The Virginia basketball team played games in Kentucky, Virginia, and Massachusetts over the last 10 days, but has struggled offensively regardless of the location during that stretch. Those troubles finally caught up to the Hoos on Wednesday night at Boston College as the Eagles secured the 63-48 win to split the season series after losing by 19 in Charlottesville in late January.
Virginia shot 44.2% and 39.2% in its previous two games, but survived 61-58 at Louisville a week earlier and held on for a 57-55 victory against Notre Dame at home this past weekend. It couldn’t overcome shooting woes for a third straight outing, though. The Cavaliers hit just 32.2% at Conte Forum and BC took full advantage as it led for 31:54 of the 40 minutes.
“Defensively, they had that, you could just feel it the way they were guarding you and you love that when you’re coaching that, and they put us on our heels,” UVA coach Tony Bennett said. “It was a lot for some of our guys and we have to learn from that because of what we’ve got coming up. Guys have put themselves in a great spot, I told them, but in that game, at times, it looked like we were on our heels on both ends of the floor and you won’t win at this stage of the year against teams that are playing tough like that.”
The Hoos made 19 of 59 shots to reach that 32.2% number, which included a rough 19.0% night from 3-point range (4-21). They had 9 assists and 9 turnovers. The problems with shooting were widespread in the loss. Other than Jayden Gardner’s 6-12 shooting night on the way to 16 points, no one could find the range as everyone else combined for 13-47 shooting (27.7%). Gardner ended up as the only Cavalier in double figures and he added 5 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 blocked shots, and 1 steal to his line as well.
The backcourt trio of Reece Beekman, Kihei Clark, and Armaan Franklin finished with 17 points. Beekman went 2-8 shooting for 6 points, 2 assists, and 2 steals. Clark had 7 points and 3 assists on 3-11 shooting as he tried several times to spark the team, but couldn’t get to the rim for clean attempts like in other situations recently. Franklin, meanwhile, made just 2 of 10 shots for 4 points. Backup guard Isaac McKneely managed two hit a pair of 3’s, but those were his only makes on a 2-8 shooting night that produced 6 points.
Virginia couldn’t create much from the frontcourt other than Gardner either. Ben Vander Plas had 7 points on 3-7 shooting, while Kadin Shedrick added 2 points on 1-3 shooting.
Overall, it was simply a dismal display of offense. The Cavaliers couldn’t create opportunities off the dribble and couldn’t generate much room with their interior motion either. A switch in scheme at halftime provided a momentary boost to start the second half, but that fizzled out quickly too. After another poor showing, the three-game string of games adds up to 37.4% shooting (61-163).
“They put good ball pressure on us and they just got into our space in every spot,” Bennett said on the Virginia Sports Radio Network. “You had to engage in that kind of game, you knew it was, with your cuts, your set-ups, with your screens, with your ballhandling. They imposed their will on us. We’ve done that often times with other teams, but not tonight and that was evident.”
In the previous two squeaker wins, Virginia overcame its offensive issues by holding the line better defensively than against BC. The Hoos held Louisville to 42.0% shooting (21-50) on the road and Notre Dame to 39.2% shooting (20-51) at home, but offered limited resistance against Boston College. The Eagles posted 52.0% shooting (26-50) with a good blend of inside-outside production. They converted 16 of 21 layups and dunks that helped create 34 points in the paint and made 6 of 15 3-point attempts (40.0%) as well.
Unlike the first meeting, Quinten Post didn’t do the most damage. He had 24 points in the first meeting, but tallied just 8 in round two. The hosts had plenty of firepower from other players, though. Makai Ashton-Langford led the way with 16 points, 6 rebounds, and 4 assists as he made 6 of 9 shot attempts. DeMarr Langford Jr. and Jaeden Zackery scored 12 points each, while Zackery added 4 assists too.
Some of those points came at key moments in the second half to prevent a Virginia rally. With the lead still at 5 points in the first two minutes after halftime, Zackery and Ashton-Langford got back-to-back layups to extend the lead. After McKneely’s two 3-pointers cut the lead to 40-31, Langford Jr. made a free throw. Then when the lead sat at 8 points and 7 points on two possessions midway through the second half, Zackery responded with a layup and 3-pointer to quickly close the door again.
It all resulted in an upset win for the Eagles that they celebrated by storming the court.
“We’ve been working hard and the fans have been showing up through the ups and downs,” Boston College coach Earl Grant said. “The fans deserve it, our players deserve it just how hard they’ve been working, specifically the last month – we’ve been more whole with everybody healthy, the practices have been very competitive. The fruit of their labor showed up today. … Really happy for the students, BC nation, our players, just everybody who had a chance to experience that.”
I would change “stumble” to fell flat on their face. CTB needs to make adjustments because the other ACC coaches have figured out how to beat the packline and also shutdown UVA’s triangle offense. BC owned UVA last night. They got outplayed and outcoached.
Congrats on your win. We will choose to Judge our court on a season long basis. Figured out or not we are still 21-5 and 13-4 in a dead heat for #1 in our league. Good luck in your potential 5 days of play in Greensboro. (doubt you make it past 2), maybe you can root for the Hoos on day 3
Outplayed I’ll grant. But BC didn’t shut down the packline or the triangle offense, we did. The guys just weren’t playing well. It happens to every team, every season, there are some games like this. Timing is unfortunate, though.
Key part of the triangle offense has been Clark penetrating into the paint, finding an opening to shoot or passing the ball out. BC pretty much snuffed this out. Most of his shots in the paint were blocked. They were also all over the three-point shooters, few open looks and when there were, players couldn’t hit them. Franklin and Beekman also could not penetrate the paint. BVP being a terrible free throw shooter and Dunn also going 0-fer didn’t help. Only guy who could get a shot and make it consistently was Gardner. When UVA doubled Post (in the post), he found the open cutter. When they didn’t double him, he found a way to score (though much less than the first game). Anxious to hear Kris’s analysis and what changes he thought UVA could have made last night.
This board, and probably most others, sure take “what have you done for me lately” to an extreme extreme. We were 21 – 4 and ranked #6 playing a majority of the same guys that missed the NCAA last season. Yet the guys lay a big fat egg and poster crawl out of the woodwork to call for a change in scheme. Look at it on the bright side. With the price of eggs where it is, that big fat one we laid should go for a nice price and athetics poor UVA could sure use the money.
This board, and probably most others, sure take “what have you done for me lately” to an extreme extreme. We were 21 – 4 and ranked #6 playing a majority of the same guys that missed the NCAA last season. Yet the guys lay a big fat egg and posters crawl out of the woodwork to call for a change in scheme. Look at it on the bright side. With the price of eggs where it is, that big fat one we laid should go for a nice price and athetics poor UVA could sure use the money.