By Jeff White (jwhite@virginia.edu)
VirginiaSports.com
CORAL GABLES, Fla. – Sprinkled throughout the crowd of 5,596 at Miami’s Watsco Center were pockets of Virginia fans, and their cheers grew louder as the second half progressed Saturday night.
“I think I heard more of them than Miami fans,” forward Jayden Gardner said after UVA rallied for a 74-71 victory over the Hurricanes.
For the Wahoos and their supporters, there was nothing routine about this win. If the Hoos are to be in the mix for an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament, they can’t afford many more missteps, and they bolstered their postseason credentials with a victory over one of the ACC’s top teams.
“This was a must-win game in our minds,” Virginia center Kadin Shedrick said, “but we’re also taking it one game at a time. We’re not listening to all the outside noise of tournament talk. We’re taking it one game at a time, trying to win every game we can, and we’ll see what happens in the end.”
Virginia (17-10 overall, 11-6 ACC) was coming off a frustrating loss to Virginia Tech in Blacksburg. As the Cavaliers have all season, though, they avoided a second straight defeat.
“It’s huge to come over here and win on the road,” Gardner said. “This team is resilient.”
For a while Saturday night, a UVA victory seemed improbable. The Hurricanes (19-8, 11-5) scored the final nine points of the first half and led 38-30 at the break. In the locker room, Virginia head coach Tony Bennett told his players they needed to come out and get quality looks on offense and not make anything easy for the Canes.
Instead, the Hoos turned the ball over on their first two possessions of the second half and found themselves trailing by 10 with 19 minutes to play.
“It was kind of like: What’s going on here?” Bennett said.
But a huge momentum swing followed. It began with a 3-pointer by senior point Kihei Clark, whose shot started a 23-4 run that stunned the Canes and their fans.
“Kihei got it rolling,” Bennett said.
“We needed a little life,” Clark said, “and I’m just trying to spark my team. Hopefully it gave us the lift that we needed.”
No Cavalier struggled more against the Hokies than Clark, who was 1 for 9 from the floor and missed all five of his 3-point attempts in Blacksburg. Against Miami, he scored 14 of his 17 points in the second half, and Clark also had five assists.
“The bounce back that Kihei had was good,” Bennett said, “and we needed it all.”
Clark’s final points came with 13.5 seconds left and helped seal the Cavaliers’ sixth straight win over the Canes. He caught a long inbounds pass from sophomore guard Reece Beekman and dribbled in for a layup that gave him 1,001 career points at Virginia.
“Kihei’s a warrior,” Gardner said. “He’s a fighter.”
That’s also true of Gardner, a 6-foot-6 forward who transferred from East Carolina to UVA last year. He had a subpar second half in Blacksburg, but against Miami he made 9 of 14 shots from the floor and 5 of 6 from the line.
Gardner led all scorers with 23 points Saturday night and also had seven rebounds, two assists and three blocked shots.
“Just staying confident, staying resilient, just playing within myself, not trying to force things offensively,” Gardner said of his mindset. “Just staying solid. I think that’s what helped me and the team tonight.”
Virginia had no shortage of heroes in this one. With starting wing Armaan Franklin hampered by foul trouble and a sore toe, senior Kody Stattmann played 26 minutes and contributed eight points, four rebounds and two blocks. With 5:55 to play, Stattmann capped a spin move by banking in a shot to put UVA up 57-53.
“I thought Kody gave us a big lift,” Bennett said.
So did the 6-foot-11 Shedrick, a redshirt sophomore who came off the bench to record a double-double (13 points and a career-high 13 rebounds) in 30-plus minutes Saturday night.
Such performances are no longer uncommon for Shedrick, who blocked a shot late in the game that would have cut the Cavaliers’ lead to two. He also played well in Blacksburg, where he totaled 11 points and six rebounds.
“I think a lot of it just has had to do with confidence for me,” Shedrick said. “I’ve been working hard to make sure I keep my confidence up, even when things get tough for me, just keep working on my mental toughness.”
Beekman recorded a game-high seven assists. He scored only six points, but two came one of the game’s biggest shots. With 4:56 remaining, Beekman beat the shot clock with a jumper that pushed Virginia’s lead back to four.
Gardner was not to be outdone. With 1:38 to play, he hit a fallaway jumper from just inside the foul line as the shot clock expired to stretch Virginia’s lead to 65-57.
“That was significant,” Bennett said. “Again, it takes that to win on the road.”