Everything’s coming up Mamadi
Last week, former UVA basketball star Mamadi Diakite finished his first season in the NBA with a championship win. The Milwaukee Bucks’ 105-98 victory over the Phoenix Suns in game six made Diakite the first player to ever win an NCAA championship, a G-League championship, and an NBA championship. (He also won his high school state championship with the Blue Ridge School.) As if that wasn’t enough, the power forward is the first Guinean to win an NBA title.
Diakite permanently etched his name into UVA history in the 2019 Elite Eight game against Purdue, where his buzzer-beater off a Kihei Clark assist leveled the score and sent the game to overtime. You know the rest of the story: UVA won the next two games, including the national championship.
Diakite finished his four years at UVA and went undrafted in 2020, but signed a two-way contract with the Bucks shortly thereafter. In April 2021, he signed a multi-year standard NBA contract with the Bucks for over $3.4 million. This season, Diakite made 14 regular-season appearances, including one start, averaging over 10 minutes and three points per game. He played seven times in the Bucks’ playoff run, as well. Congratulations Mamadi!
In the swim
Four current or incoming members of the UVA women’s swim team are representing the United States at the Olympics. At press time, one had already taken home a medal: Emma Weyant, an incoming freshman, took silver in the 400-meter individual medley.
Alex Walsh and Kate Douglass both qualified for the final heat in the women’s 200-meter individual medley. (The race took place on Tuesday evening, too late for this edition.) Paige Madden finished seventh in the 400-meter freestyle finals.
Stay tuned for more coverage of local athletes in Tokyo in the coming weeks.
Off-year election. The country’s looking. This is a big deal.
—President Joe Biden, speaking in support of Terry McAuliffe at a McAuliffe gubernatorial campaign event this week
In brief
Mike Tobey goes for the gold
Remember Mike Tobey? The big man played a key role in Tony Bennett’s UVA hoops lineups from 2012 to 2016, and has been playing in Europe, mostly for Valencia, ever since. This week, though, Tobey starred on a different team—the Slovenian men’s Olympic squad. Tobey grew up in New York but secured a Slovenian passport earlier this year, allowing him to suit up for the central European nation in its very first Olympic basketball appearance. On Monday evening, he scored 11 points and pulled down 14 rebounds as his team topped Argentina.
Search for Julia Devlin suspended, body found
A body believed to be UVA economics department lecturer Julia Devlin was found in Shenandoah National Park on July 24. Devlin entered the park in her car on July 14, and three days later, her vehicle was found wrecked and abandoned by the side of the road. Law enforcement authorities who conducted the search have not released any information about the cause of the crash.
Statue seekers
There’s no shortage of people and organizations interested in taking Charlottesville’s now-removed Confederate statues off the city’s hands—32, to be exact, according to Charlottesville Tomorrow. Fourteen groups have expressed interest in the monuments, including the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center, the town of Goshen, Virginia, the local Sons of Confederate Veterans chapter, the Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia, and the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields National Historic District. Eighteen individuals also wish to erect the statues on their private property. In September, City Manager Chip Boyles will begin evaluating the inquiries.