremely well. Appreciate those comments, Rob, on the show. This one is an interesting one. Have you guys talked about what's going to happen to Jason Williford? Well, we don't know. I'm assuming that he's probably not going to be retained, but I don't know that to be a fact. I don't know what kind of discussions may be going on behind the scenes. I don't know if Jason is in pursuit of another job or what.

I think his contract was supposed to run out at the end of this year. I may be wrong on that, but I think I read that somewhere. I think Chris Graham discovered that in one of his foyers back a few months ago. But we don't know. All that's kind of behind the curtain and we're not privy to it until something leaks out. A natural follow up from yours truly, Ron Sanchez's future in basketball. What's it look like?

Yeah, well, I imagine, I know from all the trips I've made to the final four over the years, they always have the coaches convention out there, essentially, wherever the Final Four is. It's a massive job market because guys who don't have a job or are looking for a change show up there and politic with various coaches to see what their possibilities might be. So I imagine assuming that Jason won't be retained, I imagine, well, he's been in the game so long, he probably knows a ton of coaches to begin with.

He may not even have to go out to wherever the Final Four is but I imagine there's a lot of those guys will probably show up at the Final Four and see what might be available. Ron Sanchez and Jason Williford we again commend them for their loyalty and commitment to the program. Absolutely. Yeah. Coach Sanchez. Both great quality, high quality guys, high character guys, and terrific people. The type of guys that you want your sons and daughters around. Ron Sanchez and Jason Williford. As a father of two boys, one of the top compliments I could, you know, bestow on anyone is I want my boys around them. And

I don't offer that lightly, guys. One hour in, an hour flies when you're with the Virginia Sports Hall of Famer. What's in the hopper at jerryrackliff.com? What should we be reading? What are you working on? I mean, this man's one of the busiest guys in media over here. Give us a glimpse into the schedule of late hootie. Well, you know, there's a lot of other stuff going on that I've had to kind of blow off because of the basketball. So football's been going on? They're in heavily into spring practice. Yeah. At some point I'll

start writing some of that. I've done a few interviews that I haven't been able to get to. But Virginia baseball's lost what four straight games? Yeah again something that's I've had to put on the burner for now but immediately today I'm going to try to finish off these three stories left over from yesterday talking to Jeff Jones about what Virginia is getting and Ryan Odom. Ryan Odom worked for Jeff for a couple years. Known him for years. Talked to Griff Aldrich about Ryan Odom. Just the family aspect. Talking to Dave Odom about Ryan and Ryan's comments about his dad.

A couple other stories left over from that press conference and the aftermath of it. And we'll be trying to get into spring football and the other sports as the week goes on. JerryRackliffe.com, guys. He was at the press conference yesterday. He was at the Jumbo Tron yesterday. The first media member to have his question delivered or asked, he asked the first question of the media pool to Ryan Odom. ACC Network had Hootie Rackliff on screen. All the radio broadcasted. Ryan Odom, pleased to have the question from Jerry Radcliffe, speaks to the man's reputation and his character and his trophy case of awards, jerryradcliffe.com.

Judah Wickhauer is behind the camera. Thank you, Judah, for directing and producing the show. The I Love Seville Show is up at 12.30 PM. And we encourage every viewer and listener from what was 15 states on today's show. We appreciate you guys Yeah, wahoos Far and wide to read Jerry Ratcliffe comm so long everybody and thank you for joining us Same here..