Predictions for 2015

HAPPY NEW YEAR, Wahooze Nation!

Look, I know you want more from me. I know you need more from me. I'll do my best to accommodate.


To get the year kicked off right, here are my predictions for 2015...



Winter...

UVA Basketball maintains top-10 status, despite dropping a few toughies in conference play. We end up tying Duke for the regular season title at 15-3. In the ACC Tournament, we lose a heartbreaker to Louisville in the semis. We end up getting boned by the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee, as they nail us with a 3-seed when we clearly deserve a 2. However, we ride that 3-seed to the Sweet Sixteen without really working up a sweat. Once there, we top 2-seed Arizona via a key London Perrantes three inside the last minute. Then we run 4-seed Utah (who upset 1-seed Villanova) out of the building to advance to the Final Four. Malcolm Brogdon is named Most Valuable Player of the Regional, and Justin Anderson finishes 4th in voting for the Naismith Player of the Year award. We play Kentucky extremely tough before bowing out in the Final Four, a game shy of the championship game. Kentucky goes on to crush Wisconsin, and our Final Four game against the Wildcats ends up being - by far - the toughest test they face in their run to the National Championship.

Swish, motherfucker.

Meanwhile, the ladies make the NCAAT after a surprising 10-8 record in the ACC. They lose in the second round, but Coach Boyle's program appears to have finally turned the corner.


Spring...

Typical ho-hum season for Virginia Baseball. 45+ regular season wins and a national seed. We breeze through the Charlottesville Regional, 3-0. Then we top some shitbag SEC team 2-1 in the CVille Super Regional. College World Series, our stellar pitching guns us to a 2-0 start, but we drop the third game (to a shitbag SEC team), then rally to win and advance to the Final Series, against... ugh... Vanderbilt. The Commodores win a pair of 4-2 games to win the National Championship, and the Hoos appear stuck on a [very high] plateau.

Time for the yearly dogpile.

UVA Lacrosse plays better in 2015 than they have the last two years, and grit their way to the NCAA Tournament semifinals, where they lose to Duke or Maryland or some similar team we friggin hate. Still, a nice improvement for Dom Starsia's squad after a few seasons of struggle.

Craig Littlepage announces his retirement at the end of the athletic season. Hoofans rejoice nervously, with a stinkeye focused on Jon Oliver (who is hovering around, hoping for a promotion)...

Adios.

Summer...

Virginia shocks the world by FINALLY doing the right thing and unceremoniously kicking Jon Oliver to the curb, then dumping a pile of cash on Kansas State's John Currie to take over as Athletic Director. One of Currie's first acts as UVA's new AD is to pluck Derek Dooley from the Cowboys to step in and serve as Virginia's Associate AD for Football Operations. I celebrate all of this by drinking gallons of bourbon and Shock Top. Literally, gallons. Gallons.

Jon Oliver surfaces at Boise State in some sort of meaningless administrative role. Or maybe scrubbing toilets.

Meanwhile, Virginia Football works through a quiet training camp. Reports indicate that Greyson Lambert has strongly taken the reins of leadership and has really turned the corner. We all take it with a giant grain of salt. Football recruiting, meanwhile, is in the crapper. We stand at just 7 commitments for the 2016 class, and our recruiting ranking for the cycle dips to outside the top 50. These struggles do not go unnoticed, as the Mike London sycophants slowly begin to realize that Year Two of a Dead Man Walking as our head football coach kinda sucks.

Justin Anderson goes pro and is taken at #25 overall... by the San Antonio Spurs.

Oh, and men's tennis wins a national championship somewhere in there, too. Whenever tennis season is.


Fall...

Virginia Football goes 4-8, but looks pretty good at times. The obnoxiously difficult schedule dooms us. Average attendance dips to below 35,000 per game, and the downturn in recruiting dooms the head coach. Mike London finally, mercifully, is fired.

One of either men's or women's soccer wins a national championship. Maybe neither. Maybe both. In semi-related news, Virginia's Twiddly Winks team finishes as national runner-up, and our Midget-Tossing squad sees their run end in the national semifinals.

Currie orchestrates an expert head football coaching search, and reels in Mark Hudspeth from Louisiana-Lafayette. Houston's Tom Herman and Tulsa's Philip Montgomery finish tied in runner-up status. We surprise many by handing Huddy a handsome $3.2 mil / season contract, flexing nuts with our deep pockets that nobody thought we had.

Mother-fuckin Mark Hudspeth, y'all.

Winter...

Despite losing Justin Anderson, Virginia Basketball opens the season ranked in the top five, and looks every bit like a serious national championship contender. Darius Thompson is a surprise stud, and Marial Shayok takes over the 3, set for a run as a three-year starter on the wing. London Perrantes, Malcolm Brogdon, Anthony Gill, and Mike Tobey form the veteran nucleus of a team that nobody is surprised to see playing at a super-elite level.

What do you guys think? Any predictions for 2015?

HAPPY NEW YEAR, Hoofans!