The state of the program

EDITOR’S NOTE: Daily Progress sports editor Jerry Ratcliffe had his annual sitdown chat with University of Virginia director of athletics Craig Littlepage to discuss various issues affecting the Cavaliers’ athletic program.

First in a two-part series.

Q. Your mission when you were promoted to director of athletics in 2001 was to build a program that could consistently finish among the nation’s top 10 overall. Having reached the top 10 for the first time this year, how do you feel about it?
Littlepage: I frequently have said in meeting with our donors and friends that we cannot do it without their help. To see what we have done in terms of winning championships in the ACC over the last six or seven years — more than any other school in the conference — and putting ourselves in the top 10 of the Director’s Cup standings this year, was certainly what we had envisioned.

At the same time, I realize that for many people, they will measure ours or any other program’s success, by what you do in football and men’s basketball, and I understand that. Our charge is to continue doing what we have, and for football and men’s basketball to achieve at the levels that not only do we want, but that the coaches and kids who participate in those programs want. I don’t think we’re far away at all.

Q. What did it mean to you personally to meet that top-10 goal? There were no guarantees that you could crack into that select group.

A. There was a certain level of satisfaction in accomplishing the challenge this one year, but I’m even more excited by the challenges that lie ahead and the opportunity to sustain that level of success. This wasn’t something that just happened in one year.

We think that men’s tennis, for example, is positioned to do this for the long term. Same for women’s lacrosse, baseball, rowing, whatever the case may be. There are still things we want to do. There are still areas where we can improve and our goal now is to put together a game plan for what we need to do for all our programs to achieve our full potential.

Q. Speaking of football and men’s basketball, critics will argue that even though both of those programs have enjoyed glorious moments over the past 25 years, that because of the manner in which the University of Virginia is structured, that the environment is not conducive to allowing powerhouses in either one of those sports. Is that a bunch of hooey, or is there validity to that theory?

A. I hear those same questions being asked or same comments being made and I understand why people might feel that way. But I don’t necessarily agree that’s the case.

I think that if you look at Duke basketball or Stanford basketball over a period of time — and, granted, it might be a little different in basketball because you’re dealing with fewer kids — but still, if you look at some of the models in Northwestern and Notre Dame football, I think you can have a sustained level of success in all our programs, including football and men’s basketball at the University of Virginia, even given some of the unique things that exist at UVa in terms of administratively, academically, et cetera.

Q. Some have recommended that some changes need to be made to specifically help those two sports flourish like the other sports at UVa, that they are so different in myriad ways, that they need more help. If some tweaking isn’t done, isn’t Tony Bennett just inheriting the same set of problems that Dave Leitao and Pete Gillen experienced, or Al Groh might be experiencing?
A. I will say that there are any number of people who have ideas about what needs to be done and one of the topics I’ve heard most about over a number of years and received a lot of curiosity, has been about the majors. Are there enough areas of academic interest to meet the needs of student-athletes generally? I would expand that to be a discussion about whether the academic interests of students generally are being addressed, with student-athletes being just a small part of that.

There are probably some things like that which line up better with the student-athletes’ interest, but I don’t think that necessarily those are the things that are going to help make the changes. I think that it’s a matter of things lining up such as having consistency among our coaching staffs, having consistency with regard to the approach and what it is that needs to be done in this particular sport to be not only good, but to be good over a period of time.

I would say the one thing that has helped our overall athletic program generally is that there has been some consistency in the coaching staff. We haven’t had a lot of turnover in the big picture.

Q. If the Board of Visitors or whomever came to you and granted any wishes to empower the athletic department to have whatever it wanted, to make UVa football and basketball annual contenders for the ACC title and make your life easier, what would you ask for?

A. The answer may surprise you, and I feel this sincerely. It would be for a better understanding and a better appreciation for how difficult it is of what we’re trying to do.

We have coaches that are so good at what they do that it might sometimes look easy. But what this group of coaches is trying to do isn’t easy. What Brian Boland has done in men’s tennis is not easy. What Brian O’Connor did this year is not easy. What Dave [Leitao], and Al [Groh] and Debbie [Ryan], and Dom Starsia have done, is not easy.

Q. Elaborate, please, on that thought.

A. If there could be a full appreciation of how difficult this line of work is, coaching in a very, very difficult environment of Division I athletics, and coaching at an institution that demands the kinds of things that are demanded in terms of integrity and doing things the right way, etc., while being in one of the top conferences in the country in so many of these sports is very challenging.

Just for people, whether it’s people within the University of Virginia, or whether it’s in the university community or people connected to the university, who have its best interests at heart, I would say, if they could just understand how difficult it is and how well these men and women are doing in leading our programs — that would be one thing that I would wish for.

Now, there are other things that relate to that, like trying to continue to work on facilities, and I mentioned the topic of the academic programs and academic offerings ... those are very important as well. The respect that goes with seeing these coaches as the leaders, teachers, and educators they are, and respecting them in terms of what they do, that would be a big thing for me.

Monday: Last in a two-part series. Why isn’t Ralph Sampson in the College Basketball Hall of Fame? Could some of UVa’s greatest athletes of the past even get into the school today?