Cavaliers Now

The Plus/Minus: Virginia Basketball Falls to Virginia Tech in 3OT Thriller

In an epic battle that lasted over three hours, Virginia Tech prevailed 95 – 85.
Val Prochaska|
Malik Thomas
Malik Thomas | Virginia Athletics

Plus

Yeah, Virginia lost.  And yeah, Virginia lost to Virginia Tech, but this game was why one watches sport. A dour first half that only Tony Bennett would have loved (Virginia led 24 – 23 at the intermission) became a thrilling ride with Tech equalizing late in the game, and then again late in the first half, only for Virginia to steal the equalizer at the end of the second overtime.  There were 17 ties and 21 lead changes.  Let that sink in for a moment.  Malik Thomas had the kind of game Virginia fans have been waiting for all season and Thijs De Ridder, who had a quiet regulation, put the team on his shoulders in the first two overtimes.  On the Tech side, Amani Hansberry played 51 minutes, and despite giving up four inches to Johan Grunloh and Ugonna Onyenso, grabbed 15 rebounds (8 of them of the offensive variety) and only committed two fouls.  And Ben Hammond became a grown-ass man on this day, scoring 30 points on the strength of a 16/18 outing at the charity stripe.  If this first ACC game in any indication of how the season transpires, well, buckle up!

Minus

10 for 45.  That was Virginia’s night from beyond the arc.  Virginia came into the game as the nation’s #16 team from three-point range, converting at a 39.6% clip.  10/45 is no where near that.  Two years ago the ACC Network queried over 25 ACC players about the toughest place to play, and the overall choice was Cassell Coliseum, handily beating out Duke’s Cameron.  One of the reasons for this is that the sightlines are awful, and man did it affect Virginia’s shooters.  The Hoos were just 3/17 in the first half  -- I said the first half was ugly – and most of the shots were among the worst-looking threes I’ve seen all year.  Seriously, everyone watching knew they weren’t going in as soon as they left the shooters’ hands.  It got better for Virginia in the second half and the overtimes, but bear in mind that Virginia’s best three-point shooter was Thijs De Ridder.  And he went 3/11 (we’ll come back to him.)

Nights like this happen to jump-shooting teams.  Despite how good Virginia has been from deep this year, we can expect a couple more nights like this.

Minus

Can we stipulate, again, that injuries suck?  Tech was without Tobi Lawal and Tyler Johnson, both starters.  Virginia for their part was without Jacari White for the third game.  Either Lawal or White could have ended this game a lot sooner.

Minus

Ryan Odom sat Malik Thomas down with three minutes left in the game and Virginia up 51 – 50.  He was Virginia’s leading scorer with 15 points.  He sat out the entire first overtime period and all but 19 seconds of the second OT.  That’s 22 minutes!  That’s more than an entire half of basketball.  Devin Tillis and Sam Lewis played 18 minutes in those first two Ots.  And scored just two points between them, all while Thomas was rotting on the bench.  I have no idea what Odom was thinking.

Plus

Because Malik had the game we’ve been waiting for.  Ten seconds after he came into the game, Thomas scored on a drive to the basket and he converted the and-1.  Virginia down 73 – 75 with nine seconds left.  After a pair of Ben Hammond free throws, Thomas hit a three to bring Virginia back to within one.  Five points in 15 seconds.  In ten total minutes in OT, Thomas scored 11 points.

For the game, Thomas was Virginia’s leading scorer with 26 points on 8/20 shooting (2/9 from deep and 8/11 from the free throw line.)  Four times he slashed to the rim, and he’s really the only wing who can.  This is what he was supposed to bring to the table, and thus far, he hasn’t.  If Thomas can continue to play at this level, well, Virginia just became more lethal.

Plus

End of the first half, Virginia had closed on an 8 – 0 run to take the 24 -23 lead.  The Cavaliers had the ball with 29.8 seconds remaining and with 20 seconds on the shot clock and Odom called time out.  I like it.  I mean, I’m a soccer guy and part of me thinks that timeouts are for wusses, but this is basketball and if you get five timeouts per game, they ought to be used.  And Odom draws really nice plays on out-of-bounds.

Minus

Virginia had a 32 – 29 advantage in made baskets and a 10 – 9 advantage in threes, and yet lost.  Why, because Virginia only got to the free throw line for 15 shots while Tech lived at the line, going 28 – 41.  This was a physical, hard game.  Johan Grunloh and De Ridder battled all game long under the boards against Tech’s Amani Hansberry and Christian Gurdak.  Chance Mallory and Ben Hammond went at it all game.  By the second and third OT periods, every missed shot saw seven or eight players crashing the paint, fighting for the loose ball.

And yet, Tech had a 41 – 15 advantage in free throws.  I’m sure you can read other commentators complain about this imbalance and about the refereeing in general, but I didn’t see it.  This was on-court combat, and sure, there was contact on every play, so every call/non-call is somewhat arbitrary, but Tech got the majority of the calls because Gurdak and Hansberry got better position and held their ground all game long.  Neither Grunloh nor Onyenso were strong enough for this battle.

Minus

Cassell needs a new shot clock.  Four times the refs had to stop play adjust the shot clock, and in a game that was struggling to find any sort of rhythm for long stretches, these breaks were too detrimental.

Plus

De Ridder had an interesting game.  He scored just five points in the first half, but two were the first points of the game off a great drive from the arc.  He was 0/2 from deep, and his shots were looking as bad as everyone else’s, but his three with three minutes remaining triggered a Virginia 8 – 0 run that would give them the lead at the break.

In the second half, De Ridder had nine points, most coming off drives from the arc, as well as a pair of assists.  While he went just 1/4 from deep, his one three was the perfect response to a Jaden Schutt three that felt like the makings of a big run.  In the first OT, he had a sweet alley oop to Onyensu, drained another three and then had collected a loose ball and took it to the rim.

And while Chance Mallory is going to get all the acclaim for his buzzer beating putback to send the game into the third overtime, check out De Ridder’s catch off Tillis’ in-bound.

Minus

It still comes down to non-conference scheduling.  I love the resumption of the Maryland series, and Virginia will always get one SEC team as part of the ACC v SEC Challenge, but playing Butler and Dayton (in what was essentially a home game) is just not good-enough preparation for ACC play.  Odom was only hired mid-March, so I don’t know if any of this was his schedule, but it was insufficient.  Hopefully Odom remembers this game as he’s making next year’s schedule.

Next Up:  Virginia travels to NC State on Saturday, January 3rd for a morning game:  11am tip off.  The game will be on ESPN 2.

Published
Val Prochaska
VAL PROCHASKA

Val graduated from the University of Virginia in the last millennium, back when writing one's senior thesis by hand was still a thing. He is a lifelong fan of the ACC, having chosen the Tobacco Road conference ahead of the Big East. Again, when that was still a thing. Val has covered Virginia men's basketball for nine years, first with HoosPlace and then with StreakingTheLawn, before joining us here at Virginia Cavaliers on SI in August of 2023, continuing to cover UVA men's basketball and also writing about women's soccer and women's basketball.

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