Matt Gregory Gwaltney was a second-year graduate student in civil and environmental engineering, and had received an undergraduate degree from Virginia Tech in 2005. He was a 2001 graduate of Thomas Dale.

Gwaltney was always full of encouragement for Vernon Hamilton, his younger basketball teammate at Thomas Dale, Hamilton recalled yesterday.

"He was the type of person that everyone would dream of having the opportunity to know. He was a hard-working kid," Hamilton said. "He was a great kid."

Hamilton, a senior at Clemson University in South Carolina, said he began to receive calls about his former teammate's death late Monday night. No one had heard from the graduate engineering student, but they hoped for the best.

"But when it started to get late . . . I was really worried," said Hamilton, who added that Gwaltney wasn't the type of person to stay out late on a weeknight.

Gwaltney left for college ahead of Hamilton but returned home for the summers, when the two would sometimes share an impromptu basketball game. "I'd see him at the YMCA, still playing pickup," Hamilton said.

In high school during Gwaltney's senior year, the two played together on a team that brought home district and regional championships. But Hamilton said he'll remember Gwaltney as much for his good nature as his skill on the court.

"I feel blessed to have had the opportunity to know someone like Matt Gwaltney," he said.

-- Lindsay Kastner and Holly Prestidge