Tobacco Road Report

By Michael

Two minutes into this game, TRR scribbled in his notebook,"The defenses are focused on stopping the guard duos and forcing the supporting cast to step up." On this night, Virginia's supporting cast would indeed step up and provide the necessary offensive balance, allowing No. 25 Virginia (20-8) to extract revenge from No. 21 Virginia Tech (20-9) with a 69-56 win on senior night in a rockin' John Paul Jones Arena.

What Virginia didn't know at the time was that Georgia Tech would soon take down the mighty Tar Heels, allowing Virginia to slide into first place in the ACC with an 11-4 conference record. North Carolina, Virginia Tech, and Boston College all sit close behind at 10-5. Virginia all alone at the top? Who wouldda thunk it?

The opening two minutes set the stage for this game. When Virginia Tech aggressively doubled Reynolds off a high screen, Reynolds found Soroye for a layup. On the next Virginia possession, several Tech defenders ran at Singletary, leading to ball reversal to an open Mamadi Diane for a three pointer. Not to be outdone, Virginia Tech's AD Vassallo went into traffic to score a bucket, draw a foul, and complete a three point play the old fashioned way.

As all fans of the ACC know by now, Virginia and Virginia Tech are guard-led teams and the offenses are generally focused on setting multiple picks to get the guards open looks. Virginia prefers offensive sets that produce double screens, whether run out of a high 1-4 or traditional 1-2-2 set, while Virginia Tech tends to prefer more isolation pick-and-rolls with the remaining players spotting up in key positions to receive passes off of dribble penetration.

For most of this game both defenses were doing a credible job of help-and-recover, limiting the open looks that Reynolds, Singletary, Dowdell, and Gordon need to get the offenses going. Credit the front lines of both teams for hedging on the high side of the picks. Big men are usually uncomfortable at this (as yours truly can attest to) since it gets them out of their element.

The effective help-and-recover limited Reynolds and Singletary to 30 points on 8-28 from the floor and Dowdell and Gordon to only 23 points on 9-25 shooting. The difference was that Singletary and Reynolds had 12 assists while Dowdell and Gordon could only manage 2. Gordon would spend most of the night in foul trouble, making the situation even worse for Tech.

Virginia's supporting cast of Diane (13 points, 3-4 3-FG), Joseph (7 points), and Cain (8 points) were able to knock down jump shots when the Tech defense overplayed Reynolds and Singletary, while Vassallo (3 points, 1-8 FG), Washington (9 points, 3-8 FG), and Collins (8 points, 2-7 FG) were not. In contrast, when Virginia Tech severely thumped Virginia in Blacksburg on February 10, Vassallo and Washington scored 44 points while shooting 16-25.

In the end, Virginia's long range game won out over Tech's mid-range game. 10-16 shooting from beyond the arc enabled Virginia to average 1.03 points per possession (PPP) and an effective field goal percentage (EFG) of 53 percent. Virginia Tech was only 2-15 from deep and the Hokies EFG was only 38 percent, leading to a slim 0.83 PPP. TRR's shot chart for Virginia Tech in the second half didn't record one made basket outside of ten feet. Yikes!

The Cavaliers have a very winnable game against Wake Forest on March 3rd and, barring a stumble here, will win the ACC regular season conference crown. TRR was high on Virginia in our preseason rankings, but not this high. Congratulations to Dave Leitao and the Cavaliers for a fine season...and for remaining undefeated at home in conference play. JPJ adds a dimension to the Cavaliers that has been missing for some time.