Virginia basketball does not look the same since the Cavaliers threw their March Madness hopes away to Furman basketball. After that first-round exit, coach Tony Bennett lost a lot of recruits in the Cavaliers' rotation. Retention may be the way for Bennett's Cavs as they try to get their seventh of 10 ACC regular-season championships.

Tony Bennett has lost 12 transfers in a span of four seasons. The Cavaliers' exodus is not as bad as some teams in the ACC. However, this does not faze the Virginia basketball head coach in any way. His focus has always been player development and growing culture over the pursuit of constantly acquiring transfers. After all, those are the keys to his 2019 national tournament-winning squad.

“I’m going to double down on what we believe is the way to do it at Virginia, and that’s through retention,” Coach Bennett says in response to questions about his roster construction, per Eamonn Brennan and Seth Davis of The Athletic.

“Can we do everything in our power to keep these guys together for two or three years? I think everyone is in an experimental mode right now, and I’m not saying 100 percent that it can be done. But you have to do things that are aligned with your university, aligned with how you want to do things, and then run your program the way you want it to run,” the Virginia basketball coach added with hints of uncertainty about their squad's retention.

Tony Bennett is one of the best coaches in college basketball. The Virginia basketball faithful can only trust his championship-winning pedigree.