After the Virginia football team beat another inferior opponent by a slim margin this weekend, I had a vision of the Charles Dickens Christmas Carol and the three ghosts of Virginia Sports Past, Present and Future.
Now I know this has the making of a hippy column that causes students in the back of the Chemistry auditorium to whisper, "Who is the crazy columnist that wrote this nonsense?" But stay with me through my vision, and the dim comparisons between the Gillen and Groh empires will become evident.
As the Ghost of Wahoo Past, I take you to 2002. Pete Gillen has the hearts of the Virginia basketball fan base beating as one pulse. The team just made its first NCAA tournament in 10 years and a University of Virginia player recently has been selected in the NBA draft. Things are looking good, real good.
We upset Dick Vitale's diaper dandy team, Duke, and the basketball bandwagon is full. Students camp out for games for a week in a tent to get to see the mastermind behind this team. In fact, Athletic Director Craig Littlepage is so convinced that Ol' Petey is the man that he decided to give him a huge, 10-year contract. The press supports the contract because it will help Gillen build a powerhouse by utilizing his recruiting skills. Students start booking trips to the Final Four. Look out Wake, UNC and Kentucky; Virginia basketball is on the rise.
Let's take our magic carpet ride forward four years to the Virginia football program. The Orange Crush defense has been united. The Polo shirts and ties are replaced with an Orange spirit not seen since FSU was stopped at the one-yard line (sorry Minerich, he did not score).
Virginia Tech comes to town and suffers a tough defeat. NFL agents find Charlottesville as players are drafted, including starting quarterback Matt Schaub. Optimism is so high that a lengthy contract is signed to ensure the coach of the program would not go anywhere. Bring on Miami, FSU and USC.
The ghost of Virginia Sports Past, however, takes us back a few years to a time when the armor began to chip in the red-haired giant's basketball program.
A few naysayers at the time point to a non-conference schedule that includes powerhouses such as East Tennessee State, Wagner and the mighty Bisons of Howard University. Discipline and team defense start to lack within the walls of U-Hall. The team has yet to win any type of postseason game (NCAA tourney, ACC tourney), but the Gillen supporters are still there. The tents may be lacking before games, but Team Cavalier still has Pete's back.
It does not take a ghost to point out that the football program is in the midst of a similar point. Call it the proverbial crossroads of college sports.
The fact that Groh's Wahoos never have won a meaningful game has started to take a toll on recruiting. The early games sugarcoat Virginia's record until the titans of the ACC prove their dominance. The football spirit has started to simmer as students grow weary of the continual let-down from a promising season turning into a Continental Tire Bowl bid.
As the ghost of Virginia Sports Future, it seems I must point to the eventual demise and firing of Pete Gillen's Virginia tenure. The cogs started falling off slowly before eventually leading to a full scale collapse.
Promise and optimism led to mediocrity and transfers. U-Hall could not be filled as Virginia was not even capable of receiving a bid to the NIT tournament. Critics look back at Pete Gillen's Virginia legacy and point to his inability to ever win a meaningful game. When the opposing team came ready to play ball, Virginia meekly crawled out of the gym unable to put up a fight.
Just as Charles Dickens allowed Ebenezer Scrooge to change his fate through a change of heart, Al Groh and company still can change the end of their story as well. Yet satisfaction with the play of a team that barely squeaked by two weak teams will lead to a fate similar to that of another Wahoo coach. Charles Dickens visions of ghosts show what will happen if things do not change -- the fate of the team is up to you, Al Groh.
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