An arena full of possibilities

By Jerry Ratcliffe

Published: July 9, 2006

When Virginia men’s basketball coach Dave Leitao stands near center court at the new John Paul Jones Arena, he can’t help but get excited about the Cavaliers’ future. Same goes for women’s coach Debbie Ryan.

The 15,000-seat Taj Mahal of basketball, which opens its doors to the Wahoos this season, raises Virginia’s arena status from the third-smallest in the ACC (only recent newcomers Boston College and Miami feature smaller facilities) to the fourth-largest in the 12-team league (North Carolina, N.C. State and Maryland are bigger).

A tour of the building with Richard Laurence, director of the arena’s construction, and UVa hoops legend Barry Parkhill, who has spent much of the past four years raising money to pay for the place, quickly makes you keenly aware that you’re not in antiquated University Hall any more.

Everything is state-of-the-art. What former Virginia athletic director and basketball coach Terry Holland stressed most when JPJ was first talked about was practice facilities for the men’s and women’s teams.

Mission accomplished.

When VMDO architect Bob Moje traveled the nation with Holland and other Virginia officials to critique other new arenas, Moje wanted to get seats as close to the court as possible to create an intimidating atmosphere to visiting teams. His idea was to make JPJ the Cameron Indoor Stadium of the 2000s.

Mission accomplished.

“You look around the place and it starts to get you thinking about the possibilities,” Leitao said this week while taking a brief break from the recruiting trail. “You start thinking about the crowds and the noise that could get generated and how crazy things could get inside this building.”

While U-Hall was nearly half the size (8,864), it could be a rowdy place to play. Maryland players used to dread coming to the place. No wonder Leitao wonders what a crowd almost twice as large could do.

But that’s not the only thing he thinks about when he ponders the advantages of such a facility. He and Ryan both think “recruiting.”

“The new arena has already helped a lot because being new ourselves (UVa’s men’s staff is only in its second year of directing the program), we have to talk more about the future than the present and this building speaks to our future and where we’re going,” Leitao said. “Not only from the aesthetic value of the place, but the commitment.”

For years, Virginia basketball fans perceived a lack of commitment to the program. By investing approximately $130 million into the arena project, UVa has made a strong statement that basketball is important to the school.

“That’s been a great help in trying to sell the future of the program,” Leitao said.

He has personally taken some prospects through the arena and gets what he describes as a phenomenal reaction from them.

“The vastness of the building and them perhaps seeing themselves in our uniform, playing on that court, has been apparent,” the coach said. “When you’re dealing with young people, 17 years old or so, they’re extremely impressionable, so you’re giving them something to be impressionable about.”

Obviously, Leitao is already seeing results.

Rivals, a company that reports on national college football and basketball recruiting, rated all three members of UVa’s incoming hoops class among the country’s top 115 prospects: Jamil Tucker (No. 60), Will Harris (90), and Solomon Tat (114). The Cavaliers already have a commitment for the following class from its chief target, Eric Wallace, a 6-foot-7 small forward from Kernersville, N.C., who is rated the No. 105 player in the nation by Rivals.

“With Tucker, Harris and Tat, UVa is looking like they are ready to turn the corner in the ACC,” said Rivals national recruiting analyst Justin Young. “Leitao and his staff wasted little time targeting and landing players that used to go to other schools.”

A little more than a year ago, Leitao sat in his cramped office at U-Hall and couldn’t help but think about his early days at the University of Connecticut when he was hired as an assistant to his mentor Jim Calhoun. They took over a program that was nearly bankrupt with horrible facilities and cramped and dingy work spaces.

Instead, they sold the future of the program and

didn’t have anything nearly the equal of JPJ to offer. But UConn is now one of the nation’s elite programs.

The Virginia coach hasn’t spent much time in his new digs, which is just now getting the finishing touches, but his office alone may be as large as the entire men’s basketball offices at U-Hall.

“A good friend of mine always told me that in order to be big time, you have to act big time,” Leitao said. “Facilities, whether they’re offices or other parts of the building, shows people how serious we are about all this and what level we’re trying to maintain. Practice courts, offices, everything is awe-inspiring and will do nothing but help our cause.”

Ryan, who was on a recruiting trip and couldn’t be reached for comment, would probably ditto all of her counterpart’s statements, and her program has also attracted a major incoming recruit that she hopes is a leap toward returning UVa women’s hoops to the upper echelon of the conference.

Both coaches know better than anyone else, that while the facility may be second to none in college basketball and built for the intimidation factor, that nothing really gets the job done except the players who wear “Virginia” emblazoned upon their chests.

“We have to do our part to put the right players on the court, so the building can be the icing on the cake and not the substance of what we’re doing here,” Leitao said. “It’s all about the players on the court, not the icing.”

JPJ is some pretty nice icing.

Contact Jerry Ratcliffe at (434) 978-7251 or .