Virginia Closes Regular-Season at Virginia Tech Sunday

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Feb. 27, 2016

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – The Virginia women’s basketball team (16-13, 6-9 ACC) plays its final regular-season game of the 2015-16 season at Virginia Tech (16-12, 4-11 ACC) on Sunday, February 28 at 2 p.m.

All of the 2015-16 Virginia women’s basketball games – home and away – are available locally on NewsRadio 1070 AM and 98.9 FM WINA and streaming online at wina.com and VirginiaSports.com with John Freeman and Myron Ripley calling the action. The game will also be streaming online on ESPN3/Watch ESPN.

The Virginia-Virginia Tech game is part of the Commonwealth Clash presented by Virginia529, which is a head-to-head, points-based competition between the athletic teams of the Cavaliers and Hokies. The Commonwealth Clash encourages a friendly, statewide rivalry between the two schools across all school-sponsored sports with 21 individual event points on the line. The school that accumulates 11 points or more will be crowned the winner and take home the Virginia529 Commonwealth Clash trophy. The UVA-VT game is worth a half point in the Clash. Three-and-a-half clash points will be determined in various sports this weekend. The score coming into the week in this year’s Clash is Virginia 5.0 and Virginia Tech 3.5. UVA claimed the inaugural Commonwealth Clash 15-7 last season.

The Cavaliers have won three of their last four games and are currently tied for ninth place in the ACC with Wake Forest. Dependent on the outcomes of several of Sunday’s games, Virginia could be seeded anywhere between seventh and 10th in next week’s ACC Tournament. Seeds 10-15 will play on the first day of the tournament on Wednesday, March 2 at the Greensboro Coliseum. Seeds 5-9 will receive a first-round bye, beginning competition on Thursday, with the top-four seeds earning a double-bye into Friday’s quarterfinals. The full bracket with match-ups and game times will be announced on Sunday evening.

Virginia is coming off a 72-68 victory over North Carolina on Thursday evening. The Cavaliers, who lead the ACC and are ranked 19th in the nation with a 75.4 percent free throw shooting percentage, were 15-of-16 from the stripe against the Tar Heels, including going 13-of-13 in the fourth quarter. Sophomore Mikayla Venson (Arlington, Va.), who leads the ACC and is ranked 22nd in the nation with an 86.5 percent free throw shooting accuracy, went 6-of-6 from the line, with all of her attempts coming in the final two minutes of the game. Venson is vying to become the third-straight Cavalier to win the conference freethrow-shooting crown.

Venson led all players with 23 points in the game, including going 3-of-8 from three-point range. Venson’s three treys gave her 64 for the season, the highest single-season total in program history, and also moved her into 10th place in career three-pointers with 125. Venson is currently six makes shy of tying Dawn Staley (1989-92) in ninth place. Venson’s 23 points was her eighth 20-point game of the year.

For the second-straight game, Virginia had four players finish in double figures including redshirt sophomore J’Kyra Brown (Rocky Mount, N.C.) who had a season-high 12 points and also grabbed seven rebounds, which matched her season high. Brown was one of a trio of UVA guards, which also included senior Faith Randolph (Derwood, Md.) and sophomore Aliyah Huland El (Randolph, N.J.), who grabbed seven rebounds against the Tar Heels.

The Cavaliers had won 18-straight match-ups against the Hokies before falling 66-46 on Feb. 7, VT’s first victory in the series since Jan. 22, 2007. UVA is 45-11 all-time against the Hokies and is 20-3 in ACC contests.

Virginia Tech leads the ACC in scoring defense, allowing only 53.0 points per game, and also has the lowest opponent shooting percentage at 34.5 percent. Virginia’s opponents score 61.7 points per game and shoot 41.1 percent. Virginia Tech averages 58.8 points per game while Virginia scores 64.5. Virginia Tech is coming off a 54-48 victory at Wake Forest on Thursday. After trailing by 10 midway through the third quarter, the Hokies used a 13-0 run to rally past Wake. Sidney Cook and Chanette Hicks led the Hokies with 15 points each. Hannah Young added 13 points while Vanessa Panousis chipped in seven. Taijah Campbell tallied eight rebounds and four blocks.

The ACC Women’s Basketball Tournament will be held March 2-6 at the Greensboro Coliseum in Greensboro, N.C. The full bracket, first-round match-ups and game times will be released this Sunday evening.