Interview Lineup

1) Thomas Rogers – May 19, 2019 – 1 hour, 4 minutes

#30, 2010-2014

We crossed paths a few times in college, but I really talked with him for the first time in Asheville around June 2018. Sometime in April 2019, I wrote him a letter describing a ludicrous dream to write a book on Virginia Basketball, then we met up for breakfast the morning after a May wedding in Chicago. There’s a 15-minute break in the recording when I got up to reload our coffee, and all you can hear is the whirring of beans grinding and forks clinking plates. We wrapped up, and I went straight to the airport to head back to Atlanta. I can’t thank him enough for kicking this thing off.

2) Evan Nolte – June 26, 2019 – 26 minutes

#11, 2012-2016

Nolte paced the whole time we FaceTimed. As most of this book came together between bouts of pacing, I respect his pacing game. Pacing helps thinking, I think.

3) Johnny Carpenter (Round 1) – July 31, 2019 – 1 hour, 8 minutes

Student Manager, 2009-2013; Basketball Technology Assistant, 2015-2018; Director of Player Personnel, 2018-Present

I met Johnny when he let a group of us play pickup on the main court in JPJ before a wedding in 2018. He complimented my 54-degree arc shot, which no one has ever done because I am bad at basketball, but I did hit a game winner with my lone shot of the day. Johnny is non-stop, fascinating, and about as good of a human as there is.

4) Alex Peavey – August 2, 2019 – 1 hour, 4 minutes

Mindfulness Coach, VCU

Peavey was my high school counselor and remains a role model. While we haven’t gone to a game in JPJ together, we did go to the 2009 Phish show there and sat on the second-to-last row. A naked guy ran around on stage during Ya Mar, so Phish changed the lyrics in the encore Run Like An Antelope to “run like a naked guy out of control” – it was wonderful. So was the Bold as Love that night. While Peavey’s only official role with Virginia Basketball came as a ball boy when he was a kid, he grew up in Charlottesville, lived in one of the pavilions on The Lawn for a year, knows his basketball, and currently serves as VCU Basketball’s Mindfulness Coach.

5) Jontel Evans – March 12, 2020 – 30 minutes

#1, 2009-2013

He FaceTimed from inside his car after getting some ice cream. He’s the first Virginia player who played for four years under Coach Bennett, and when Jontel has the mic, let the man rip.

6) Ronnie Wideman – May 5, 2020 – 1 hour, 28 minutes

Assistant Director of Men’s Basketball Operations; Associate Athletic Director, 2009-Present

Ronnie asked me if it was okay if he ate a sandwich during our interview, made sure the ceiling fan’s light shining above his head didn’t distract me, then he interviewed me for the first half hour or so. Once we got into it, though, his words were invaluable. He said what became the first line of intangible, which gave Johnny Carpenter chills when I relayed it to him – he showed me the goosebumps. There are also like seven different instances of guys getting goosebumps in the middle of the interviews, which is nuts.

7) Will Gent – May 6, 2020 – 43 minutes

Student Manager, 2014-2018

Will worked with one of my friends before venturing back into the basketball world, and Will’s story might be my favorite of any individual’s on this list. Anybody who spends a college (and pro) career rebounding for Malcolm Brogdon (among others) has learned a few things along the way.

8) Rob Vozenilek – May 11, 2020 – 1 hour

#23, 2011-2015

Rob’s roommate at the time was taking an exam during our interview and said we were being too loud, so Rob switched rooms and we got rolling. I’m another Richmond guy who was probably a good enough athlete to attend a walk-on tryout in another sport and promptly get cut within a few minutes, so I loved hearing Rob’s experience of being a good enough athlete to actually make the team and live that life.

9) Kevin Oberlies – May 12, 2020 – 38 minutes

Student Manager, 2014-2016

Kevin graciously took a break from Law School studying to talk with me. Every student manager on here crushed their interviews, and Kevin was no different.

10) Grant Kersey – May 14, 2020 – 39 minutes

#1; Student Manager, 2016-2020

Grant actually had the original first line, but that got nixed and replaced with a Tolkien quote. I think he’s just fine with that. He posted up under his framed jersey for our call, and Grant is about as kind and patient as people get. He also holds an NCAA record, and his journey from growing up in Charlottesville is a wild ride.

11) Angus Mitchell – May 19, 2020 – 1 hour, 10 minutes

#21, 2011-2012

Our wives lived across the hall from each other fourth year, and his wife would like to thank Coach Bennett for letting Angus make the team as a walk-on because they never would have met otherwise. Angus was instrumental in helping me think through the broader strokes of what I was trying to do, and I remember him saying, “You’ve definitely got the vibe down,” which I carried with me.

12) Joe Harris – May 27, 2020 – 36 minutes

#12, 2010-2014

You could tell Joe’s been interviewed a few times. He also once begrudgingly obliged to text my sister on her birthday my fourth year – a fantastic little brother prank. Joe is a pro in every sense of the word, and when this guy speaks up, listen up.

13) Will Sherrill – June 1, 2020 – 51 minutes

#22, 2007-2011

Will is the only person I interviewed who played under the previous coaching regime. His perspective through that coaching transition drives a good portion of the narrative in the beginning, and he doesn’t miss.

14) Ty Jerome – June 14, 2020 – 45 minutes

#11, 2016-2019

I thought he was in New York, set an 11am start time, and woke him up with a FaceTime call at 8am in Phoenix. He did the first half of the interview horizontal, shirtless, and head-on-pillow, which was perfect because I’d been blaring rap in my ears and pacing before the call, and Ty operating in wake up mode and me at peak mental capacity are about equal. Don’t worry – he heated up quick. The call dropped about halfway through, I thought he’d had enough of me, then he texted a few minutes later saying his phone died. We got back on, and while Ty doesn’t say a word until page 203, he brings the whole thing home. When he said what became the last line, I stopped in my tracks and asked him, “What’d you just say?” He repeated it, and I thought, Dude, you just ended this.

15) London Perrantes – June 24, 2020 – 54 minutes

#32, 2013-2017

I learned my lesson in the apparent difference in west coast and east coast time, but I told London about my blunder with Ty, which got him laughing. London has my favorite way of speaking of all these guys – so easy and fluid. He’s also hailed by a few folks on here as one of the elite minds in college basketball history.

16) Devon Hall – June 29, 2020 – 36 minutes

#0, 2013-2018

Ty’s dad called Devon halfway through, and it was actually like the day after he got called up to the OKC Thunder. Devon made a lot of complicated subjects sound simple, which is exactly how it should be.

17) Barry Parkhill – June 30, 2020 – 54 minutes

Associate Athletic Director, 1998-Present

He’s essentially the godfather of Virginia Basketball, so hearing his take on the current program after being around it for decades was an honor.

18) Johnny Carpenter (Round 2) – July 2, 2020 – 1 hour, 22 minutes

Student Manager, 2009-2013; Basketball Technology Assistant, 2015-2018; Director of Player Personnel, 2018-Present

Round 2 with Johnny came after he finished a run and wound up alongside a golf course. No joke, somebody hit a hole-in-one when he walked by. I told him he should go celebrate with them. I also botched the last half of this one. My dog came in from outside, so I went to close the door and put the recording phone in my pocket, where it remained. As a result, I couldn’t use my favorite Kyle Guy story: Coach Bennett stopped practice and told Kyle, “You’re too good of a shooter to miss as many shots as you do.” Then the two of them went around the arc shooting threes, and it was like Coach Bennett’s level of focus at the top of his shot transferred to Kyle. Sorry for the fumble there, and Johnny told it better.

19) Isaiah Wilkins – July 8, 2020 – 45 minutes

#21, 2014-2018

In one of my favorite bits, Isaiah partially gives Call of Duty credit for how close his teams were. I mean, if you think about it, hours-long stints of shared cognition and functioning as a team probably helps tremendously. He also says at one point, “Hopefully, I’ll move [to Charlottesville] one day,” which came true, and his one-liners kept me laughing throughout the whole process.

20) Jack Salt – July 9, 2020 – 39 minutes

#33, 2014-2019

Jack made me laugh a lot, too. Tracking his story from New Zealand, to redshirting his first year, to captaining the teams that lost to UMBC and won a National Championship, you can’t help but be impressed by who he is.

21) Ben Buell – July 11, 2020 – 51 minutes

Student Manager, 2015-2019

Ben had my brother as a teacher in high school and Peavey as a basketball coach, and our conversation took off. He’s destined to be a great coach.

22) Ritchie McKay – July 14, 2020 – 54 minutes

Associate Head Coach, 2009-2015

Coach McKay was in Liberty’s film room for our Zoom, and he was comfortable preaching from that podium. One of his lines stuck with me and inspired me in the making of this thing: “But when we lead our lives based on our convictions, our convictions influence our circumstances. When we lead our lives based on our circumstances, they influence our convictions.”

23) T.J. Grams – July 14, 2020 – 47 minutes

Assistant Director of Academic Affairs; Director of Academics, 2010-Present

T.J. dropped some knowledge, that’s for sure. His take on education at Virginia will serve anyone who reads it, especially current students.

24) Jason Williford – July 16, 2020 – 51 minutes

Assistant Coach, 2009-2018; Associate Head Coach, 2018-Present

This one was fun. He went from knowing Coach Bennett only as “the little point guard backing up Muggsy Bogues” to being the current Associate Head Coach.

25) Mike Curtis – July 16, 2020 – 31 minutes

Strength and Conditioning Coach, 2009-Present

Yes, I was intimidated going into Coach Curtis’ interview. I had to call a strength and conditioning coach I know to have him translate the research I’d done for it. Coach Curtis systematically laid it out for a layman like me, and I barely had to touch his transcript… flawless speech the whole way through. As we wrapped up, he said, “This was time well spent,” and I don’t know that I’ve felt more accomplished in my life.

26) Marial Shayok – July 19, 2020 – 52 minutes

#4, 2014-2017

Marial was signing basketball cards in the NBA Bubble during our call, and after a brief digression from me on the disintegration of autograph quality due to mass production, he took me through playing at Virginia and transferring to Iowa State. Some of it was tough to hear, but if I learned one thing about Marial, it’s that he’s a class act.

27) Akil Mitchell – July 22, 2020 – 43 minutes

#25, 2010-2014

When I interviewed Thomas Rogers the year before, he said, “I mean, you can’t do this without Joe and Akil.” He was right, and Akil entertains from start to finish. His first line is, “I might just ramble a little bit.” Ramble on!