No. 14 Cavaliers Fall to No. 22 Tar Heels

By Jeff White (jwhite@virginia.edu)
VirginiaSports.com

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — The UVA men’s basketball team is no longer unbeaten at home.

For much of the first half Saturday afternoon (Jan. 24), the 14^th-ranked Cavaliers appeared headed to a victory that would have improved their record at John Paul Jones Arena to 11-0. Two minutes before halftime, Virginia led No. 22 North Carolina by 16 points.

From there, however, the Tar Heels dominated. UNC scored the final seven points of the opening half and, on a frigid day in Central Virginia, never really cooled off in an 85-80 win over UVA in front of a sellout crowd at JPJ.

“The end of the half was a killer,” Virginia head coach Ryan Odom said. “The beginning of the second half was another killer. We did not come out with enough fire on the defensive side of the ball to make things harder [on UNC].”

For the Wahoos (16-3 overall, 5-2 ACC), the loss ended their five-game winning streak. After falling behind by five midway through the second half, they staged a spirited comeback of their own, and they led 74-72 with 3:51 to play. The home fans did their to urge the Cavaliers on, but Carolina (16-4, 4-3) answered with back-to-back three-point plays and then went up 81-71 when 6-foot-10 Jarin Stevenson hit a 3-pointer.

Five straight points by the Cavaliers cut UNC’s lead to 81-79. In the final 50 seconds, however, the Heels made enough plays to hold off the Cavaliers, who outrebounded their guests 44-28.

“Virginia's such a physical, unbelievable team,” Carolina head coach Hubert Davis said. “In the first half, I felt like they kicked our tail. In the second half, I felt like we met the fight.”

Poor transition defense played a large part to UVA’s defeat. Time and again in the second half, the Heels beat the Hoos back down the court for layups or dunks. They finished with 21 fast-break points.

“The defensive intensity was not where we needed it to be,” Odom said. “The communication was lacking, really, in general. A poor defensive performance overall.”

Turnovers also hurt the Cavaliers, who totaled 11 to only four for North Carolina. In points off turnovers, UNC finished with a 19-2 advantage.

“You’re going to turn it over on occasion,” Odom said. “Some of them were bad beats. Some of them were not. The key is you can't have those turn into baskets, and tonight they turned into baskets.”

UNC, which trailed 43-34 at intermission, shot 63.3% from the floor in the second half. From 3-point range, the Heels were 5 for 11 in the final 20 minutes.

Forward Thijs De Ridder led UVA with 20 points and eight rebounds, but he also had four turnovers. On defense, De Ridder said, the Cavaliers lacked a sense of urgency.

Against an opponent as talented as North Carolina, De Ridder said, “you have to be urgent 40 minutes and not 30 [or] 20.”

Malik Thomas, Sam Lewis and Chance Mallory also scored in double figures for Virginia. Each finished with 11 points. Hall totaled eight points, seven rebounds and four assists, with no turnovers.

For most of the first half, UVA could do little wrong, and Johann Grünloh’s free throw at the 2:04 mark pushed its lead to 43-27.

“I think offensively, the ball was moving,” Hall said. “We were putting them in rotations a little bit more, and that's really how we like to play offensively. But I think really it comes down to the defensive end for us. That's when we're a top team in the country, when we're locked in defensively and executing the scout. And the first half, I thought we did a really good job of that.”

Two 3-pointers by Carolina in the final minute of the first half flipped the momentum, however, and what had been a rout turned into a battle.

“We like to try and pride ourselves on closing out halves the right way,” Hall said, “and unfortunately we didn't. Credit to [the Heels], they're a great team and played a great game tonight, and they kind of threw a punch, figuratively speaking, right there and kind of [fed off] it into the next half.”

Freshman forward Caleb Wilson, a projected lottery pick in the next NBA draft, led UNC with 20 points on 8-for-12 shooting, and Stevenson added 17 points, all in the second half.

The Cavaliers were far from perfect on offense. In addition to turning the ball over 11 times, they made only 2 of 12 shots from 3-point range in the second half. Even so, Odom noted, they “scored 80 points,” and that should be enough to win most games.

“We have to defend,” he said.

UP NEXT: Virginia will play two road games before returning to JPJ to host Pittsburgh on Tuesday, Feb. 3.

UVA visits Notre Dame on Tuesday and Boston College next Saturday. The game at Purcell Pavilion will start at 7 p.m. and air on ESPN2. The CW will carry Virginia’s game at Conte Forum at 1:30 p.m.

The Cavaliers are 18-5 all-time against the Fighting Irish and 22-9 against the Eagles.

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