The Plus/Minus: Virginia Beats Florida 73-70 in Charlotte

Blake Buchanan had his coming-out party, leading Virginia to a hard-fought 73-70 victory over Florida

Virginia moved to 2-0 on the season with a hard-earned 73-70 victory over Florida on Friday night at the Spectrum Center in Charlotte. Val has the Plus/Minus to break down what we learned from the Cavaliers in their first major test of the season. 

Positive

A win is a win is a win. Two of the very worst losses of the Tony Bennett era came at the hands of the Florida Gators, so this win was doubly sweet. And with an unimpressive out-of-conference slate this year, the Cavaliers need all they wins they can get against presumed NCAA tourney teams.

Negative

Jacob Groves is NOT a 5 and Tony Bennett is doing him a disservice playing him there. Florida came out and eviscerated the Hoos over the first five minutes of the game jumping out to a 14 – 7 lead. All fourteen points were scored in the paint and Groves playing in the center was a big part of that. Plus, he was 1/3 around the rim, you know, attempting shots that a 5 takes. I don’t know why Bennett isn’t playing Jordan Minor – the big man appeared to be dressed out – but after getting just 11 minutes against Tarleton State, Minor got the DNP on this night.

Positive

At the 15-minute mark, Blake Buchanan replaced Groves and it immediately settled Virginia down. Buchanan scored six of Virginia’s next nine points. He had two rebounds, altered two shots, had a steal and an assist as Virginia went from down 7-14 to take a 20-19 lead in eleven minutes. He was active on the hedge showing much better footwork than previous freshman bigs under Bennett and he was diving all over the floor. For good measure, he fouled out Florida’s Micah Handlogten with about two minutes left. After missing his first four free throws, Blake went 10/12 down the stretch from the charity stripe.

Negative

Free throws are going to be thing this year. Virginia was 14/24 from the line with Reece Beekman going an uncharacteristic 1/4 for the game. Of course, if Buchanan gets 16 a game, he’s going to be getting a lot of practice.

Positive

Groves is much better as a stretch 4. For the second game in a row, he buried back to back threes in the middle of a 12-4 Virginia run. Having done that, he pulled his defender out to the line and he had a nice drive to the rim. Add a couple of free throws, and Groves had a 10-point second half.

Positive

Andrew Rohde’s hands. Rohde transferred in with a reputation as a long-range gunner and as a potential slasher. He’s still finding his footing on the former and we haven’t seen any evidence of the latter, but he’s already a pretty good defender. We haven’t seen Ty Jerome range yet, but Rohde does have Ty Jerome hands on D.

Positive

Dante Harris is going to have a fine season for the Cavs. He does a very nice job attacking the space 5’ from the rim and then pulling up for the short jumper. He’s not trying to finish at the rim but his drive and speed is giving him open shots inside the paint.

Negative

After playing 10 players against Tarleton State, Bennett is back in midseason form, playing, in essence, just seven players. Leon Bond III, breakout star of the first game, got just 5 minutes this game. Jordan Minor didn’t get any minutes at all.

Positive

Duke lost tonight to Arizona.

Negative

It is going to be very hard to draw a charge this year. A defender has to have his feet set before the attacker plants his foot. Groves was whistled for a block that last year would have resulted in a charging violation. Smart, but slower, defenders are going to struggle with this for a while.

Positive

Ryan Dunn channeling his inner Kyle Guy. And no, unfortunately, I do not mean by his shooting, which has been poor to the start of this season. No, like Guy, Dunn is frequently the first guy to a fallen opponent with an offer to help that guy up. Guy’s predilection to help the other team ticked off a lot of fans, but I say bravo. You can be ultra-competitive and not be a jerk. 

Negative

Buchanan had a great game and I was clearly wrong to be so bearish on his immediate impact while most Virginia commentators were higher on him. But Buchanan really struggled against the size of Florida, and believe me, they were big with four guys over 6’ 9”. Florida had 21 offensive rebounds and Buchanan was getting boxed out pretty easily. He also struggled in traffic as he got his hand on the ball many times but couldn’t corral the ball.

Negative

Corey Alexander. And the officiating crew.

With one minute left in the game and Florida trailing 72-70, Buchanan was 35 feet from the basket defending Florida point guard Walter Clayton. And he was doing it perfectly, sliding his feet and showing all kinds of nimbleness when he slapped the ball out of the bounds. The referee called the ball off Clayton and awarded the ball to Virginia. The refs huddled over the monitor and confirmed the call. But the feed that Corey was looking at clearly showed that Clayton did not touch the ball, so it should have been Florida's ball. 

Apparently referee Lee Cassell asked Corey, as he was walking by, if they had gotten the call right. Corey said no. And he swiveled his monitor around to show it to Cassell.

That is beyond bogus. I fully admit I do not know the rules for video review in men’s college basketball, but I know that every league that utilizes video review has very exacting rules as to how it can be applied. And asking a commentator for a verdict on a call is as egregious as asking a fan in the first row if she has video on her phone.

This was the right call, and it’s why we have video review, but refs can’t just make up the rules as they go along. 

Next Up: Virginia hosts North Carolina A&T next Thursday, November 16th. Game time is 7pm and the game will be on the ACC Network.

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