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UVA Basketball: How to Rewatch Tony Bennett's Halftime Ceremony

Matthew Newton|
Aaron Snyde

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Virginia Cavaliers

Nearly four months after Tony Bennett announced his retirement, the all-time winningest head coach in the history of the UVA men's basketball program returned to the floor at John Paul Jones Arena for a special halftime ceremony during the Virginia-Georgia Tech game on Saturday, a 75-61 victory for the Cavaliers.

Bennett was joined on the floor by his entire family, UVA President Jim Ryan, UVA director of athletics Carla Williams, and several of Bennett's former players, including Jack Salt, Evan Nolte, Grant Kersey, and current NBA players De'Andre Hunter and Ty Jerome, who were just reunited on the Cleveland Cavaliers this past week when Hunter was traded to the Cavs from the Atlanta Hawks.

The halftime ceremony began with a five-minute video montage, which can be viewed in the YouTube video below.

Several tributes and gifts followed, including a decree from Governor Glenn Youngkin that February 8th would henceforth be known as Tony Bennett Day in the Commonwealth of Virginia. A banner was raised to the rafters commemorating Bennett's 15 years at UVA; it resides next to the banner honoring Terry Holland.

Bennett then took the microphone and addressed the UVA crowd.

“I’m not comfortable being honored like this, but the way I look at it is this is a celebration of all the people that have been along with me on this journey," Bennett said. "And to you the fans, thank you for your support over these 15 years, through some of the hard losses, the great wins you’ve made this place one of the best places, the most intense places.”

You can hear everything Bennett had to say and watch the full halftime ceremony from Saturday in the video below.

Here is a quick one-minute summary video of the event as well:

At the end of the game, Virginia had built a large enough lead to afford the opportunity to get the bench players and walk-ons in the game, including Tony Bennett's son Eli Bennett, who proceeded to come up with a steal, leading to an all-walk-on basket in transition with Bryce Walker passing to Desmond Roberts for the layup. Tony Bennett's reaction to that play was pure gold.

In the lead-up to Tony Bennett Day, the Virginia Cavaliers On SI staff took turns writing about some of their favorite moments of the Tony Bennett era of Virginia basketball. We certainly didn't cover them all, and we decided not to include any of the games during the Cavaliers' run to the 2019 National Championship (low-hanging fruit), but it was a fun exercise to recall some of the best games and moments of Tony Bennett's 15 years at Virginia.

Stories in Our Series on Tony Bennett's Best Moments at Virginia

A Tony Bennett Moment: Grant Kersey Makes Basketball Fun Again

A Tony Bennett Moment: Hunter Stuns Louisville at the Buzzer in 2018

A Tony Bennett Moment: Beekman Takes Down Duke at the Buzzer in Cameron

A Tony Bennett Moment: Virginia Wills Itself Past Gardner-Webb

A Tony Bennett Moment: Reece Beekman's Buzzer Beater vs Syracuse

A Tony Bennett Moment: Virginia Captures the Main Event Title in Las Vegas

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Matt Newton
MATTHEW NEWTON

Matt launched Virginia Cavaliers On SI in August of 2021 and has since served as the site's publisher and managing editor, covering all 23 NCAA Division I sports teams at the University of Virginia. He is from Downingtown, Pennsylvania and graduated from UVA in May of 2021.

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