Hoos Put Summer to Good Use

By Jeff White (jwhite@virginia.edu)
VirginiaSports.com

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — For about six weeks this summer, the sounds of a basketball team at work regularly filled the women’s practice gym at John Paul Jones Arena.

It’s quieter in there now, but with the start of the fall semester nearing, that will soon change. And when the Cavaliers reconvene at JPJ next week, head coach Amaka Agugua-Hamilton said, they’ll be in a good place.

Since the end of last season, UVA has added seven transfers and a freshman, and the summer practices gave  the newcomers an opportunity to mesh with returning players Kymora Johnson, Paris Clark, Olivia McGhee, Breona Hurd and Jillian Brown.

“I love the character of the group,” Agugua-Hamilton said. “They’re just competitors. I think everyone wants to be great, everybody wants to win, everybody wants to be the best version of themselves, and they grind. I think everybody who transferred here obviously came here for a second chance to really showcase their talent and their versatility.”

Gabby White, a 5-foot-10 guard from Chapel Hill, N.C., is the lone first-year on the roster. The transfers are 6-foot-5 Adeang Ring (Central Florida), 6-foot-4 Tabitha Amanze (Princeton), 6-foot-4 Caitlin Weimar (NC State), 6-foot-4 Danelle Arigbabu (West Virginia), 6-foot-3 Romi Levy (South Florida), 6-foot-2 Sa’Myah Smith (LSU) and 5-foot-9 Raiane Dias Dos Santos (Florida State).

Led by Johnson, an All-ACC guard, the Wahoos finished 17-15 in 2024-25. The talent level on the current roster is significantly higher, Johnson said.

“It’s miles from where it’s been,” she said, “but I think most of all I’m just amazed by how well we get along. The chemistry, it just instantly clicked. There wasn’t a waiting period. And I think that despite all the talent, everyone’s a good person. We’re all competitors, but we all get along really well together. We go at it in practice but off the court we’re best friends.”

Brown had a similar assessment of the newcomers.

“It’s just a good group of people, first and foremost,” she said on a recent Wahoo Central Podcast. “We all care about each other. We want to see each other succeed … I would say that everybody’s just committed to being the best that they can for the team.”

Also new to the program is assistant coach Ronald Hughey, who came to UVA in late March after 11 seasons leading the women’s program at the University of Houston. Agugua-Hamilton has charged Hughey with shoring up the Cavaliers’ defense.

“He brings a lot of energy, a lot of good energy, especially with defense,” Brown said. “He’s already helped us a lot, and you can definitely tell that he was a head coach for a long time. He has that demeanor about him. He pushes us hard and he’s been really good.”

Johnson’s take?

“Love Hughey,” she said, smiling. “He’s a loud one, but he’s very insightful. Everything he says has good benefits.”

For various reasons, by the latter part of last season Virginia’s rotation usually consisted of only six players. Depth shouldn’t be an issue for the Hoos in 2025-26. Having so many options is helpful, but “either way it’s a problem,” said Agugua-Hamilton, who’s in her fourth year at Virginia.

“Last year was a problem because we weren’t deep, and I’ve always been successful with being deep,” she said. “And this year is going to be a problem because we’ve got 13 talented players, and obviously you can’t play 13 players. So it’s a good problem to have. I think we’re gonna be very competitive. Practices are very competitive already, because you gotta bring it every day. If you wanna play, you gotta compete, and you gotta compete every day at a high level. So I love that. That’s where you really build championship teams.”

The post players have impressed Brown. “Tabby is super, super strong. Caitlin has great footwork. Sa’Myah is super athletic. Adeang is long. Danelle is strong. They all bring a lot of things to the table.”

As a sophomore in 2024-25, Johnson averaged a team-high 36.7 minutes per game. Medical issues limited point guard Yonta Vaughn to seven games last season, which meant Johnson often was the only Cavalier capable of running the offense. With White and Dos Santos on board, that shouldn’t be the case this season.

“Mo, obviously, can play 40 minutes,” Agugua-Hamilton said. “She’s proven that, and she was pretty darn efficient in every category. But I think she’ll be even more efficient with being able to get some rest or getting moved to the 2 and being off the ball and not just having to deal with everybody’s best defender for 40 minutes. Because that’s what [opponents] did. They just rotated people on her and trapped her and did all that stuff. So I think that Mo is gonna be even better, which is hard to even imagine, because the kid was pretty good.”

Johnson welcomes the help.

“I was just really grateful to be able to play that many minutes,” she said. “Obviously, it does take a toll, not just on your body, but on you mentally too. I’ll definitely be glad for a little bit more rest. I think any rest is good rest.”

Dos Santos, who’s from Brazil, averaged 11.9 minutes per game last season for a Florida State team that finished 24-9. She played for Team Brazil this month at the GLOBL JAM, an U23 tournament in Toronto.

“She’s just a high IQ kid that can really get downhill and shoot the 3 as well,” Agugua-Hamilton said, “and she plays defensive angles really well. Florida State had those elite guards that were ahead of her and she didn’t really get a chance to showcase her talent, but she’s really talented and I see her as more of a combo guard.”

Look for White, whose mother, Joanne Aluka-White, is the associate head women’s coach at North Carolina, to contribute immediately.

“Gabby is head and shoulders ahead of where most first-years are as far as physical strength, as far as competitiveness, as far as skill set, things like that,” Agugua-Hamilton said. “It’s mainly because of her IQ as well. She’s just been around basketball her entire life, so she learned the game from a very young age and also learned what it takes to be great, to take care of your body and be in good physical condition.”

White carries “herself like a coach’s kid,” Brown said. “She’s very impressive. She’s really mature on the court. She doesn’t seem like a freshman out there at all. And in the weight room too, she does not seem like a freshman. She’s strong, she’s athletic, she has a great IQ on the court.”

The 5-foot-11 Brown, who missed last season while recovering from a knee injury, is healthy again, and that further bolsters the backcourt. She started 10 games for the Cavaliers in 2023-24.

“I think she’s getting back into the things that make her really effective,” Agugua-Hamilton said. “She can affect the game on both ends in a variety of ways. Very high IQ player, good passer, plays with pace, can bring it in transition. Hit open shots is what she needs to do consistently. She’s really grown in that area, so I think she’s looking pretty good, and she’s a good defender too.”

As a junior last season, the 5-foot-8 Clark averaged 30.2 minutes per game, third-most on the team, and averaged 10.3 points. But a foot injury forced her to miss six games, and she was never fully healthy.

“She’s continuing to work to get back to where she really needs to be,” Agugua-Hamilton said. “Last year she played hurt pretty much the whole season, so I’m looking forward to seeing a healthy Paris this season. I think a healthy Paris is a dangerous Paris, so I like where she is right now. I think she’s in a good spot.”

Johnson, a Charlottesville native, led the Cavaliers in points, assists, steals, 3-point percentage and free-throw percentage and was second on the team in rebounds. Her primary goal this season is to help the Hoos return to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2017-18.

“It’s No. 1 right now,” Johnson said. “I just want to win. I’m going to do whatever it takes to win.

She believes her teammates are driven as well.

“Every time we come in to practice, to lift, whatever, we have a championship mindset,” Johnson said. “We train hard and practice hard, like it’s the last practice, like it’s the last game and everything’s on the line. That’s just the mentality we’ve had this summer, and we’ll take it going into the season.”

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