Lessons for BC from the UVA win

Like Clemson in Football, UVA's basketball win is a reminder that BC is in the right conference and championship success is possible. You could argue that UVA's basketball history is superior to BC's (I would disagree) but they were a traditionally underachieving/middle of the pack ACC team when Bennett was hired. (Bennett was only hired one year before we hired Donahue.) We are not that far off. Here are some lessons from UVA.

Invest in facilities
Before they hired Bennett, UVA built a state of the art arena for basketball. BC doesn't need to duplicate John Paul Jones Arena's capacity, but could and should duplicate all the bells and whistles and of course practice venues and locker rooms.

Find the right coach who has the right system
Bennett's critics would argue he is all system (his dad's pack line D), but it has served him well at two Power 5 stops. His teams are always among the best defenses in college basketball. When things were at their best at BC -- Davis, Williams, Skinner -- we had a clear system in one of both ends of the court.  The benefit of having something, anything that you can turn to (2-3, flex, packline, havoc) is that you can plug in players year to year and you focus on executing instead of just trying to match your opponent possession to possession. If you are at a talent disadvantage a system can be an equalizer. With the right coach, superior talent and the right system, you can blow most of your opponents away.

You need good recruits, but not the best
This is a good summation of how both Virginia and Texas Tech did this without elite recruits. With one and dones on the way out, finding the right guys and developing them is going to become all that more important.

We've seen Clemson down. We've seen UVA down. Now both are on top. That should motivate and inspire BC fans and hopefully BC leadership.