In an era when kids are about to get paid on their social media status via the coming ncaa rule changes, we may need to up our game.
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That is another point but one I wasnt even considering. It’s almost a complete neglect of the Fans who create the program in exchange for this image of being a “quiet/down to earth program”.
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But this is where the specialists and management comes into play. I doubt that Roy Williams actually knows a lot about social media, so I bet he relinquished control to the department heads, marketing, sports management etc. I’m okay with Tony not knowing about Instagram, tick toc etc, but at its most foundational level it’s just Marketing no matter the platform.
I’m actually really curious about who is getting paid to market and what they are *doing?
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Good points, but at the end of the day, the program still has to open its doors for those people to do their jobs.
Did this topic ever come up on the J Willy show? I listened to quite a few but wasn’t able to catch them all. He’s the only coach that I consistently see on social media. He may have some interesting perspectives on why we’re light relative to other programs.
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I think the reason is it has nothing to do with winning. Tony has won in a huge way doing what he does and they do. My guess is he hasnt even considered it and why would he? Play the game, do what you do, and win games.
Winning is really really fun and losing sucks
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It’s respect to the fans during a pandemic looking for something. anything. It’s just bad branding in general. Outside a UVA fan who looks up old games, when is the last time anyone else saw UVA basketball in action? With other programs they see other schools active on media engaging and they get interested, look into and start looking up clips.
Of course tony highlights everything we have in the zoom visits. but imagine if your a prospect mulling a decision. It wont make or break the decision but it doesn’t hurt for a recruit to give a few looks over everything online and imagine themselves being in the program. Especially when you can’t do official visits during a pandemic. Other schools are showing how they are active with the social justice causes, whats going with their program, etc.
Again we aren’t asking tony to whore himself out like Duke. But our media team could vastly improve.
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Not to be rude but recruiting is part of winning. As I’m sure it’s been stated before we finally won a championship with Tony’s highest rated class. He has continued to try and recruit at a high level, but it would be myopic to think that kids these days don’t want to be featured as often as possible. As a matter of fact it was either Keels or Houstan who said something along the lines of “getting noticed for the NBA” (exact phrasing escapes me), but the point is, we actually have a very deep team this year with some freshman and redshirts that may be very big impact players but we have literally heard nothing outside of the JWilly show.
With all of that said, I understand Tony not liking social media and maybe trying to protect the critiques of the team, but for us fans (yes those of us that support the program, buy merchandise etc), to not really be treated at all, makes for a very long, 8-9 month dry spell.
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One other thing. Caleb Houstan has been writing a blog, which just dropped yesterday Ironically. He probably didn’t *have to do it, but he likes to have a presence for his fans and people that are looking to recruit him. To me that says that he is of the mindset that he wants *some sort of attention and so UVA needs to show that we are not out of touch with that kind of thinking. Again we don’t need to whore ourselves out dookie style but we need to be able to show that we can relate. Honestly this is really basic stuff we are asking about in terms of Marketing a grade A program.
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It’s not even just about the kids that are recruits. UVA doesn’t own the state of Virginia like UNC owns North Carolina, the Vols own Tennessee, UK owns Kentucky, etc. Now we have a national title program that does things the right way. We can showcase the university in a way the whole state can be proud of. The closed off nature just feeds into the larger problem of how UVA is seen as too good for a lot of Virginia rather than embraced by the entire state. And it certainly would pay dividends with in state kids who are in 6-9th grade now to increase the social media presence even if it is too late to matter to the current junior and senior classes.
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Not rude at all We just dont agree. I am new to this following recruits thing etc and I never knew Joe Harris, Malcolm Brogdan, London Parrentes, on and on before they were on Grounds. And they are all winners and thats what matters to me
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Owning a state is more of a football thing. We’re recruiting a handful of guys across the country each year, so there’s no need to focus more on in state recruits just because they are in state.
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We don’t need to own the state in terms of recruiting but we do want to be THE program in Virginia. Kids growing up watching UVA. Not something you see unless you have a Hoo in your family. Didn’t even know UVA had a basketball program until my first game and seeing Mike Scott in all his glory.
Expanding our media also gives Tony a bigger platform for his ideals and his messages.
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I don’t just mean for basketball recruiting. I mean UNC owns the state of North Carolina. The University of Kentucky owns the state of Kentucky. UVA doesn’t have the same love in Virginia. A lot of the state actually hates us. A national championship basketball program run by the classiest man in the sport could start to change that perception but we hide it away as much as possible instead of showcasing it.
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I get what you are saying…When there is an instate kid that we want we should be able to lock them up…easy feckin peasy…unfortunately we are in close proximity to UNC and Duke which are legit blue bloods and we are Johnny come lately…the Richmond thing is damn annoying…an hour away and we can’t close a top prospect from there…time will tell when Roy and K move on…
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You can bet everything Tony does is calculated. I may not agree with it but who am I? This may be part of the filtering process. I know I trust CTB and you better believe if he feels it’s important, he will adapt / adjust.
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The football team has a solid social media presence.
And they’re 1-3
Stop whining
There are going to be a lot of games cancelled this season if this is the protocol every time there’s a positive test.
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Oh yeah, I’m pretty bearish about basketball season now. The rosters simply aren’t big enough to withstand the protocols.
As I was watching our defense get torn apart by wake I was thinking how we would be 4-0 if it weren’t for the damn marketing team doing their jobs and providing fans with content.
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