Defending champ Virginia must rely on a cast that’s mostly inexperienced this time,
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Two years ago, Kihei Clark became a freshman hero forever etched in Virginia men’s basketball lore for delivering the most memorable assist in the program’s history in the waning moments of regulation in an Elite Eight overtime win against Purdue.
Now, as he’s a grizzled veteran as a junior with 72 career starts under his belt, the 2019 tournament seems like ancient history.
Clark’s supporting cast has changed dramatically as U.Va. (18-6) gears up to try to defend its 2019 national championship in a tournament that once seemed to be in serious jeopardy for the Cavaliers. Regardless of the altered landscape surrounding him as Virginia emerges from seven days of coronavirus quarantine and prepares as the West Region No. 4 seed for tonight’s game against No. 13 seed Ohio, Clark knows getting his NCAA tournament-green teammates on the same page will be key.
“In single elimination, one mistake can cost you the game,” Clark said before last week’s ACC tournament, which U.Va. had to exit after winning in the quarterfinals because of a positive coronavirus test within the Cavaliers’ program. “Just trying to get everybody to be locked in on what has to be done on and off the court to just help us get to where we want to go.”
Clark, Jay Huff, Kody Stattmann and Sam Hauser are the only players on U.Va.’s roster who have played in NCAA tournament games — and Huff only played 17 minutes during the Cavaliers’ title run, while Stattmann only checked in for less than a minute in a first-round win against Gardner-Webb.
Gone are Kyle Guy, De’Andre Hunter, Ty Jerome, Mamadi Diakite, Braxton Key and Jack Salt. In their places going into U.Va.’s first-round game in Bloomington, Indiana, is a group that’s inexperienced outside of Clark in terms of on-court time in the NCAA tournament.
Hauser never got past the first round in his two tournament appearances with Marquette before transferring to U.Va. Trey Murphy played for a team that failed to finish with a winning record, much less get to the tournament, in his two seasons at Rice.
“You’ve kind of got to play like it’s you win or you’re done,” Hauser said. “Every possession matters even more this time of the year. We know that.”
The unique nature of this year’s tournament is that many teams are in the same boat as U.Va., lacking experience at this stage of the season since last year’s tournament was canceled near the outset of the coronavirus pandemic.
Ohio (16-7) will be even less experienced in the NCAA tournament than U.Va. The Bobcats are making their first appearance in the tournament since 2012, but they might have the best player on the floor in 6-foot-4 guard Jason Preston. He’s a possible first-round NBA draft pick averaging 16.6 points, 6.8 rebounds and 7.2 assists per game whom U.Va. coach Tony Bennett compared to Jerome.
With five players averaging in double figures, Ohio is 29th in the nation in adjusted offensive efficiency, according to statistician Ken Pomeroy, and 11th in 2-point fieldgoal percentage. Ohio prefers a tempo similar to that of Duke (68.8 possessions per game, while Ohio averages 69.3), while U.Va. will look to employ its typical plodding pace — the slowest in the nation (60.1 possessions per game).
It’s a daunting opening-round matchup for a Virginia team that’s 12th in the nation in adjusted offensive efficiency and 30th in adjusted defensive efficiency, but has had precious little opportunity to prepare because of its quarantine protocols. With just one on-court practice and a walk-through leading into the game, Bennett and his staff have had to rely largely on video conferencing to get his team ready.
“Whatever we can do to make ourselves as ready as possible,” Bennett said. “To understand the opponent’s abilities, but to be true to who we are and just be ready and know you’re going to have to play, in this case, all the minutes well, but you also can’t get too up or too down whichever way it goes. There’s a lot of possessions, so you battle through those, but you want to be as ready as possible, especially given the circumstances. I think that’ll be a good challenge.”