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Sylven Landesberg scored 20 points in another home game, this time reaching the mark against Longwood. |
The Virginia men’s basketball team had struggled against some more talented in-state teams earlier this season, even losing to Liberty 86-82 nearly a month ago. On Wednesday night against lesser talented Longwood, however, the Cavaliers wasted little time in showing their supremacy while shaking off the rust of an extended exam break.
The Hoos bolted out to a 7-0 lead in two minutes, an advantage that eventually ballooned to 31-14, 42-27, 62-39, 76-47, and the 90-61 final score. UVa coach Dave Leitao said the in-game success is hopefully a point the team can build upon.
“Coming off of a long break as we did, obviously one of the concerns, and we talked about it a number of times, is not having the kind of rhythm that you need and we’ve been victim to that before,” Leitao said. “I thought we made more good plays today than we’ve made in a while, practice or a games. So it’s a point at which we can hopefully build from. When you break it down and look at it, there’s still some very key areas we have to work on but I thought we did many, many good things today than in times past so we’ll take that, move on, and hopefully start to build some consistency with it.”
Much like early season games, the first contest following the exam break provided an opportunity for mixed minutes and an expanded rotation. In the first half alone, seven players logged at least 10 minutes while nine Hoos hit the floor altogether. Eight of the nine scored. The starters – Jamil Tucker , Mike Scott, Calvin Baker, Sammy Zeglinski, and Sylven Landesberg – all contributed strong numbers by the end of the night with Tucker leading the team in rebounds (10), Landesberg leading in scoring (20), and Zeglinski leading in assists (4). (Note: Tucker injured his ankle in the second half and Leitao said he was going to have an x-ray as a follow-up measure.)
Of course, Landesberg’s scoring ability isn’t surprising at this point, particularly at the JPJ. In five home games, the freshman forward has averaged 21.6 points per game while shooting 56.7% (38 of 67). By contrast, Landesberg shot a combined 6 of 22 in two road games. In other words, he scored in double figures in both of those games as well but wasn’t nearly as efficient, something he said he was aware of and is looking forward to improving.
“My first time on the road was a little rough because just the atmosphere, the crowd – it was my first time playing against something like that but I’m getting used to it. Next time I go on the road, I’m hoping to improve on that,” Landesberg said. “It’s easy when you have good fans like this [at home]. Everybody loves you.”
While Landesberg’s points production continued to be a promising trend, the movement toward Zeglinksi eating up minutes in the leading point guard role continued as well. Zeglinksi played 16 of 20 minutes in the first half, all at the point. He ended up logging 24 total minutes (after landing awkwardly on someone’s foot late in the first half), all of which seemed to come with him at the controls – when Baker shared court time, he played the off-guard spot.
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Sammy Zeglinski continues to show improvement as the team’s leading point guard. |
Zeglinski is focused on earning the trust of his teammates and coaches as the go-to point guard for the program.
“I want to be the guy, the starting point guard that they look to for leadership and I’m definitely getting more comfortable with it. … It’s hard to keep [Coach Leitao] happy for a long period of time,” the redshirt freshman said with a grin, “but I’m starting to get the hang of it. But I like that he’s on me. It just motivates to play better.”
The Cavaliers also showed some fullcourt pressure defense as a change of pace, something that has not been a common staple in Leitao’s tenure at Virginia. The first time they showed the man-to-man fullcourt defense, it resulted in a Longwood turnover, a lay-up, and a 9-0 lead early in the game.
“We’ve talked these last two weeks about doing more things,” Leitao said. “We didn’t do everything today that we’ve been practicing on, but that was one of the things from a whole court standpoint that we’ve been working on to give us more options. So whether it was specifically for Longwood or anybody else, hopefully we’ll see more of that and giving us a better and more chances to be diverse in what we do.”
“We’ve been changing defenses a lot, putting in a lot of different fullcourt defenses, traps, and it’s something we’re going to continue to work on so we can add it to our game,” Zeglinski said.
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