Virginia Basketball Notes: Speakers Announced For Terry Holland Tribute

Virginia Cavaliers Terry Holland
Ralph Sampson will be a co-moderator at the tribute to Terry Holland service this weekend. ~ Photo by Mike Ingalls/TheSabre.com

Terry Holland, who passed away in February at the age of 80, left a lasting legacy at the University of Virginia and beyond. On Saturday at 2 p.m., UVA will host a memorial tribute to Holland at the John Paul Jones Arena to celebrate his life and that legacy.

It’s a fitting location for the ceremony. Holland, after all, played an instrumental role in the building of the arena after serving as UVA Athletics Director from 1994-2001. That, of course, is really just a drop in the bucket of his accomplishments.

Holland retired from coaching at UVA as the program’s all-time winningest men’s basketball coach as he posted a 326-173 (.653) record from 1974 to 1990. That mark stood until this past season when Tony Bennett took over the top spot. Holland coached the Cavaliers to 2 Final Fours, 2 Elite Eights, and 9 NCAA Tournament appearances. His teams won three consecutive ACC Regular Season titles from 1981-83 as well as the 1976 ACC Tournament and the 1980 NIT. Holland received ACC Coach of the Year honors in 1981 and 1982.

As AD at Davidson, UVA, and ECU, he oversaw many accomplishments. Davidson returned to the Southern Conference and increased fundraising during his tenure. Virginia expanded Scott Stadium and underwent facilities upgrades for swimming and diving, tennis, and more while he was the athletics director. He then served as a special assistant to then UVA President John Casteen III and helped secure the creation of the John Paul Jones Arena. At ECU, the athletics department expanded Dowdy Ficklen Stadium and fully funded women’s sports teams. The school later named the Terry Holland Olympic Sports Complex after him.

With such widespread success, the speakers at Saturday’s tribute are impressive. Ralph Sampson, three-time national player of the year and Naismith Hall of Fame member, will share moderator duties with Seth Greenberg, ESPN basketball analyst and former UVA assistant basketball coach. In addition to members of the Holland family, other coaches and players scheduled to participate include Virginia coach Tony Bennett, Kentucky coach John Calipari, Miami coach Jim Larranaga, Old Dominion coach Jeff Jones, and Indiana Pacers coach Rick Carlisle. In addition to Jones and Carlisle, other Virginia players featured in the service will include Wally Walker, Marc Iavaroni, Jimmy Miller, Bryant Stith, Jeff Lamp and Bobby Stokes. Friend of the UVA program Lucky Graves will also share memories of Holland.

Other planned speakers include Big East Conference commissioner Val Ackerman, former Davidson College president John Kuykendall, and East Carolina and NFL standout Carlester Crumpler as well as Davidson basketball players Jerry Kroll and Fred Hetzel. Former East Carolina head football coaches Ruffin McNeill and Skip Holtz are scheduled to participate as well. Three-time Grammy Award winner Bruce Hornsby will perform too.

Doors will open at John Paul Jones Arena at 1 p.m. for the event. The JPJ clear bag policy will be in effect. Parking is free at the JPJ lots adjacent to the building and at the McCue Center. Hornsby will perform starting at 1:30 p.m. The tribute will be streamed live on VirginiaSports.com and on Facebook at @VirginiaCavaliers starting at 1:30 p.m.

In lieu of flowers, the family has requested memorial contributions should be made to Coach Holland’s tribute within the Alzheimer’s Association to help raise awareness and find a cure for the disease. Donations can be made to this link: https://act.alz.org/goto/CoachTHolland.

Rick Carlisle Previews Terry Holland Memorial On WINA

The list of familiar names scheduled for Saturday’s service included Rick Carlisle. The current coach of the Pacers, Carlisle won an NBA Championship as coach of the Dallas Mavericks in 2011. He also won a title in 1986 as a player with the Boston Celtics. He played for Holland at Virginia from 1982-1984.

Carlisle joined WINA 1070 AM this week to preview Saturday’s tribute. He discussed what brought him to UVA as a player and what made Holland “so affectionately thought of in Virginia basketball circles and around the state, around the country, and around the basketball world in general.”

Virginia Women’s Team Announces New Staff Members

The Virginia women’s basketball team announced a pair of staff updates Tuesday. Justin Westbrook has been named the program’s strength and conditioning coach, while Kahree Peterson has been named its director of multimedia and creative content.

Westbrook did not move far for his role. He has been an assistant for the UVA men’s program alongside head strength and conditioning coach Mike Curtis since 2018. He served 8 years in the U.S. Navy and earned a bachelor of science in education with a major in kinesiology from UVA. He will complete his master’s degree in exercise physiology later this month at Virginia. Peterson spent the last three years working as a freelance videographer covering ACC and Big Ten teams as well as serving as the social media manager at LC Bird High School in Chesterfield, VA. He has also worked as a content creator at Overtime, an independent online sports content provider.