When Virginia basketball coach Dave Leitao visits U.S. military troops in Iraq this week, he hopes to bring them a little piece of home.

The last time that the Virginia men’s basketball team traveled outside of the 50 states to play games was during the 2006-07 season. Things didn’t go well.

Three-time Olympic gold medalist Dawn Staley will leave Temple to become the women’s basketball coach at South Carolina.

Some basketball recruiting gurus aren’t completely sold on Virginia’s incoming class. Bob Gibbons, one of the more respected evaluators of talent, isn’t one of them.

Virginia big man Tunji Soroye wants to return for a fifth year, and the UVa coaching staff would like to have him back. However, a “Tunji Time” redux is still up in the air according to Virginia coach Dave Leitao.

Two years of being a crowd favorite during garbage time may be all that Andy Burns can stomach.

Time with Team USA in 2005 taught Sharnee Zoll that patience was truly a virtue.

Virginia point guard Sharnee Zoll was selected by the Los Angeles Sparks with the 29st overall pick in Wednesday’s WNBA draft.

Virginia’s record-setting floor leader, Sharnee Zoll, is expected to be taken in the first or second round today by a WNBA team in search of a backup point guard, a true need for several organizations.

Sharnee Zoll, a former Virginia women’s basketball star, was invited to the WNBA Draft in Palm Harbor, Fla., at 1 p.m. on Wednesday. Zoll was one of 20 players invited to attend the festivities, a direct sign of interest in the point guard following the professional league’s two-day pre-draft camp, which was held Friday and Saturday in Tampa.

That was the backdrop for a story that began to circulate in San Antonio over the weekend that said Virginia coach Dave Leitao might have interest in taking over the job at Providence.
Leitao, who is in San Antonio with his staff at the Final Four, seemed taken aback by the rumor.

Countless nights passed by when Gus Gerard’s heart was thumping so hard that he felt it would pop through his chest.

For Virginia women’s basketball coach Debbie Ryan, it was a season of returns.

As Virginia prepares for life without senior star Sean Singletary, Daily Progress beat writer Whitelaw Reid hands out his final 2008 report card in alphabetical order.

You don’t need to be John Wooden or even Isiah Thomas to figure out where things went wrong for the Virginia men’s basketball team in 2007-08.

Sources have told The Daily Progress that Virginia junior Lars Mikalauskas will undergo surgery on his right shoulder on Friday.

Shortly afterwards, Thompson told coach Ryan the news, giving Virginia two of the nation’s best prospects in the fold for the class of 2010.

Bradley, thanks to 27 points from Jeremy Crouch - and blistering 57-percent shooting in the second half - ran away with a 96-85 CBI semifinal win in front of 5,582 frustrated fans at John Paul Jones Arena.

Old Dominion, the fifth-seeded team in the Greensboro Regional, did the career-ending damage as it upset fourth-seeded Virginia, 88-85, in overtime in the second round of the NCAA Tournament.

But now, after wins over Richmond and ODU in the CBI, UVa has regained a pulse. Ditto for its fan base.

Virginia’s senior point guard has made 200 steals during his career, but none bigger than the one that came with seven seconds remaining Monday night. That’s when Singletary’s split-second anticipation resulted in a steal near mid-court and a dramatic breakaway layup that nearly brought the house down.

Lyndra Littles awoke Monday around 7 a.m. — far earlier than she expected or preferred — to a chipper voice in her hotel room.

It hit Sharnee Zoll on Senior Day.
It pulls at coach Debbie Ryan’s heart almost daily.
The thoughts of a pair of would-be seniors that are not along for the NCAA Tournament ride were rekindled throughout the program Sunday night once it was official that the next opponent would be Old Dominion.

“He just continues to rewrite a story that is already a best-seller in the annals of Virginia basketball,” said Virginia coach Dave Leitao. “We’ve been able to ride on his shoulders for a very long time.
“He’s one in a million.”

ESPN.com reporter Andy Katz wrote on his blog that, according to Virginia coach Dave Leitao, Sean Singletary is “starting to check out the process and may opt to declare [for the draft].“

Did the battle for first place in the ACC between Virginia and Virginia Tech really need any more spice? Well, now it has it.