Stout defense carries Cavaliers to victory
Virginia overcomes early deficit, pulls away from Boston College on the road
His team reeling Saturday afternoon after going nearly nine minutes in the first half at Boston College without scoring, Virginia coach Tony Bennett called a timeout.
Time to go nuclear on his guys, who’d fallen behind 23-18 in the midst of what would eventually become a 14-0 BC run? Snap a dry-erase board? Blow a blood vessel in his forehead screaming and hollering for 30 seconds?
“I said, ‘Make some shots,’ ” Bennett said.
He was joking. If coaching was that easy, we’d all be making more than $3 million to do it, like Bennett does.
Rather, his plan involved none of the above.
Nevermind that none of those reactions really suits Bennett’s generally-composed nature, but he had another remedy in mind that led to No. 22 U.Va.’s 61-49 win at BC.
He espoused the you-got-usinto-this-mess, now-you-get-usout approach. Hitting the reset button was part of the design, but so was finding out how much resolve his team had on its own.
“I said, ‘You’ve got to be aggressive. We’re standing. We’ve got to move the ball,’” Bennett said. “You spin the wheel a little bit, ‘Hey, let’s look at this action, let’s look at that action,’ and then I said, ‘Screw it. We’re going to do what we started the game with. You’re going to have to figure it out. You’re going to have to touch the paint, you’re going to have to get the shots and stop letting the ball stick.’ ...That’s why we’ve said defense has got to hold you in there. You’ve heard me say that all the time. Offense can come and go, but your defense can’t.”
Behind Sam Hauser’s 17 points and 10 rebounds — his third double-double in as many ACC games — and Jay Huff’s 18 points, eight rebounds and five blocks, U.Va. (7-2 overall, 3-0 ACC) was indeed able to rely on sturdy defense throughout the game and bounced back from the deficit with an 11-1 run to end the
first half. U.Va., which shot 45% from the floor, stretched its lead to 49-39 with 8:25 left in the game and never saw its advantage fall under 10 points after that.
BC (2-9, 0-5), which split a pair of games last season against U.Va., made just 31% of its shots and was outscored 32-16 in the paint.
Guards Wynston Tabbs (14.6 points per game) and Jay Heath (13.1 ppg) came into the game as BC’s only players averaging in double figures, but they made a combined 2-of-19 shots.
Three things we saw
Despite BC missing forward
Steffon Mitchell, its best rebounder, the Eagles still had a 37-33 rebounding advantage (13-6 edge in offensive rebounds, 15-6 cushion in second-chance points).
With Notre Dame (3-6, 0-3) coming Wednesday to Charlottesville, U.Va. will see a far more dangerous post presence. Though Notre Dame, which plays tonight at No. 19 Virginia Tech, already lost 66-57 on Dec. 30 at home against U.Va., 6-foot10 forward Nate Laszewski (17.2, ppg, 8.2 rebounds per game) has been one of the ACC’s most effective players on the offensive end.
U.Va. guard Kihei Clark scored 10 of his 12 points in the second half, including some scores in the lane against a zone defensive look.
“It’s something we work on in
practice — that play-maker spot,” Clark said. “Just trying to make a play in the post. I’ve been working on my touch in that area.”
During its scoring drought of eight minutes, 44 seconds in the first half, U.Va. missed nine consecutive shots from the floor and committed four of its five first-half turnovers. It turned the ball over just two more times in the final 23½ minutes.
Who was out and who was back?
U.Va. forward Kadin Shedrick missed the game because of an illness not related to the coronavirus. Guard Kody Stattmann was out again while continuing to deal with a cardiac condition.
Bennett said assistant coach Orlando Vandross and director of
recruiting/player development Kyle Getter missed their second straight games, while Brad Soderberg and Jason Williford were back after being in quarantine because of contact tracing for Wednesday’s game against Wake Forest.