There was a moment Saturday afternoon inside a delighted Purcell Pavilion, early in a basketball game that began haywire and ended deranged, that eventually felt fitting.
One second lingered on the Notre Dame shot clock when Tae Davis kicked to J.R. Konieczny, who jumped and caught the ball and shoved it toward the basket. The ball smacked the backboard. The ball went in.
After a momentary review, the officials confirmed the basket—a floating, chest-pass, banked-in three at the shot-clock buzzer. The bucket made it Notre Dame 9, Virginia 0.
Things only got worse.
And worse.
At the end, the scoreboard read like this: Notre Dame 76, Virginia 54. Here are three takeaways.
No sugarcoating
Is this the apocalypse? Nope. But the first zombie is emerging from the ground. If things continue going this way, its brother will surface. The zombies will proliferate. The season will fall apart.
This was bad. Notre Dame sucks. The Irish have lost to Western Carolina and The Citadel. They have barely escaped against Niagara, by 7 points, and against Marist, last week, by 4 points. They have lost by 24 points to Auburn and by 19 points to Marquette. Oh, and that loss to the Citadel? By 20 points. It was 65-45.
Then the Irish did to the Wahoos what an energetic dog does to a new toy. They pushed it around for a bit. They chewed on it. Then, finally, they pulled out the stuffing.
This is damaging to any perception of Virginia’s ceiling. One cannot possibly have watched that basketball game and still strongly believe in this team. Make all the arguments—inexperience, road woes, talent waiting to coalesce—but there’s no disguising what just happened. Or what happened against Memphis and Wisconsin. Or what nearly happened against Northeastern.
The loss harmed Virginia’s NCAA Tournament resume, saddling the Hoos with a terrible defeat, currently Quad 3. It sent them sliding toward the bubble and all the accompanying worry.
The arguments, and hope
There is no sugarcoating. But there is contextualizing.
Everything, in fairness, went right for Notre Dame. Like the floating, chest-pass, banked-in three. The Irish are shooting 28% on threes for the season—on Saturday they shot 48%. The Irish are shooting 40% from the field for the season—on Saturday they shot 51%.
Some of this is because of leaky defense. But some of it is because of good fortune. A magnet seemed to be tugging shots toward the hoop, as if Christmas had stayed late for the Irish, more presents materializing underneath the tree.
The agonizing thing, though, is Virginia has the talent. Reece Beekman is a future NBA player. Ryan Dunn is a future NBA player. Isaac McKneely and Elijah Gertrude and Leon Bond are, down the road, possible professional prospects. This team has seven former four-star recruits, an upgrade from last year’s five.
There are issues, true, in the utterly unimposing interior presence and in the many flaky performances. But most of the woes are because the team is young and inexperienced and still finding itself and in need of time to coalesce.
Things will improve over time. But that reality raises its own question.
Is there enough time?
A crossroads
Virginia, we all assumed, slammed into its floor against Wisconsin and Memphis. Saturday the floor disappeared, dropped out from underneath. Are the Cavaliers still falling? We find out Wednesday.
That’s when Louisville will arrive in Charlottesville, towing all its putrid luggage, the controversies and the humiliations and the theatrical levels of suck. Things are bad at JPJ West (known alternatively as the KFC Yum! Center). Really bad.
Coach Kenny Payne sticks his foot in his mouth in postgame interviews so routinely it makes you wonder whether he enjoys the taste of his own toes. The Cardinals perplexingly bungled a player’s situation, so badly the player called the team out for posting a misleading social media message, a message the team then retracted and revised. They have lost games to Chattanooga, DePaul and Arkansas State, and almost lost to UMBC, New Mexico State and Bellarmine.
So Virginia better beat Louisville.
If the Hoos successfully dispatch the flailing Cards, they can make the next step, and the one after that, and the one after that.
But it starts here.
With the first step.
Image – Virginia Athletics