The Plus/Minus: Virginia Women’s Basketball Falters Versus Syracuse

Minus

This week’s edition of the Plus/Minus would be a lot more fun if I were covering Syracuse. Virginia was undone by magnificent games from Laila Phelia (38 points on 13/19 shooting and 10/11 from the line) and Sophie Burrows (7/8 from beyond the three-point line.) Between the two of them, they scored 59 points, just one point less than the entire Virginia squad.

Plus

Tabitha Amanze schooled Syracuse’s star freshman, Uche Izoje, in the post. Izoje has been named ACC Freshman of the Week four times already this season, and over her last three games was averaging 17 points and 12 boards. She had nine points, but it took her 10 shots to get there. She also had three turnovers and four fouls. Amanze, and Caitlyn Weimar, who have been in college for a collective decade, were punishing down low.

Amanze set a career high with five assists. Her high-low game with Weimar was Virginia’s strongest sector of the game.

Minus

Virginia was 4/21 from deep.

Oh, what the heck, let’s just get all the bad news out at once. Virginia was 8/13 from what this team euphemistically calls the “charity stripe.”

4/21 is, obviously, not going to win you many games, and any other night, Virginia might have won shooting just 19% from beyond the arc. But when Sophie Burrows goes 7/8, well, you have to match that level of production. Only Kymora Johnson can situationally match that, and she was just 1/4 from three.

Minus

The refs are back to calling ticky-tacky travels on women, the kind of which they don’t call on the men. Across all levels of the sport, men take a first step without dribbling the ball first. It’s just that the men are so explosive, it’s hard to make the call. But the violation is easy enough to catch in the women’s game and so they get called. All it does is degrade the women’s game.

Minus

In addition to the refs “helping” out in that regard, twice I think, the Cavaliers had a total of 21 turnovers. (Note: the Cavaliers only made 24 buckets, yielding an ugly 1.14 basket-to-turnover ratio. That’s not going to win any games either.)

Minus

Gabby White has fallen into coach Agugua-Hamilton’s doghouse. She played eight minutes against FSU, seven minutes versus Georgia Tech, and now three minutes against Syracuse. She hasn’t played particularly well in those [counting…] eighteen minutes, but she hasn’t been so egregious that she ought to have been yanked. One of Virginia’s strengths this year had been the flexibility of changing Kymora Johnson’s angle of attack when letting her play off-ball.

This team misses her play and the results have shown a distinct, downward trend since she’s been limited. There was a 2 OT victory over a much-diminished Florida State, a two-point nail-biter over an equally diminished Georgia Tech, and now a trouncing to a Syracuse team that won all of 12 games last year.

This team needs Gabby White.

Plus

Coach Mox played her collegiate ball at Hofstra, and her coach then was Felisha Leggette-Jack, so it’s a great dynamic when the two meet up in the ACC. Hopefully Mox can still learn from Leggette-Jack, who won this game when she inserted Olivia Schmitt at the point and removed Dominique Darius. I try not to speak too poorly of any player, but Darius was a disaster, seen here getting her pocket picked by Johnson.

Mo extends an 8-0 run! Hoos back in front 😤#GoHoos🔸⚔️🔹 #GNSL pic.twitter.com/JDOOYrgqT4
— Virginia Women's Basketball (@UVAWomensHoops) January 11, 2026

Schmitt came in, had a trio of steals, recorded five assists and had no turnovers. Virginia really stood no chance in the second half, getting outscored 51 – 26, and much of it is attributable to Schmitt’s performance.

Plus

Johnson has a really lovely teardrop floater. When she drives and drops the floater, which she did four times this game, Johnson makes the game look so easy.

Of course, she reportedly spends an hour after each practice working on that teardrop. So, anything but easy.

Minus

Virginia had one fast break, so the progress of the first two weeks of ACC play was not in evidence. The problem is that when a big grabs a rebound, they really only look for Johnson. She, for her part, drops back behind the ball, giving her more separation from defenders and to make her more available. Paris Clark, Romi Levy, they can advance the ball, but there’s never an outlet pass to them.

Up Next: Virginia travels to Durham to take on Duke, Thursday, January 15th. Tip off is 8:00pm and the game is the ACC Network.