Virginia Basketball: Freshman Leon Bond III Plans to Redshirt This Season
With Virginia bringing back seven key rotation players from last season and adding Ben Vander Plas through the transfer portal, there was speculation around the program that one or more of UVA's star-studded freshman class would end up redshirting this season.
That question was answered just ahead of Monday's season-opener as Tony Bennett indicated on the Virginia Sports Radio pregame show that the plan is to have 6'5" guard Leon Bond III (Wauwatosa, Wisconsin) redshirt the 2022-2023 season. Bennett elaborated to say that they are taking it "month-by-month" with Bond, whose redshirt status is not quite set in stone. Bond is likely to redshirt, there could be circumstances in which he will play and they'll reevaluate that in a month.
Isaac McKneely played 23 minutes in Virginia's 73-61 win over NC Central on Monday. Fellow freshmen Isaac Traudt and Ryan Dunn did not enter the game, but the expectation is that there will be opportunities for them to play throughout the season.
Leon Bond III will look to become the latest in a long line of Virginia men's basketball players who went on to have very successful careers after redshirting a season. That list includes De'Andre Hunter, Mamadi Diakite, Jay Huff, and Malcolm Brogdon, who redshirted his second year due to injury.
Virginia will be back in action on Friday at 9pm against Monmouth at John Paul Jones Arena.
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