By Jerry Ratcliffe
One moment I will never forget in Virginia basketball history was a frozen February night in Pittsburgh, when the 16-1 Cavaliers were trying to keep pace with ACC leader Syracuse and couldn’t afford to lose a road game against a tough Panthers team.
In a game when UVA and Pitt leapfrogged into the lead all night, it came down to whether 6-foot-5, sophomore guard Malcolm Brogdon could deliver.
Only 9.1 seconds remained in a game deadlocked at 45-45 and Virginia had one last chance. Point guard London Perrantes was looking for 3-point sharpshooter Joe Harris coming off a screen, but “Joey Buckets” stumbled on his curl.
Trailing Harris was Brogdon, who took Perrantes’ pass and buried a winning triple with a mere 0.4 seconds showing for a critical Cavaliers victory.
After it was over, Brogdon just kind of stood around. I remember asking him why he didn’t celebrate the shot more with a dance or something.
“I didn’t really know what to do … I’ve never hit a last-second shot before,” Brogdon smiled. “We actually didn’t run the play right. We ran four screens instead of three. It’s basically a play for me to come up and shoot the three. I haven’t hit it one time in practice all year. We’ve been practicing it all the time. I guess it’s better to hit it in a game.”
Brogdon was just a sophomore during that 2013-14 season, but you could see greatness. Certainly he evolved into bigger moments, but this was the beginning.
Sadly, Wednesday was the end — the end of Brogdon’s career as a basketball player.
The 32-year-old from Atlanta announced that he was retiring from the game after joining the New York Knicks in the offseason in what would have been his 10th year in the NBA.
“Today, I officially begin my transition out of my basketball career,” Brogdon said in a released statement. “I have proudly given my mind, body and spirit to the game over the last few decades. With the many sacrifices it took to get here, I have received many rewards. I am deeply grateful to have arrived to this point on my own terms and now to be able to reap the benefits of my career with my family and friends. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, to all who have had a place in my journey.”
Brogdon was one of the main players in putting Virginia basketball back on the map under Tony Bennett.
I remember Ritchie McKay, formerly Bennett’s right-hand man, telling me the story of how he discovered Brogdon, essentially by mistake. McKay was actually on a recruiting trip watching a specific player in a summer tournament when he couldn’t help but notice this other kid, Brogdon.
McKay couldn’t stop watching. The more he saw, the more he liked. After researching, he found out that only Ivy League schools were in pursuit. He couldn’t hardly contain his excitement.
Once Virginia got into the picture, McKay and Bennett had to find a way to convince Malcolm’s grandma that Virginia would be a better destination than Harvard.
Brogdon went on to become an All-American for the Cavaliers in both 2015 and 2016, a three-time All-ACC player, and had his number 15 retired in 2017.
When he left UVA, he was the ninth-leading scorer in school history, first in free-throw percentage (87.6), second in games played, fifth in minutes played, sixth in 3-point field-goal percentage and seventh in 3-pointers made.
He was the 36th overall pick in the 2016 NBA Draft by the Milwaukee Bucks and won Rookie of the Year. After three years he was traded to the Indiana Pacers, where in 2020-21 he averaged a career-high 21.2 points per game.
After three years with the Pacers, Brogdon was traded to the Boston Celtics where, for the first time in his career, he wasn’t a starter, but won Sixth Man of the Year in 2023, making him one of only two players in NBA history to win Rookie of the Year and Sixth Man of the Year.
From there, he bounced around from Portland to Washington and had agreed to a deal with New York before deciding to hang up his sneakers. He had signed a non-guaranteed Exhibit 9 contract.
Injuries had prevented him from delivering the usual production he had posted earlier in his career, and he appeared in only 63 games over the past two seasons. Still, he managed to average double-figures scoring in all nine of his NBA seasons.
Brogdon used to tell media back at Virginia that he didn’t see himself hanging on as a player too deep into his future, that he had other interests, potentially politics or non-profit ventures, something that would allow him to give back.
Still, that winning 3-pointer at Pitt is frozen in time, a moment that hinted at Brogdon’s greatness.
He didn’t disappoint.
