Virginia Basketball 22-23 Roster Preview: Kihei Clark

How will Clark put the finishing touches on his collegiate career in his fifth and final season at UVA?

The countdown is on for the start of the 2022-2023 college basketball season. Less than a month remains until a new season of college hoops tips off. With that in mind, it's time to preview the roster for the 2022-2023 Virginia men's basketball team. CavaliersNow will be going through the UVA roster player-by-player over the next few weeks in preparation for the season, which begins on Monday, November 7th against NC Central at John Paul Jones Arena.

Today, we examine fifth-year point guard Kihei Clark.

Click on the links below to read our player previews for the rest of the UVA men's basketball roster:

Armaan Franklin

Isaac Traudt

Ben Vander Plas

Taine Murray

Francisco Caffaro

Ryan Dunn

Isaac McKneely

Kadin Shedrick

Jayden Gardner

Leon Bond III

Reece Beekman

Kihei Clark 2021-2022 stats: 10.0 ppg, 4.4 apg, 2.9 rpg, 0.9 spg, 38.7% FG, 34.6% 3pt FG, 78.2% FT

Kihei Clark's decision to come back for a fifth year was one of the more polarizing storylines of the offseason for the Virginia men's basketball program. While many UVA fans were happy to see the return of such an accomplished leader, there was also a large group of fans who disputed whether Clark's choice to come back was actually good for the team. 

Most notably, the last two seasons have made it clear that there are inefficiencies on offense and defense when both Kihei Clark and Reece Beekman share the floor together. As two natural point guards who each have difficulty playing off-ball due to their lack of reliable perimeter shooting ability (and occasional unwillingness to take open threes), the UVA offense evidently lacks spacing when playing two guards who don't stretch the floor. And despite his tireless motor when it comes to on-ball defensive pressure, Clark's physical shortcomings are an issue especially when facing the bigger guards of the ACC that can shoot over him with ease. 

But, as Tony Bennett has said repeatedly in interviews this week, experience is key in the college game and Clark has a ton of it. A regular rotation player since his first year and a starter for each of the last three seasons, Clark has played 4,244 minutes in his career, 4th all-time at UVA and less than 200 minutes behind Virginia's all-time leader in minutes played - London Perrantes with 4,425 minutes. Clark has started 108 games - 24 starts behind Perrantes, UVA's all-time leader with 132 starts - and Clark has played in 128 total games - 10 behind the leaders Perrantes and Mike Tobey with 138 total appearances. 

The vast majority of UVA fans respect and appreciate what Clark has done for the program, but many felt it was time for him to move on after his senior season. Even Tony Bennett indicated that he and the Virginia coaching staff were somewhat surprised that Clark decided to come back. For many in the UVA fanbase, however, the debate of how long Kihei Clark is welcome to play at Virginia begins and ends with a single play: his miraculous pass to Mamadi Diakite in the Elite Eight against Purdue to save UVA's season, without which there is no national championship for the Cavaliers in 2019. Clark was a pivotal piece of that title run and has been a leader of the team in each of the three seasons since then. 

With Clark returning, Virginia brings back its entire starting five and its top six scorers from a season ago. This offseason, many asked the question of if that's a good thing given that this same team failed to make the NCAA Tournament a season ago. The answer to that question is: yes, it is a good thing. 

To say nothing about Tony Bennett's undeniable track record of developing and improving players in his program year over year (that is to say, the same six players will do better this year than they did last year), it is also true that this year's UVA roster has something that last year's sorely lacked: depth. 

With the influx of four talented first-years as well as an experienced veteran in Ohio transfer Ben Vander Plas, Virginia can run an extended rotation of eight or nine players rather than the short 6-7 man rotation the Cavaliers ran last season. Tony Bennett joked that he's not sure he'll ever run a 10-man rotation like Leonard Hamilton does frequently at Florida State, but that if there was ever a year that he would consider it, it would be this season as he feels he has 12 players who could earn significant minutes. 

With a deeper roster of options, Virginia should be able to rely less on playing Reece Beekman and Kihei Clark together in the back court. This should result in Clark's minutes declining somewhat - from 36.0 minutes per game last season to somewhere in the area of 20-28 minutes this season. Beekman is simply the better option as a true point guard from a playmaking and defensive standpoint. In 2021-2022, Beekman ranked second in the nation with an assist to turnover ratio of 3.62 and this season, he should be a contender, if not the frontrunner, for ACC Defensive Player of the Year. 

Clark will still play quite a bit and will, in all likelihood, become the program's all-time leader in minutes played, games played, and starts. But, his value to the team as a leader may be more important than his impact on the floor this season. 

Of course, Clark can maximize his value to the team if he can keep his turnover rate low (77 turnovers last season) and keep his three-point shooting up around the 35% mark. Clark shot 34.6% from beyond the arc last season, an improvement from his 32.3% clip in 2020-2021, but still not matching his career-best of 37.5% his sophomore season when the UVA offense rested entirely on his shoulders. 

From among Virginia's players who shot at least 25 three-point attempts last season, Kihei Clark was the team's best three-point shooter at 34.6%. Taine Murray, Igor Milicic, and Malachi Poindexter each shot marginally better than that from the perimeter, but they did so on significantly less attempts. Perimeter shooting was the biggest weakness of the Cavaliers last season. Tony Bennet echoed that point a few times this week as well and he thinks that shooting is an area where UVA will be much improved this season. 

Ben Vander Plas is a career 32.5% three-point shooter, a number which doesn't exactly jump off the page. However, he has an ability to take and make shots from well outside the arc. At 6'8", Vander Plas will be able to stretch the floor from the forward positions, making opposing defenses respect his range, and giving the UVA offense spacing it never had last year. Isaac McKneely is expected to earn significant minutes early on as a sharpshooting guard. The Cavaliers are hopeful that Armaan Franklin will drift closer to his 42.4% three-point clip from his final season at Indiana as opposed to the 29.6% he shot at Virginia as a result of a season-long slump. Isaac Traudt also boasts some perimeter shot-making ability if he manages to crack the rotation and there are reports that Kadin Shedrick has been developing his outside shot. 

The combination of new players coming in with shooting ability (McKneely, Vander Plas, Traudt) and the hopeful shooting improvements from the returners (Franklin, Beekman, Shedrick), UVA should not be nearly as bad from behind the arc as last season. That means Clark won't be relied on as the team's best three-point option, unless of course he has a breakthrough shooting season which would be very welcomed by the UVA coaching staff. 

A three-time All-ACC selection, Kihei Clark has led Virginia to 97 wins, two regular season ACC championships, two NCAA Tournament appearances, a Final Four, and a national championship in his career. It's up for debate what UVA's ceiling is this season, but Clark certainly wants to end his legendary career at Virginia on a high note, contending for an ACC title and returning to the NCAA Tournament. 

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