In a game full of back-and-forth runs, the Virginia men’s basketball team took control with a second-half surge and then held off an SMU charge to win 76-73 on Friday night. With the victory, UVa will play in the Corpus Christi Challenge Championship on Saturday night.
Cavalier coach Tony Bennett said he was happy that his team pulled out a close contest. The Hoos fell on a last-second shot against VCU earlier this year.
“We had to finish a game and win it. That was important against a quality opponent,” Bennett said on the Virginia Sports Radio Network. “I told our guys that SMU is good. They’ve got some high level transfers, a junior college All-American, and one of the greatest coaches that’s coached. … These were two teams that have aspirations to be good fighting it out and you had to earn a lot of what you got.”
Virginia had to make some big plays down the stretch to survive with a win. An 18-8 burst took UVa from a 53-50 deficit to a 68-61 lead and set up a nail-biter in the final minutes. After a turnover led to a Mustangs’ dunk and a 68-65 score, the Cavaliers needed several key contributions in the final minutes to prevail.
First, the Hoos ran a flare screen for Evan Nolte, playing in a post spot at the time, on the weak-side of the floor and he drained a 3-pointer in the right corner. That made it 71-65. SMU capitalized with back-to-back buckets and a free throw around a Virginia turnover to pull within 71-70. With the shot clock nearly expired on the next possession, UVa’s Akil Mitchell created a jumper and got hit on the arm to earn free throws; he made 1 of 2 before the Mustangs did the same thing on the other end for 72-71.
Mitchell made another offensive play out of a timeout with 1:15 to go. The Hoos were looking for a high-low post feed to Anthony Gill, but when it was covered, Mitchell drove past his defender from above the elbow and scored on a lay-up to make it 74-71. He came up with a big play on defense in the final seconds as well with the score at 74-73 in UVa’s favor. The Mustangs had the ball for a sideline out of bounds play with 4.8 seconds to go and drew up an isolation play (it had a hand-off option built in, but it wasn’t used) for Yanick Moreira. Mitchell moved his feet to force a spin move and then kept his hands high and off of Moreira to avoid the foul; Moreira traveled on the play. Mitchell finished with 6 points and 9 rebounds.
“I’ll mention this. Teven [Jones] didn’t play much, Justin [Anderson] didn’t play much down the stretch, nor Mike Tobey. They were terrific on the sidelines and talking about staying with it. I think that’s got to be our strength this year – our depth. It’s been Tobey, it’s been Justin, it’s been different guys at different times and their attitude was good,” Bennett said on the Virginia Sports Radio Network. “So we don’t know who it is going to be night in and night out, but that depth is a key for us.”
While Mitchell came through with several big plays to help seal the win, fellow post player Anthony Gill helped the Hoos pull ahead and force the Mustangs to play catch-up mode in the final 10 minutes. In fact, the aforementioned 18-8 run that built Virginia’s 7-point lead at 68-61 was sparked almost entirely by Gill. The run started with a 3-pointer from London Perrantes, but the opening was created when SMU swiped down on Gill in the post. Other than a 3-pointer from Joe Harris, the rest of the scoring damage came from Gill, who poured in 12 points during the surge.
Gill made 4 free throws during the burst, a pair of which came on the back end of and-one plays in the paint. The other two baskets were impressive. He caught the ball in traffic as the screener on a pick-and-roll play and then faded away just outside the paint for two points. He then capped off the run with a power move from the short corner into the paint. Gill faced up, made a spin to the middle, jump-stopped in the lane to stabilize himself, and then rose up for an 8-footer.
Gill tallied a career-high 19 points off the bench and added 7 rebounds as well. He had just 2 points at halftime.
“Coach Bennett puts us in the right position to score every day,” Gill said on the Virginia Sports Radio Network. “Whenever I was out there, I was feeling good. So the shots I took, I felt good about them so I shot them.”
“Anthony was so hard for them to handle. Because of how they’re calling it with these rules, he’s good when he turns and faces, sweeps, and drives,” Bennett said on the Virginia Sports Radio Network. “He made some plays. … Our ability to let Anthony get aggressive off the lane and attack, that was key for us.”
With Gill and Mitchell providing some inside punch, UVa’s scoring in the second half was a complete reversal from the first half. The Cavaliers made 6 3-pointers before intermission and they only had one bucket from inside the arc. The rest of the points (10) came from the free throw line.
Both the 3-point shooting and free throw shooting proved to be significant improvements from the start to the season. Entering Friday night’s game, UVa had shot 34.1% from 3-point range (29 of 85) and 57.5% from the free throw line (65 of 113). Against SMU, the Hoos knocked down 10 of 14 triples (71.4%) and 26 of 36 free throws (72.2%). Harris, Perrantes, and Nolte each went 3 of 3 from 3-point range in the win, while Gill made 7 of 9 free throws. Harris made 4 of 7 free throws, but hit two in the final two seconds to help seal the win.
Harris ended the game with 15 points and 2 assists, while Nolte added 12 points and 2 steals. Perrantes chipped in 9 points and 3 assists, while Malcolm Brogdon recorded 7 points, 4 rebounds, and 3 assists.
Great improvement offensively against a quality team. That bodes well for the Wiscy game.