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Major College Basketball News: Virginia’s Tony Bennett is Retiring

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Tony Bennett

Virginia head coach Tony Bennett is retiring immediately, as confirmed by Virginia basketball on Thursday.

Jeff Goodman was first on the story.

This coaching change now gives the Virginia men’s basketball players 30 days to enter the transfer portal, by rule from the NCAA. The season starts in 20 days.

In June 2024, Bennett signed a contract extension that secured his position through April 2030.

Read more on the extension here.

Bennett has been the head coach at Virginia since the 2009-10 season. He has led the Cavaliers to ten NCAA Tournaments in his tenure, and won the 2019 NCAA Championship. Bennett led his 2019 team to the national title one year after becoming the first NCAA tournament No. 1 seed to fall to a 16-seed (UMBC).

This past season, Bennett’s Cavaliers finished 23-11 and made the First Four of the NCAA Tournament. They lost in that first game to Colorado State by a lopsided score of 67-42.

The Cavaliers were recently picked as the No. 5 team in the ACC Preseason Poll.

Here is the full poll.

  1. Duke
  2. North Carolina
  3. Wake Forest
  4. Clemson
  5. Virginia
  6. Miami
  7. Pitt
  8. NC State
  9. Louisville
  10. Notre Dame
  11. Syracuse
  12. Georgia Tech
  13. SMU
  14. Virginia Tech
  15. Florida State
  16. Cal
  17. Stanford
  18. Boston College

Virginia was the No. 13 team in Ken Pomeroy’s preseason rankings recently.

Pomeroy’s ratings are almost always a topic of conversation throughout the basketball season along with the NCAA’s NET rankings.

Pitt came in at No. 38 in the country and No. 4 in the ACC.

This is how the ACC stacks up in his rankings.

  1. Duke (No. 2 overall)

  2. North Carolina (No. 14 overall)

  3. Clemson (No. 24 overall)

  4. Pitt (No. 38 overall)

  5. Wake Forest (No. 44 overall)

  6. NC State (No. 52 overall)

  7. Miami (No. 55 overall)

  8. Louisville (No. 64 overall)

  9. Syracuse (No. 68 overall)

  10. Notre Dame (No. 69 overall)

  11. Georgia Tech (No. 70 overall)

  12. SMU (No. 74 overall)

  13. Virginia (No. 78 overall)

  14. Florida State (No. 90 overall)

  15. Virginia Tech (No. 92 overall)

  16. Stanford (No. 99 overall)

  17. Boston College (No. 113 overall)

  18. Cal (No. 135 overall)

Pomeroy’s system has Pitt’s offensive rating ranked No. 32 overall and its defensive rating No. 50 overall.

See Pomeroy’s full rankings here.

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