Kihei Clark scored 19 points, including 14 in the second half, as Virginia basketball rebounded from a close loss at Notre Dame with a 67-55 win over Boston College at John Paul Jones Arena. The resilient Hoos, now 9-0 this season when coming off a loss, improve to 13-9 overall and 7-5 in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
Capitalizing on turnovers and a mega-productive night at the free throw line were major factors in the Cavaliers’ win. Six of UVA’s first eight points of the night came from the charity stripe, as senior forward Jayden Gardner sank all six attempts to keep the Hoos within reach of the visiting Eagles, who jumped out to an 11-4 lead five minutes in.
Virginia made just one of its first eight field goal attempts, so Gardner’s free throw accounted for six of the Cavaliers’ first eight points. After a cold start, UVA closed out the first half in strong fashion, making nine of its final 15 attempts. The Hoos turned eight first-half Eagles turnovers into 15 points, helping the home team surge from seven points down to five points up – 30-25 – at halftime. Boston College, meanwhile, scored only two first-half points off three UVA turnovers. Following a four-of-seven start from the field, the visitors cooled off, making five of their final 15 field goal attempts in the final 15 minutes of the first half.
Clark, who ended the first half by swishing a running sideline jumper as time expired, opened the second-half scoring with two free throws, the start of a 12-2 run that gave UVA a 42-27 lead. The Eagles never got closer than eight points the rest of the game. Though UVA never delivered the decisive knockout blow to fully put the game out of reach, the Hoos staved off several Boston College comeback attempts and stretched the lead to 15 points three more times in the second half.
Boston College closed to within eight at 61-53 with 51 seconds remaining. However, Clark was a perfect six-of-six from the line in the final minute to ensure victory. The senior point guard made 10-of-10 free throws on the night. Virginia made 26-of-29 free throw attempts, outscoring the Eagles by 14 points from the line. The Hoos finished with 20 points scored off 14 Boston College turnovers while the Eagles had 10 points off nine turnovers, a significant stat in an otherwise even game.
Of Clark’s clutch performance on both ends of the court, Virginia head coach Tony Bennett said, “I thought he came in with great energy, great ball pressure, and pickup point. Sometimes you just look in a guy’s eyes, and you see their posture, and you can hear it in their voice. I thought he was terrific in that way. We’re just trying to chase quality, chase improvement. We know there are so many teams that are smashed in the middle of this league, and we understand that the top of the league is coming. We just need to show up, be tough minded, and as good as we can and keep seeking quality and improvement. Kihei is the guy who has the experience so he has to lead us in that regard. It’s everyone’s job to do that and have the right kind of spirit. We’ve talked about ‘what gets done gets done together for this team.’ That’s why unity is one of our pillars and we talked a lot about it today, even in terms of the significance of the shirts the guys wore [in pregame warmups], and what that meant. Passion and unity were our mantras today in terms of how we wanted to play.”
Virginia outrebounded a good rebounding BC team, 27-26. Kadin Shedrick, coming off the bench for a sixth straight game, led the Hoos with eight boards. The 6’11” redshirt sophomore also contributed a career-high 13 points in 31 minutes of play in a reserve role he seems to be very comfortable playing. Clark chipped in six rebounds too. Gardner finished with 17 points, answering a few Boston College second-half charges, including converting an old fashioned 3-point play that boosted UVA’s lead to 61-50 as play entered the final minute. Armaan Franklin added 12 points, making two-of-four from beyond the arc. Virginia shot only seven 3s against Boston College, making three.
Although he did not score any points, sophomore point guard Reece Beekman contributed seven assists to just two turnovers and two steals. Senior wing Kody Stattmann matched a career-high with three steals, adding two points and two blocks off the bench.
6’9” forward James Karnik led Boston College with 16 points on seven-of-10 shooting. Sophomore guard DeMarr Langford Jr. added 11 points on four-of-seven shooting. Virginia held the rest of the Eagles to 28 points on eight-of-30 shooting (26.7%). Boston College, which has struggled as a whole from beyond the arc this season, made only five-of-21 attempts from 3 against the Cavaliers. BC was two-of-10 from 3 in the second half.
“The defense early was really important and I just had a feeling it was going to be one of those blue collar games where you know it’s going to be physical,” Bennett said. “That was the message right before we went out, I said, ‘Give everything you got on defense, this cannot be a lukewarm defensive game; You’re going to have to give all you got.’ Even though they made some of those tough threes at the end of shock clocks, we needed to battle. We had a couple breakdowns but you’re never going to play it perfect. We said look, in the Notre Dame game, there were 10 or 12 unforced errors, so let’s try to limit that to maybe just a handful this game because it won’t be perfect. But we scrapped and played hard and it [our defense] held us in there until we got a couple tough baskets and then most of the night, we made them earn their looks.”
Virginia stays home for its next game, a 5 p.m. EST showdown with ACC-leading Miami on Saturday, February 5. The last time the Hoos won two consecutive games was January 1 and January 4, defeating Syracuse and then Clemson on the road.
“This is another test for us,” Gardner said of the 16-5 Hurricanes. “It will test us a lot to play one of the top teams in the conference. It is going to be a challenge. They shoot the ball really well. We will have to trust our discipline to get to the shooters, knowing when to leave the pack, and try to box out. We will fight, that’s all we can do”
