So Kihei Clark is coming back.

The most divisive decision of the offseason became official Monday night when Virginia announced that Clark would return for a fifth season with the basketball program. Some fans welcomed the point guard back with open arms; others were not so cordial.

History will remember Clark as having one of the most unique careers the UVa program has ever seen. He arrived in 2018 as a 5-foot-9 curiosity. By the end of his senior season, he was a starter for the national champions, and made one of the most iconic passes in program history, setting up Mamadi Diakite’s game-tying shot at the end of regulation in an eventual overtime win against Purdue in the 2019 Elite Eight.

Three years later, Clark is one of just five players at UVa to ever record both 1,000 career points and 500 career assists. He has crept into the school’s all-time top 10 in a few categories, like assists and minutes played. But the last time UVa fans saw the senior point guard, he was having a potential game-winning layup attempt blocked as time expired in a 52-51 loss at home to St. Bonaventure in the NIT quarterfinals.

Under normal circumstances, that loss would have exhausted Clark’s eligibility. He’s returning for a fifth year thanks to the additional COVID-19 season granted by the NCAA due to the abrupt finish to the 2019-20 season, Clark’s second in college. Despite being honored during UVa’s senior day ceremony prior to the team’s final home game against Florida State in late February, the guard has elected to run it back one more time.

With Clark coming back, it means the Wahoos will return all five starters and the top six players in both minutes and scoring from this past season’s 21-14 team. The senior point guard’s decision will likely have a trickle-down effect on both the remainder of this offseason and the upcoming year.

Some subsequent questions in the aftermath of Clark’s return:

Under head coach Tony Bennett, UVa has had its share of notable fifth-year seniors: Malcolm Brogdon, Mike Scott, Anthony Gill, Devon Hall, Jack Salt, Jay Huff and Sam Hauser, to name a few. But Clark’s situation is unique from those on that list.

They all sat out a full season, either because of injury or transfer rules. Clark has played full four seasons for Bennett already. He’ll enter his fifth year just 181 minutes shy of the school’s career record for minutes played (4,425, set by London Perrantes). His 33.2 minutes-per-game career average is tied for sixth all-time at UVa, with Sylvan Landesberg.

Clark finished second in the ACC in minutes per game last year at 36.1, which is tied for seventh-most in a season in program history. As a sophomore in 2019-20, Clark played 37.1 minutes per game, which is second on that same list. In 128 career college games, Clark has played fewer than 25 minutes just 16 times—just twice since his freshman year.

That’s a lengthy way of saying that Bennett has long leaned heavily on his point guard. So it’s unlikely that the UVa coaching staff would envision a drastically reduced role for Clark in his fifth season, or that Clark would want to return in such a role.

Clark spent the past two seasons splitting point guard duties with Reece Beekman, who will be back for his third season in 2022-23. Beekman grew into more of a primary point guard role last season, with Clark—who also ranks fifth all-time at UVa with 539 career assists, 144 shy of John Crotty, the only player in program history to surpass the 600-assist mark—playing off-ball more frequently. Both players earned All-ACC honorable mention after the season, with Beekman also finishing second in the league’s defensive player of the year voting.

For Beekman to take another leap in his development, it would likely require Clark to maintain more of an off-ball role. But Virginia’s offense, which finished 85th in KenPom’s efficiency rankings last year, will still be initiated by that same combination of dual point guards.

As mentioned earlier, the point guard’s return means Virginia will bring back its top six players from last year in both scoring and minutes played: Clark and Beekman, guard Armaan Franklin, forwards Jayden Gardner and Kadin Shedrick, and center Francisco Caffaro. It essentially creates a minutes logjam at the top of the roster.

Kody Stattmann, who averaged 15.8 minutes as the seventh player in a seven-man rotation last year, is eligible to come back for a fifth year but has given no indication that he intends to. Three other players—former walk-on Malachi Poindexter, guard Carson McCorkle and guard/forward Igor Milicic—have entered the transfer portal after playing a combined 17.4 minutes per game in limited roles off the bench. Stattmann appeared in all 35 games last year; none of the others played in more than 19.

In their place, UVa is welcoming the No. 16 recruiting class in the country. Guards Isaac McKneely and Ryan Dunn and forwards Isaac Traudt and Leon Bond are all four-star prospects. Traudt (No. 61), McKneely (No. 70) and Bond (No. 74) are all top 100 players in the 2022 class; Dunn (No. 102) is just outside that group.

Minutes were hard to come by for first-years at UVa last season, with Taine Murray averaging 7.7 in 19 games and Milicic playing 6.3 in 16 games. Now Clark is back and, as discussed earlier, likely to again be one of the Wahoos’ leaders in minutes played in 2022-23. Those minutes have to come at the expense of someone else’s potential playing time.

Could it be McKneely, who could bring some much-needed outside shooting to a team that made just 32.3 percent of its 3-pointers last season? Or Franklin, who started all but one game last year and averaged 15.1 points in his first season after transferring from Indiana, but shot just 29.6 percent from long range? Or could Bennett expand a rotation that only ran seven-deep for most of last season to get more players involved, and not lean as heavily on Clark, Beekman and Gardner (who all averaged at least 32 mpg last year)?

Clark’s return takes away both a roster spot and potential playing time from any UVa targets in the transfer portal.

The two players most closely connected to UVa in the transfer portal are Ohio forward Ben Vander Plas and West Virginia guard Sean McNeil. Both players visited the school in recent day. McNeil, a career 36.8 percent 3-point shooter who averaged 12.2 points each of the past two seasons at WVU, is more directly impacted by Clark’s decision to come back for a fifth season, and in the process take a big bite out of potential minutes in next season’s backcourt rotation.

Playing time instantly became less of a guaranteed incentive for potential transfers when UVa made its announcement on Monday evening. In essence, Clark becomes an experienced backcourt addition to the Hoos’ roster. His return combined with the addition of a transfer would put even more of a squeeze on potential minutes for the incoming class.

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