Three takeaways from Virginia’s smooth win over Albany

The first steal was vintage Kihei. Body low to the ground, feet sliding, arms waving. Tight pressure. 

The ball squirted free, and Kihei lunged for it and took it to the rim for an easy layup. JPJ jumped to its feet.

But the second steal? The second steal turned this into something special. Same thing again. Like a little wind-up toy. Dogging the Albany guard, smothering him, then reaching out and poking the ball away. Back to the rim. Back for another two points.

Back for another round of resounding applause. 

Now JPJ grew raucous. And so it should have. Because Kihei Clark—playing in his 139th game, a UVA record—had just delivered the fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh points in a 16-0 run that capsized Albany.

Virginia pulled away after a scratchy first 15 minutes, winning, 66-46, to snap a two-game losing skid. 

Nobody’s giving out any awards for beating Albany, KenPom’s 325th-rated team. But Virginia did it without Reece Beekman, the team’s putative best player. And the rollicking second half was therapeutic after 22 winless days.

Here are three takeaways.

The 3-point shot has deserted Virginia

Per the fabulous Twitter feed of Danny Neckel, Virginia has failed to eclipse the 28% mark on 3-pointers since November. The Hoos shot 5-18 (27.7%) from three against Albany. Make that five straight games where Virginia’s 3-point percentage has languished in the 20s.

Ew.

Remember those glorious early-season days when the threes gushed forth like a perpetual flood? Remember when a mediocre blog named after a suffocating defense wrote about “a hail of 3-pointers” that “evoked wonder”?

Perhaps it was all a mirage. 

On November 12, 2022, after Virginia drilled every three it looked at against Monmouth and NC Central, The Packline wrote the following:

As a cautionary tale, recall the first game of the 2020-21 season. The Covid season. Bubbleville. Virginia against Towson. The Hoos won, 89-54, hitting 15 threes on 29 attempts.

There was dancing in the streets of Charlottesville. 

But the season crumbled when the well of threes dried up.

Let’s hope this is merely a temporary drought.

Caffaro is not pronounced the way you thought it was

If you watched on television, you, like me, experienced a moment of searing astonishment when the ACCN play-by-play guy declared that for four years we’ve been mispronouncing “Caffaro.” The revelation left me thunderstruck.

It’s ka-FAIR-oh, not ka-FAR-oh. Mind blowing.

In a game against a crappy team, with Virginia playing at less than full strength and Bennett fiddling with lineups, this was the biggest revelation. 

A weird lineup, and a weird game, and a weird vibe

Reece Beekman in a sweatsuit, parked on the bench, smile radiating and earrings sparkling. Kadin Shedrick absent from the starting lineup. A half-empty JPJ, its students and many of its fans sucked away for the holidays.

Weirdness tinged the game. 

Virginia came out sluggish. Then the enormous 16-0 spurt. Then victory. 

When the game ended, the prevailing thought was simple. What to make of all this?

Well, to put it quite simply, I don’t know. I haven’t the slightest inkling. This team is unrecognizable from the world-beaters that vanquished, in quick succession, Baylor and Illinois and Michigan. That previous high level feels unreachable.

It’s like trying to recover your golf swing after the frigid winter months. You know that perfect swing—the one that delivered glistening low scores over the summer—is there. But you can’t find it. You search. Before every round, you convince yourself it will return. But the round comes, and the round goes, and the swing doesn’t reappear. 

So you keep searching.

Image – Virginia Athletics