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I make my return to the podcast airwaves today with a deep dive into UVA Basketball and UVA Baseball. First, on the hoops: there’s no news, and I explain why, and apologize, because the silence is all my fault. Seriously. I’m the reason we’re all having to read the smoke wafting up from JPJ. Baseball: have to apologize here. I so desperately want the ’Hoos to get back to Omaha this year, and to beat Brian O’Connor in getting there, that I’m holding Chris Pollard to ridiculously high standards.   https://youtu.be/s7LK6GEt7UA

Actually, first, this week’s “Street Knowledge” acknowledges that, it’s going to be hot in our part of the world in the next few days – with temperatures forecast to get near or above 90 this week. A little early for that. Crystal Graham joins the show to keep me in line – good luck with that. Her job this week: to keep me on task talking about the April 21 congressional redistricting referendum. We also discussed the ongoing decline of the Virginia news media, and what we’re trying to do to forge a new path forward. Why not try to overturn the tables in front of that particular temple, right?

Something is going on down at Virginia Tech, where the school’s president, Tim Sands, announced to Hokie Nation on Thursday, in a shock move, that he will be stepping down in the coming months. And it took a sports guy – not me – to figure it out.

TNA President Carlos Silva, obviously getting marching orders from big brother WWE, has forced Nic Nemeth, the former Dolph Ziggler, out of a May 1 indy match with AEW champ MJF, citing “partner conflicts.” Uh, huh.

Abigail Spanberger isn’t polling well right now, but I think I’ve got the solution. No, not better policies. I mean, a big part of the problem is that she’s not doing well with Democrats and independents, because she’s governing like a center-right Republican. We don’t fix bad poll numbers these days by course corrections. The solution: bombs.

Iran got Donald Trump to agree to a two-week ceasefire in which the Iranians basically give up nothing, and actually secured the right to charge tolls on ships navigating the Strait of Hormuz – and Ben Cline thinks this is “a beautiful thing.”

ESPN.com college basketball scribe Jeff Borzello has his “Way-Too-Early Top 25” for next season out this morning, and has Virginia at #9.

Donald Trump, not at all off his rocker, is, today, threatening Iran with total genocide. “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will,” Trump posted on his Truth Social account, timestamp: 8:06 a.m. Tuesday. Deadline, per the post: “tonight.” Unless, from Trump, “different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail.”

The AWARE Foundation is highlighting the cold case of James Davis Walker, who was last seen on April 7, 2000, in the Food Lion parking lot on Longwood Avenue in Bedford. Walker, known to friends and family as Slim – he was 6’7”, 140 pounds, at the time of his disappearance, at the age of 53 – may have been the victim of foul play, according to authorities.

A school bus driver in Lynchburg allegedly assaulted a student and has been arrested and charged with strangulation and child neglect.

UVA Basketball alum Jenny Boucek would obviously be somebody whose agent you’d want to contact about the coaching vacancy in the UVA women’s hoops program.

First-team All-ACC guard Kymora Johnson is entering the transfer portal, and there is one possible, quite logical, landing spot for her – on the roster of legendary UVA point guard Dawn Staley down at South Carolina.

Rugby is American football, without pads and helmets, and without mass substitutions – and if you’re bleeding after a hit, nothing to it, ’tis but a scratch. “I hate being pulled out, even just to catch my breath. I want to be out there for the full 80 minutes,” said Perry Allen, a member of the Virginia Rugby Football Club, which will host the Virginia Beach Falcons on Saturday at VFW Post 1827 in Charlottesville in the first round of the Division 3 playoffs. Significant others, prospective players, no worries – it’s safe. More on that as we dive into the sport.

To the UVA Basketball fans who thought they wanted Will Wade over Ryan Odom, and you know who you are, Wade not only already lost his way out of his first NCAA Tournament at NC State, with last night’s last-second defeat in the First Four, but he’s also a loser.

I’ll be heading to Philly on Thursday to cover the first weekend of the 2026 NCAA Tournament, with a focus on #9 Virginia, which opens play on Friday as the #3 seed in the Midwest Region. On the podcast, I offer insight into what we’ve learned about the first-round opponent, #14 seed Wright State, the champ of the Horizon League. I also offer a travel itinerary – I get to be a tourist, too, in between games.