In depth on Virginia's new look roster, with an assist from Jason Williford

Part one: The guards

Photo credit: Virginia Athletics

If Virginia’s coaching staff was stressed out this spring, well, yeah. In 2023, every staff is exhausted by default; such are the demands of the transfer portal and the requirements of a non-stop summer calendar. There is no downtime these days anyway, and that’s true even if you aren’t a traditionally inclined, get-old-stay-old program trying to scramble up a roster from scratch.

Which, of course, was exactly what Tony Bennett & Co. were trying to do. In March, the Cavaliers took a devastating loss in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, when Kihei Clark ended his acclaimed five-year career in ignominy. Then came defeats in the transfer portal: the expected but nonetheless damaging departure of disaffected veteran center Kadin Shedrick (to Texas); the shocking post-redshirt flight of vaunted wing Isaac Traudt (to Creighton). Four starters, and seven scholarship players, would end up leaving the program — and before Reece Beekman’s return from the NBA draft, it could have been worse.

“It’s all just non-stop,” Virginia associate head coach Jason Williford said. “There’s no getaway.”

Yet despite the agita and uncertainty there is something enjoyable, something deeply competitively satisfying, about beginning anew. This Cavaliers team is not an established core of multi-year starters, known quantities long marinated in the Virginia way. This is almost entirely a collection of new faces — and one expected by many to struggle.

“This is like year one and two for us all over again,” Williford said, referring to the start of Bennett’s tenure in 2010, and the number of new pieces being integrated at once. “As a staff, though, that’s fun. It’s a different challenge for us than starting a season like we usually do, with a target on our back. It gives us a little motivation, a little bit of a chip, to see people aren’t thinking about us. Not that it matters — but it does help drive home the point with a group like this. It gives them motivation, too.”

Such was Virginia’s vibe this summer. By all accounts, it has been another customary offseason of grueling individual player development, guys living in the gym, with wide-eyed newcomers gradually downloading Bennett’s complex defensive requirements, and coaches getting vague ideas about how the whole thing will come together. This offseason, with this many new players, those ideas are even vaguer than usual.

Still: Virginia knows even more about its guys than it did a few months ago, and Williford (in keeping with a minor offseason tradition established at my last spot, one Virginia fans read in large numbers and have since requested — here you go, guys) agreed to chat at detailed length on each player’s offseason progress.

What follows is the definitive offseason UVa roster breakdown. For the sake of length, this is part one, focusing on the guards. Part two, digging into the rest of the roster, is to come early next week.

Reece Beekman, senior

With all due respect to everybody else we’re about to analyze, Reece Beekman’s return is by far the most important bit of personnel acquisition Virginia did this summer. When you think about it, it might be the most important of the past several years. When was the last time a Cavaliers roster was so hollow as a 2023-24 UVa team without Beekman would have been? (The post national-title group might have somewhat unexpectedly lost all three of its stars to the pros and thus struggled offensively, but it still had Mamadi Diakite, Braxton Key, Clark, and guarded like crazy.) What happens to Virginia if Beekman stays in the NBA draft? How many games would these Hoos be expected to win then?

And for a while there, it really looked like Beekman was going to stay in the draft. The late first round was a possibility. UVa is not exactly known for massive NIL deals. The word around the sport is Beekman’s NIL opportunities this season will be the most significant of any Virginia player to date — but still not to the level that makes a kid really think twice about going pro. Besides: Would he want to return to a totally remade team?

Yes, as it turns out, and you can also understand why. Simply put, this is Reece’s chance to be The Guy.

Is Reece Beekman a star?

Very few Bennett-era Virginia players have been given as much individual responsibility as what Beekman will be expected to shoulder in 2023-24. He is his team’s best defender by some margin (his defense is good enough for the NBA already) and now more than ever he will also need to be its primary ballhandler, distributor, and straight-line offensive attacker — and without the comfort blanket of Clark by his side.

That should be freeing. “The biggest thing for him now is accepting that he’s going to have to put us on his shoulders,” Williford said. “He’s earned the right to do it, and he’s looking forward to it.” Virginia’s staff is excited by the precedent of past players (Ty Jerome, Mamadi Diakite) who tested the draft waters, got a taste of the next level, and came back to Charlottesville even more determined to get there. Beekman is a worker, too.

He has some clear areas he can still improve. He has gotten much better as a perimeter shooter since his freshman season, but still took just 77 attempts last year. He has become a solid catch-and-shoot threat, specifically, but for a guy with the ball in his hands so much, he should be finishing better than the 17-of-63 he put up on dribble jumpers last season (per Synergy). He was often a little too happy to settle in the midrange; he needs to get to the front of the rim more often.