Not all 3s are created equal. You weren’t getting wide open 3s against that defense in 2019. Also if you have a good offense that gives you sizable leads, the opposition will be shooting a lot of 3s to catch-up.
This year it always felt like a shorter or slower guy was trying to close out on a wing shooter. That didn’t happen with Hunter, mamadi, key. Then on offense, Guy, Hunter and Jerome were building us leads.
Personally I would say we overachieve in the regular season, but that just means we end up slightly overseeded, not that we are especially prone to variance. It was still super unlikely to lose to 3 double-digit seeds, just a little more likely than your average 1/4/4 seed team. Actually think our play style more than makes up for lack of possessions–less overall variance when you consider we usually don’t foul/get fouled, don’t give up or take open lay-ups, and stay out of transition. That’s why there’s no major upset losses really in all of 2018 and 2019 outside of UMBC.
The “system” to me is we are very solid on defensive positioning, not turning the ball over, not taking bad shots, and keeping teams out of transition. We don’t stop doing these things in the postseason, but the gap closes between us and the Michigan States of the world who have a higher ceiling. We’re closer to our ceiling in the regular season.
Completely agree with @haney on needing to make faster adjustments though.
While I would like to play talented more mistake prone younger guys early to hopefully have them be better later in the season TB will never risk losing a game doing that. He is not built that way. Another thing looking to the future is the influx athletic guys (Dunn, Bond, Gertrude) who bring a lot to the table but at the moment it probably isn’t 3 point shooting. How will we try to take advantage of their offensive skills in ways other that 3 point shooting next year?
But he is risking losing a game by doing that… a significantly more important game…
We didn’t have that luxury this year, unfortunately. Pitt got in off the bubble at 14-6. Clemson got left out at 14-6.
Had we been weaker in November, we would likely have gone 0-for-Vegas, and we would have been Clemson
In most years, your premise is solid, but we can’t bank on several ACC teams not shitting the bed early in the season, thereby tanking the conference metrics.
I agree but that is how he coaches.
Don’t have much to add other than we need better players/athletes if we ever want to get back to a final 4 or even 2nd weekend. Kihei/Franklin/Gardner core is relatively weak after watching all these other teams. That’s an undersized and/or unathletic trio that we rely on
Seems we went 4-guard a lot in that game (and in the ACCT), as Dunn and Murray are listed as guards and play a hybrid role, particularly in a sides offense.
Problem is, it’s tough to play four- or five-out motion with Dunn because defenses don’t respect his jumper (Murray, either, for that matter).
Lots of general disrespect for Vander Plas on this board, but he would have helped us vs. Duke, and probably vs. Furman as a guy who wouldn’t hesitate to take a three in the first half.
I think we get through the zone pothole much more smoothly with BVP. We definitely got worse when BVP got hurt.
Also, Beekman’s last second shot wasn’t so far away from going in…
I don’t think BVP’s shooting would have helped that much because he had been ice cold, but I do think his passing and decision making would have helped a lot with that zone.
Think the takeaway from the last 2-3 years is simple: you have to play perfect when you have an undersized, average athletic, middling shooting team. We want to avoid being in that position again. Need to target players with positional size moving forward. And if a guy is undersized, he needs to be a knockdown shooter to compensate
I want Kon. NO MORE NON SHOOTERS
That’s tough because I’m like “Obviously the problem was that. Well, and that, too. And that. And also that.”
I know its supposed to be “which was the biggest one?” but I’d have an easier time answering “Which 2-3 weren’t the biggest problem?”
This was the only poll question that I couldn’t answer. It’s so hard to try to find a common thread for six losses over 12 years. For me, there’s so many different players and circumstances over that timeframe that it’s almost impossible to try to find that one thing.
I will say for the common thread for this year’s team and the ‘20-21 team was that neither of those teams had “the guy”. You know, the guy who says “alright, this is getting silly, I’m taking this game over.” Reece has had a few games where he’s been the guy, but he was slowed this season by his hamstring injury. If Reece comes back next year and he’s healthy, I don’t think Virginia is going home early.
So, I did the numbers on this, because I thought the answer was “Mid-majors who make the NCAA’s tend to do so on the back of great outside shooting and disciplined offensive play to make up for mid-major athleticism, etc. And that happens to be the Packline’s primary weakness.”
Turns out, we have not generally been losing to blistering outside shooting. Furman hit 35% of their 3s against us vs a season average of 34% (which is also exactly what UVA allowed, on average). Last year in the NIT, Miss State hit 31% (against their season average of 30%). In '21, Ohio hit 31% of their 3s while averaging 35% on the season. Gardner-Webb hit 39%, but they averaged 38% on the season. UMBC really did go nuts, hitting 50% of their 3s. They were a good outside shooting team, averaging 38%, but they still obviously outperformed.
So, 3 of those 5 teams shot within 1% of their season average on 3s against us, one shot dramatically better, and one shot modestly worse. The point being, we didn’t lose those games because our opponents perfectly took advantage of the Packline’s weakness.
In fact, the answer is the opposite. Sure, many factors combined to make those losses happened, but imo the single biggest one is that UVA’s outside shooting turns into utter trash in those games. Over those five games, UVA shot over 30% from 3 once (and it was barely over 30%, 30.4% vs Gardner-Webb) and under 20% THREE TIMES. The 5th game was vs Ohio when we shot 25.8%.
UVA wasn’t a great outside shooting team in all of those games, but the squad was at a minimum solidly above average in 3 of them. Not only did UVA go 2-12 vs Furman but 3, but the squad also went 2-12 from 3 against Miss State and, of course, 4-22 against UMBC. 7-23 against Gardner-Webb was the best performance, and by a solid margin.
I have no idea why its happening, but that’s probably the single biggest issue in first round games.
It has to be mental, right?
Tight. That’s the NCAAT. Losing teams shot a combined 29% from 3 yesterday. It’s the norm. Gotta find a way to relax and play free.
I’m just thinking out loud here, feeling out another hypothesis, but… over the past 3 seasons, it feels like UVA doesn’t have a “postseason upset” problem so much as it has a broader problem with putting away “lesser” teams. JMU (both this year and last), Kent State (OT win), San Francisco, Navy (one loss, the other game too close) maybe others? (Do BC, FSU, and Louisville count?) We often talk about how Virginia plays to the level of the opposition and doesn’t put teams away… that wasn’t always true, but it’s true lately. Have our recent teams lacked a killer instinct?
I’m very grateful for all that UVA basketball has become under Tony. I never, ever thought UVA would win a national championship. That said, I never, ever thought that just 4 years later, UVA would regress to what it was prior to 2016. To me that’s all about Tony. If he was having his year-end review with me, I’d stress the following: