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Sean Singletary scored 19 points to go with 6 assists, 5 rebounds, and 4 steals. |
Early season games in college basketball often are ragged around the edges. Careless turnovers, defensive lapses, and sporadic shooting all can be part of the equation. Virginia’s season-opener with Vermont on Sunday was one of those games. The Cavaliers experienced all of the ups and downs of a typical November contest, but still won comfortably, 90-72, against the competitive Catamounts.
That’s much better than the fate suffered by teams like Kentucky, Georgia Tech, and Southern Cal already this season. All of those clubs lost games to so-called inferior competition in the first week of play.
“Opening 1-0 is obviously a better way to get started than 0-1. I’ve had a lot of conversations with people about the word that will come up all year long: parity. The last sport to be affected by that was college football, in that anybody can beat anybody. That, in my opinion, has more to do with the spirit of an individual or a player or a team than the actual physical advantages or disadvantages,” UVa coach Dave Leitao said. “One of the first things Coach [Al] Groh told me about this team in July was that he loved them because they have each other’s back. You don’t win that many close games, you don’t go down to Miami and do what they did unless you have a team that you can trust and rely on in the locker room, before you ever take the field. When you play a good team, and [Vermont head coach] Mike [Lonergan] has got a really good team that is going to do really well in the America East Conference, it’s going to give you a mental test more than anything.”
Vermont gave the Cavaliers a mental and physical test by not packing its bags early in the John Paul Jones Arena. The Catamounts battled from beginning to end despite never truly threatening the Cavs, who jumped out to an early 7-0 advantage in this one and never trailed.
In fact, the lead only dipped below that margin once the rest of the game when Vermont cut it to 36-30 late in the half with Sean Singletary watching from the sidelines. He re-entered the game at that juncture and immediately assisted on two 3-pointers from Calvin Baker and Mamadi Diane , which were sandwiched around two Singletary free throws and two Singletary steals. The star point guard finished with 19 points, 6 assists, 5 rebounds, and 4 steals as well as 6 turnovers.
It was another senior, however, who filled the highlight reel as Adrian Joseph poured in 19 points of his own on 7-of-11 shooting. He had a career-high 5 3-pointers and a career-high 3 assists. Joseph hit three of those treys in the first seven minutes as the Cavs built a 19-7 lead.
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Adrian Joseph had 19 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists, and 1 block. |
But Joseph’s shooting was only one part of the story. Much like the Tennessee game in last year’s NCAA Tournament, Joseph contributed all over the floor throughout his 31 minutes. He added 6 rebounds, the aforementioned 3 assists, and 1 block to the stat line while aggressively seeking driving or pull-up opportunities as well attempting some tip-dunks by crashing the boards.
“I know Adrian [Joseph] pretty well. I told our guys Mamadi Diane and Adrian Joseph are shot-fake, one-dribble guys and 3-point shooters. We just did a poor job guarding the 3-point line, especially in the first half. That is why they got off to such a great start,” Lonergan said.
Another hallmark of early season games are somewhat balanced minutes. Virginia played 14 guys in the contest and eight of those players logged double-digit minutes. The statistical production reflects that fact. In addition to Joseph and Singletary’s team-leading 19 points, Mamadi Diane (10), Calvin Baker (11), Jeff Jones (8), and Laurynas Mikalauskas (8) all contributed at least eight in the victory. Diane added 8 rebounds as well. Ryan Pettinella had 4 points, 5 rebounds, and a career-high 2 assists in 9 minutes as well.
Baker also contributed heavily defensively. Along with Singletary, he hounded Vermont standout Mike Trimboli on the perimeter throughout the game. Trimboli finished with 16 points, but the output came on 7-of-17 shooting; he also had 4 turnovers. Marqus Blakely helped pick up the slack with 24 points, 10 rebounds, 4 steals, 3 assists, and 2 blocks.
“[Calvin] was a guy off the bench who really contributed, on both ends, offensively and defensively,” Leitao said of Baker. “He’s had a year of understanding what is required of everybody in this program, a year of being successful individually on a team, and he got beaten up for one straight year by both J.R. [Reynolds] and Sean, but he’s better for those experiences. They allow him to, at the very least, come out of the gate and be a very solid contributor.”
The Catamounts represent a quality opponent for this portion of the schedule. The defending America East Regular Season Champions are always in the hunt for the NCAA Tournament berth from their conference, appearing in five straight league title games. Vermont is the type of team that will test you and make you earn your way to victory, something that’s never bad as the progress of building toward success begins.
“We’ve got a lot of those kinds of teams on our schedule – fortunately or unfortunately,” Leitao said. “They don’t just show up and try to play well. Vermont is extremely well coached obviously. They’ve got a terrific backcourt obviously. They’ve got tournament experience. They’ve got individual and collective experience. And the best part about them is they’re mentally tough. So you don’t just go in and yawn and win by 35 and everybody goes away happy. It was going to be a test. I knew it and as a result, we tried to prepare our guys to play through that as best they can.”
Statistics | Media Relations Notes
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