Virginia Basketball 2023-2024 Roster Preview: Isaac McKneely
Basketball season is upon us. As we march closer to another exciting Virginia men's basketball season, CavaliersNow is previewing UVA's roster player by player in preparation for the 2023-2024 season, which begins on Monday, November 6th against Tarleton State at John Paul Jones Arena.
Today, we analyze sophomore guard Isaac McKneely.
Click on the following links to read our player previews for the rest of the UVA men's basketball roster: Taine Murray | Anthony Robinson | Leon Bond III | Dante Harris | Elijah Gertrude | Blake Buchanan | Jake Groves | Andrew Rohde | Jordan Minor | Ryan Dunn | Reece Beekman
In our roster preview before last season, we asked if then-incoming freshman Isaac McKneely would be the answer to Virginia's perimeter shooting woes from the previous year. We also suggested that McKneely would play the most and have the greatest impact of any of UVA's highly-touted freshmen class due to his shooting ability and his familiarity with the Pack Line Defense. Those predictions ended up holding true as McKneely appeared in all 33 games, including one start, and averaged more than 21 minutes per game.
Even with those expectations, McKneely was quite impressive in his first year and showed an abundance of promise for his future at Virginia. He averaged 6.7 points per game on 42.3% shooting from the floor and 39.2% from beyond the arc. McKneely is the second-leading returning scorer from last season's team (only behind Reece Beekman) and was the team's leading three-point shooter last year and should be again this season. He averaged 3.9 three-point attempts per game and that volume should go up even more as his playing time increases and as he becomes a bigger focal point of Virginia's offense this season. The Cavaliers are hoping to have a number of decent-to-good perimeter shooters - McKneely, Andrew Rohde, Reece Beekman, Taine Murray, and Jake Groves to name a few - but McKneely should be taking by far the most three-pointers and his ability to knock down those shots consistently (40%+) will be a critical component of Virginia's offense and overall team success this year.
After getting extremely valuable experience as a freshman, McKneely will likely slide into UVA's starting lineup as a sophomore and should also take on a leadership role as one of just a few returning players from last year's roster. Not only did McKneely play a lot of minutes in a lot of games, but he also played important minutes in important games, as Tony Bennett trusted McKneely to be on the floor in late-game situations more and more as the season went on. McKneely scored in double figures eight times a year ago, including in the Championship Game of the ACC Tournament and in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
McKneely's perimeter shooting ability is the highlight of his game and with good reason. Given the athleticism Virginia has on the roster this season, McKneely's shooting will provide crucial spacing for players like Reece Beekman and Ryan Dunn to attack the rim. But McKneely has some other more underrated basketball skills that could prove to be extremely valuable as well. There were more than a few moments last season when McKneely showed he was capable of aggressively attacking close-outs and driving to the basket or pulling up for mid-range jumpers. And although his assist numbers weren't great, he also proved he could make some nice passes to find open teammates. Those are two areas in which significant progress will accelerate McKneely's development into a great player. Virginia likely won't put the ball in McKneely's hands and tell him to go make a play, but setting up screens and motions off-ball to free him beyond the arc will be one of the central focuses of UVA's offense. We saw some of that already last season, but McKneely will bear a heavier offensive load this time around. If he can handle it, he could be primed for a big sophomore leap.
On the defensive end, it's pretty simple. McKneely has to be able to hold his own against the talented guards of the ACC. McKneely wasn't bad defensively as a freshman, but there were certainly some growing pains and he progressed nicely as the season went on and he got more comfortable playing his role within Virginia's system. He doesn't have to be a defensive All-Star like Reece Beekman, but with a full year under his belt, McKneely can and should be able to be plus on the defensive end.
Isaac McKneely has drawn comparisons to Kyle Guy consistently ever since he committed to Virginia nearly three years ago. So far through one season, those comparisons are not at all unjustified. In Guy's freshman year, he scored only slightly more than McKneely, played fewer minutes, and shot roughly the same from the floor. The only area in which Guy had a significantly better freshman season than McKneely was in three-point shooting percentage.
Kyle Guy freshman stats: 18.6 mpg, 7.5 ppg, 43.9% FG, 49.5% 3pt FG
Isaac McKneely freshman stats: 21.5 mpg, 6.7 ppg, 42.3% FG, 39.2% 3pt FG
Going from his freshman to his sophomore season, Guy's minutes and scoring nearly doubled (averaged 14.1 ppg) and his three-point attempts more than doubled. Guy started seven games as a freshman and then entered the full-time starting lineup as a sophomore, leading to that increased usage on offense. McKneely appears to be following a similar path as he is essentially a lock to crack the starting lineup this season. The question is how will he produce with the elevated volume? Kyle Guy's three-point percentage actually fell significantly from 49.5% to 39.2% from his freshman year to his sophomore year (while his three-point attempts went from 3.0 to 6.2 per game) and then Guy shot 42.6% from three on 7.4 attempts per game as a junior and Virginia went on to win the national championship. McKneely will likely see his attempts rise drastically this season just as Guy did. How well he adjusts to that increased usage will go a long way in determining how big of a step forward McKneely will take as a sophomore and how successful Virginia can be as a team in 2023-2024.
What's your prediction for Isaac McKneely's sophomore season? Let us know on social media at the links below.
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