Virginia Shows Toughness in "Slugfest" Win Over North Carolina in ACC Quarterfinals
Last March, North Carolina defeated Virginia in the quarterfinals of the ACC Tournament to put a final end to UVA's hopes of making the 2022 NCAA Tournament. Exactly one day shy of a year later, the Cavaliers returned the favor.
The challenge of facing a talented and desperate UNC team which was essentially playing a home game at Greensboro Coliseum became even more difficult when Virginia learned that starting forward Ben Vander Plas would miss the remainder of the season, and the rest of his collegiate career, with a fractured right hand, an injury the Ohio graduate transfer suffered in practice on Wednesday.
But, behind stellar performances from Reece Beekman, Jayden Gardner, and Armaan Franklin as well as a big time contribution from Kadin Shedrick off the bench, Virginia defeated North Carolina in Greensboro for the first time ever, as the Cavaliers came away with a hard-fought 68-59 victory, effectively eliminated the Tar Heels from both the ACC and NCAA Tournaments, and sent themselves into Friday's semifinals where they will face No. 3 seed Clemson.
With Ben Vander Plas out of the lineup, the UVA coaching staff knew that they would need their center pairing of Francisco Caffaro and Kadin Shedrick to step up after both of them had seen their minutes decline drastically over the course of the season as Virginia made the switch to small-ball lineups. Shedrick's case was particularly disheartening, as the redshirt junior started the season as UVA's starting center before getting relegated to the bench and eventually, not playing at all in either of Virginia's final two regular season games, even as 11 of his teammates played in the finale against Louisville.
Even hampered by an ankle injury, Armando Bacot posed a serious matchup problem for Virginia, as without Vander Plas, no one else on the roster other than Shedrick and Caffaro possessed the size to be able to contain Bacot. Caffaro and Shedrick ran into some foul trouble, with Caffaro picking up three fouls and Shedrick four fouls, but they accomplished their mission. Bacot was held to just four points and three rebounds and was -16 in his 21 minutes on the floor. He played just five minutes in the second half.
In the first half, it was the North Carolina guards, and namely RJ Davis, who had the Tar Heels on their way to perhaps defeating the Cavaliers for the second time in as many weeks. Davis scored 12 points on 5/6 shooting in the first half and had UNC up by four points early on as UVA struggled to score.
Reece Beekman then flipped the aggressive switch that UVA fans have been waiting to see since before his hamstring injury earlier this season. Beekman came up with three steals in the first half, two of which turned into transition baskets on the other end of the floor. He had 11 points and three assists before halftime as well, powering Virginia to an 11-0 run that allowed the Cavaliers to build a lead as large as eight at 23-15.
UVA had a chance to make it a double-digit lead at halftime, but missed a couple of point-blank looks. North Carolina capitalized by scoring nine of the final 11 points of the half, all on three-pointers. Two of those threes came from RJ Davis, who was practically the only player who showed up for the Tar Heels. Thanks to his ability to elevate over Kihei Clark and knock down shots, UNC was able to narrow the deficit to just one point, trailing Virginia 25-24 at the half.
The other piece of North Carolina's back court, Caleb Love, was held completely in check by the ACC Defensive Player of the Year Beekman in the first half. Love missed all five of his shots and was stuck on zero points at halftime.
Davis continued to put the UNC offense on his back to start the second half, knocking down a couple of three-pointers to apply some pressure to the UVA lead. This time, it was Armaan Franklin and Jayden Gardner who protected Virginia's advantage with timely baskets that quelled North Carolina's momentum just as the Tar Heel faithful packed into Greensboro Coliseum started to make some noise.
Franklin scored nine points in the second half and finished with 14 points to go along with three rebounds, two assists, and a block. Gardner hit a couple of a jumpers and wasn't afraid to attack the rim, as UNC's defense was significantly more vulnerable on the interior without Bacot's rim protecting abilities. Gardner also showed a willingness to get fouled and take and make free throws that proved pivotal later in the game.
North Carolina stuck around, partly due to the Tar Heels enjoying a favorable disparity in foul calls. At one point in the second half, UVA had been called for nine fouls while just three fouls had been called on North Carolina. After a Caleb Love three-pointer, both Davis and Love went 1/2 from the free throw line to cut the deficit to just three points with less than three minutes left in regulation.
Armaan Franklin hit a floater off the glass to end a Virginia scoring drought, but UNC responded as Davis attacked Isaac McKneely and scored off the backboard plus a foul on McKneely. Davis made the ensuing free throw and the Virginia lead was down to only two points at 57-55 with two minutes to play.
North Carolina implemented a full-court press in the final minutes and had some success speeding the Cavaliers up and getting them out of sync on the offensive end. But after they cut it to a one possession game, the Tar Heels continued to press full court and ended up fouling Kihei Clark after he broke the press, sending him to the line for a one-and-one.
Free throws have been a roller coaster for the Cavaliers at times this season, but they took care of business at the charity stripe on Thursday night, making nine of their ten free throws in the final two minutes of the game. Clark made both ends of the one-and-one to make it a four-point game.
Virginia then forced a missed three-pointer by Puff Johnson and Gardner snagged the rebound and was fouled. Gardner made both of his free throws and then Caleb Love chucked up a long-distance three that missed and Gardner grabbed another big board. This time, he went 1/2 from the free throw line, but that still gave Virginia a seven point lead with a minute remaining. RJ Davis missed a three-pointer and Gardner got yet another rebound before giving the ball to Clark, who was fouled and made both free throws.
If that wasn't the nail in the coffin, then the next sequence certainly was. Davis tried to drive to the basket for a layup and Kadin Shedrick rejected the shot for his fifth block of the game. Shedrick then immediately started to run the floor as Beekman sent a full court pass up ahead to Franklin, who made the unselfish extra pass to reward Shedrick's hustle, and Shedrick slammed home the emphatic slam dunk to put the game away. Shedrick had just four points, but registered five blocks, including a few big ones in the final minutes that were especially impressive as rejected a few shots while playing with four fouls.
It was a sad circumstance of the injury to Vander Plas that provided the opportunity, but Kadin Shedrick was ready for the moment when it finally came.
"Finding out about Ben was hard - nobody expects that to happen," Shedrick said of learning of the injury to Vander Plas. "So when you're kind of just thrown back into the action, you've just got to make sure you're ready. I'm here to pick Ben up because I know he's going through a lot right now, and I'm going to try to play as hard as I can, not only for myself and my team but specifically for Ben."
Shedrick was one of many heroes for Virginia on Thursday night. Reece Beekman finished with 15 points, five steals, five assists, three rebounds, and zero turnovers and played lockdown defense on Caleb Love before helping to slow down RJ Davis down the stretch.
With 17 points and 10 rebounds, Jayden Gardner recorded his fourth double-double of the season and second double-double against North Carolina. The Wake Forest, North Carolina native made no effort to hide the fact that there was a little more at stake for him when playing against UNC, especially in the ACC Tournament in Greensboro.
"It's always just when you're playing North Carolina because you know this is the hoops state. It's special to playing this time of year in Greensboro for the first time for me," Gardner said. "Growing up, they rolled the TVs out in middle school and high school and it's ACC country, so it's just a special time, and I'm happy I could be part of it."
Armaan Franklin added 14 points and Kihei Clark had eight points, five rebounds, and three assists and was also 4/4 from the free throw line. Isaac McKneely added six points on a pair of three-pointers off the bench.
After the game, Virginia head coach Tony Bennett noted that he was pleased with his team's performance on both ends of the floor, making big stops or coming up with big baskets every time that North Carolina threatened UVA's lead.
"I thought we were running good, tough offense. Our guys were screening well, we got some nice drives, and I just thought it was kind of a slugfest in a way as to who was going to be last standing, but you have to answer," Bennett said in the postgame press conference. "Our guys stayed within themselves, took the shots that were there... didn't let them get going in transition, and you just could kind of feel that. But I loved how hard our guys worked offensively, and of course I did defensively."
North Carolina scored just two fastbreak points, as Virginia limited UNC's transition opportunities, largely due to UVA's solid ball security, as the Cavaliers had only six turnovers in the game. Virginia scored 14 points off of 11 North Carolina turnovers and had 11 fastbreak points.
In the end, Virginia went on to win 68-59, defeating North Carolina in Greensboro for the first time ever. UVA had been 0-6 against UNC in the ACC Tournament in games played in Greensboro before Thursday night.
Virginia (24-6) will take on No. 3 seed Clemson (23-9) in the semifinals of the ACC Tournament on Friday at approximately 9:30pm at Greensboro Coliseum. The game will be televised on ESPN2.
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