Fresh off their emotional loss to Duke last night, the Tar Heels get a home game against the grinding Virginia Cavaliers. Aren't they lucky? Make no bones about it, this Virginia team is a Tony Bennett team and like his father, their is always the potential for U-G-L-Y. Poor Huckleberry Roy.
Barring a late season swoon, the Cavaliers are poised to go dancing again. KenPom likes them. They're 17th (ADJ O 87; ADJ D 6). The RPI is 42. They're best win is at home against Michigan who struggled on the road early in the year. Virginia does have wins at LSU and Oregon. Not great wins but good wins. Any team going cross country early and getting a win is good. Road losses to Duke and FSU were hard fought games that went down to the wire.
The calling card, of course, is defense. They have an effective FG% on defense of 43.6 (14th in the nation). They DO NOT give up second chance baskets. Offensive rebound % against is 24.4. The national average is 32.3 They're slightly below average on the offensive side and they simply don't score alot (260th in the nation) but that is not a concern to them. They don't foul either. FTA/FGA%, they're 28.7, below the national average of 36.6. Opponents get 16.9% of their points at the line. Again, the national average is 20.5%. Nationally, they're 17th in PF per game.
This'll be the team that announcers will warn you about not wanting to face and Tony Bennett was 3-2 in tourney appearances at Wazzu, no small feat. In one of those games, UNC ran them off the court in the 2nd half. Ultimately, the offense will let them down. They don't make 3's, averaging only 5 a game. They protect the ball fairly well and are "efficient". 5th-year Sr. Mike Scott is their best player. He averages 17 & 8 per game. They lack the dynamo to take them to a Final Four but a win or two shouldn't come as a surprise.
Key announcer words for Virginia: Tempo, efficient, discipline, slow, smart
No comments:
Post a Comment