For more than four decades at Virginia, Ethan Saliba built a reputation that went well beyond the training room. Around UVA, he became the person people leaned on when they needed something solved, fixed or figured out - and by the sound of it, he usually found a way.
That kind of impact is exactly what earned him praise from the people who know his work best. Kelli Pugh, UVA’s senior associate athletic director for sports medicine, counts Saliba among her many protégés and called him “the most generous person I know.”
“Ethan is the most generous person I know. ‘No’ is not in his vocabulary,” Pugh said.
“It's always, ‘I'll find a way.’ And that's how he's been able to get so much done.
Mike MacKnight, who finished his internal medicine residency at UVA in 1995, said Saliba’s long run in Charlottesville has made him a rare resource inside the athletic department.
“No one in the athletic department knows how to get things done in the health-care world better than Ethan Saliba, because he's been here so long and he has so many contacts,” MacKnight said. “And it's super helpful for me.
I can simply say, ‘Ethan, here's what I need to try to get accomplished. Can you help me?’
And with the snap of a finger, he's made it happen.”
Saliba’s path to UVA started far from Virginia. He spent several years as a boy in Zahlé, Lebanon, then came to Southeast Missouri State University on a football scholarship. After three years there, he walked away from football and transferred to the University of Kansas, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in physical therapy.
He said the injuries and rehab work he experienced as an offensive lineman at SEMO helped steer him toward sports medicine, even though he was never seriously hurt.
After finishing his degree, Saliba worked as a physical therapist at a rehab hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, before moving on to a master’s program at the University of Nebraska. He completed work on that master’s at UVA while serving as an assistant athletic trainer.
He later added two doctorates, one from UVA and another from Virginia Commonwealth University.
When Saliba arrived at Virginia, the athletic training staff was tiny by today’s standards. He and Joe Gieck were the only two full-time athletic trainers, and the entire department operated out of University Hall, which was demolished in the spring of 2019. Virginia had 24 varsity sports at the time, and Saliba dove into all of it.
“It was like a gold mine of growth opportunity,” said Saliba, who also worked closely with Dr. Frank McCue.
His influence stretched across generations, starting with the first men’s basketball team he worked with at UVA, the one that reached the Final Four in Seattle in 1984. Jimmy Miller, a forward on that team and now the analyst on Virginia men’s radio broadcasts, said Saliba’s presence never changed even as the sport around him did.
“You think about his impact through multiple generations,” Miller said. “His impact isn’t measured in games won but measured in people.
I think what’s amazing for me is that my relationship with Ethan spans nearly 45 years. I first knew him as a trainer taking care of us when I was playing and then decades later sitting courtside as the radio analyst, and I got to see the exact same person, the same professionalism, the same humility, the same commitment to the players.
A lot has changed in college basketball, but Ethan never changed.”
In 2016, UVA recognized Saliba with the Algernon Sydney Sullivan Award, which is given each year for excellence and service to humanity. That same year, he was also inducted into the Mid-Atlantic Athletic Trainers Hall of Fame.
In Other News...
Virginia Gets An Early Chance To Prove Something In Charlotte
Virginia gets an early measuring-stick game in Charlotte this week, meeting West Virginia at Bank of America Stadium in the Dukes Mayo Classic with both programs still unbeaten. It is the kind of nonconference showcase that can tell a lot about where a team really stands, and for Tony Elliott and the Cavaliers, the setting adds an extra layer of intrigue. Virginia has talked about its preparation and the value of playing in a venue with this kind of stage, where the margins tend to show up fast.
For the Cavaliers, this is also the first of two scheduled trips to Charlotte against the Mountaineers, which gives the matchup a little more staying power than a one-off neutral-site date. Virginia has reason to want a cleaner showing in Bank of America Stadium this time around, and the meeting arrives early enough in the season to shape how the rest of the schedule is viewed. A win would not settle anything, but it would offer a sharp answer to a basic question Virginia is trying to answer for itself right now. [Read more 🡒]
Virginia Faces A Serious Defensive Test Before West Virginia Kickoff
Virginias defense is heading into its next nonconference matchup with a different kind of stress test, one that has Tony Elliott focused on more than just the final score. West Virginia brings an efficient, high-tempo offense that can make a defense work from snap to snap, with quarterback Michael Hawkins and running back Cam Cook both giving the Mountaineers production on the ground and keeping the pace moving.
For a Virginia unit that has looked solid in earlier games, the challenge is about sustaining that level while adjusting to a style that does not give much time to breathe. The Cavaliers are also dealing with a likely defensive tackle injury that adds another layer of uncertainty up front, just as they prepare for an opponent built to press that weakness quickly. [Read more 🡒]
Former Virginia Standouts Are Already Forcing Bigger NFL Roles
Week 1 is hardly enough time to draw sweeping conclusions, but several former Virginia standouts wasted no time making themselves part of the conversation at the next level. Olamide Zaccheaus filled in as Atlantas emergency quarterback and running back, Malik Washington led Miami in targets while also helping on special teams, and Malachi Fields made his NFL debut with the Giants and came away with two catches.
The most intriguing early returns may belong to the players who flashed more than one way to help. Jonas Sanker led the Saints in tackles and came close to adding a score, while Dontayvion Wicks found the end zone for Philadelphia, a reminder that Virginias recent NFL pipeline is already producing players who can push for bigger jobs. For a program that has spent years trying to turn college production into pro staying power, that kind of first-week impact is a welcome sign. [Read more 🡒]