WEEK’S END

• Today the Hokies play the Cavaliers, and, like prudent (and timid) political candidates, we decline to take sides. Because the Editorial staff includes fans of Tech and of UVa, office morale requires discretion. In truth, we officially root for the Colorado Buffaloes, but that is a complicated story and a lost cause.

• Unless the Cavs beat the Hokies by a score of 112-0, today’s match-up reportedly will be Al Groh’s last game as UVa’s head coach. Boosters are trying to come up with the $4 million, give or take a billion, it apparently will cost to buy out Groh’s contract. The sports-industrial complex claims that donations to big-time athletics are voluntary and that general education dollars do not fund coaches or teams. Athletic foundations do that. Nevertheless, the extravagant sums paid to coaches are vulgar and almost certainly unjustified. They also mock the idea of a university.

• Virginia’s colleges and universities are under financial stress. Institutions are cutting academic programs and student services. We love college sports and admire true scholar-athletes. Yet the Groh story reflects the misplaced priorities at schools throughout the commonwealth and the nation.

• We, and the eight proud grads who agree with us, might as well command the tides to stop.

• Gov. Tim Kaine’s Thanksgiving Message celebrated the feast at Berkeley Plantation as the first Thanksgiving in the English-speaking New World. The book of Lesser Feasts and Fasts for the Episcopal Church mentions Thanksgivings in Virginia and Massachusetts. The national symbols associated with the holiday draw from Pilgrim imagery, to Virginia’s seasonal dismay. The reasons for the pre-eminence of Massachusetts are various. As Virginia partisans, we will concede a crucial one: Capt. John Smith died in London; William Bradford died in Massachusetts and is buried there.

• Yesterday, Black Friday, opened the Christmas shopping season. Don’t forget the red kettles.

• Our favorite holiday commercial showed a customer at a convenience store preparing to buy some lottery tickets. He looked outside and saw a volunteer ringing a bell, put his betting cards down, and moved to make a donation instead. The spot was sponsored by the Colorado Lottery and advised gamesters that they had better things to do with their money. That’s the spirit.