Virginia finishes In Top 25 of Learfield Sports Directors’ Cup

For the 12th straight year, the University of Virginia finished in the top 25 of the Learfield Sports Directors’ Cup. The final standings, which consist of how each program finishes in NCAA postseason play, were revealed Saturday. UVa ranked 21st out of 292 Division I schools, which was good for fifth out of the 15 Atlantic Coast Conference schools (Florida State was 9th, Duke 11th, UNC 12th and N.C. State 15th). Notre Dame (22nd), Virginia Tech (28th) and Louisville (30th) also cracked the top 30. Although it was the school’s lowest finish since coming in 26th overall in 2006, Virginia […]

UVA’s O’Connor Reunited With His Heroes On USA Baseball Team

Brian O’Connor has worked wonders for the University of Virginia baseball program and at the same time enhanced the ACC’s national reputation in the sport by giving the conference its first national championship (2015) since Wake Forest’s in 1955. Now, it was time for O’Connor to do something for his country, and a little bit for himself. When the National Anthem played at the USA Baseball National Training Complex in Cary, N.C., on Thursday night, prior to the U.S. game versus Chinese Taipei, O’Connor felt the spine-tingling chills any American coach or athlete has felt for his country. Standing alongside […]

The Time Has Come: Saddle Up, Let’s Ride

A week ago, I reunited with an old friend to talk about a new life. Dave Scarangella and myself had worked together in the mid-1970s as we began to carve out careers in the newspaper business. Although we had kept in touch, we hadn’t seen each other in a while, and so upon our meeting at the Black Bear Bistro in downtown Warrenton, well, it was like old times. I had just lost my job after 36 years of covering University of Virginia athletics amongst other sports and was exploring the next step. Dave, who had been semi-retired after successful […]

“Well, I Guess It All Started One Rainy Day At The Black Bear Bistro…”

Every great tale usually has a backstory. And as I was reading Jerry’s post about how this site came to be in such a small amount of time, I thought maybe some folks would like to hear some of that backstory. Jerry and I are not only life-long friends, but we’re writers and story tellers. So much so that when he called and asked if I wanted to get together and have lunch, the next obvious question was where. He lives in Charlottesville and I live in Ashburn, so we looked for a town somewhere in the middle. Warrenton was […]