On Saturday night, Virginia went into McCamish Pavilion and came out with their first win in the last four games. Jay Huff had a fantastic game, scoring 17 points whilst pulling down 8 rebounds and recording 6 blocks. Likewise, Mamadi Diakite had 17 points, 6 boards and 2 blocks. On the perimeter, Tomas Woldetensae knocked down three triples.
So which of these players was the one that tipped the scales for the Hoos? The answer, you may be surprised to read, is none of them. Virginia won this game because Tony Bennett did three things that set them up to do so.
1) Progressed from last game
The first thing that Bennett did was that he took what worked against Florida State and used it to his advantage. Last Wednesday, the Hoos were very successful in going aggressively towards the basket for easy layups. It happened more in the first half, but it was clear from the whistle that the players were trying to emulate their success from last week.
Mamadi, Braxton, and Kihei’s efforts in this category bore the most fruit. Even if Kihei wasn’t able to take the shot himself, the 5’ 9” guard was able to find teammates that could. Key did much the same, and Diakite was able to stop and take a jump-shot if he didn’t see a clear path to the hoop. Either way, it was clear throughout that Tony Bennett meant for his players to go aggressive to the basket, and it most definitely paid off.
2) Moved the ball around
The consensus throughout the Virginia fan base is that the thing most hurting this team (aside from three-point shooting, which was viewed as a lost cause—that is, until tonight, when Woldetensae showed up) is turnovers. This is a fair assessment, given that the Hoos are averaging just over 15 turnovers per game in losses. So what did college basketball’s most humble coach do?
He decided to limit the turnovers by moving the ball around more. The main reason why Kihei Clark commits so many turnovers is because he often has no options. The players around him are static, waiting for somebody else to make the first move. This leads to little Kihei trying to weave through players that are a foot taller than him in search of his teammates. Instead of that, against Georgia Tech, players were constantly moving, and passing the ball amongst each other, instead of just back to their point guard every time.
Ultimately, this slight adjustment limited turnovers and helped the Hoos win the game.
3) Sacrificed defense for offense
This was not a good defensive game for Virginia, there’s no getting around that. One can point to Georgia Tech’s turnover count, but most of those were unforced. The Yellow Jackets managed to score 58 points and shoot 50% from the field. Plus, it was obvious to see at times how easy it was for them to get buckets. But what if I told you that this was a calculated risk by an experienced coach?
The omission of Casey Morsell from the starting lineup, and really from the game (4 minutes), was proof of this. He’s possibly Virginia’s best defender, and he’s certainly better than both Woldetensae and Stattmann. The difference is that those two have proven that they can score at times, while Morsell had one big game but not much else.
If this was a gamble that was thought out beforehand by Bennett, it certainly paid off. While the Hoos looked bad on the defensive end, Woldetensae and Stattmann—the two who benefited in playing time with Morsell’s absence—combined to hit 4 of Virginia’s 5 threes.
Oh yeah, and they won the game. Props to Tony Bennett for making the necessary decisions in order for the Hoos to snap their losing streak.