🏀 Virginia vs NC Central, Friday, 7 November 2025, 1900, ACCNX

[jphat007]

In 2019 we beat similarly ranked teams to NC central by 29 and 57. GE and MTSU were ranked in he 200s. The teams at the bottom are truly worse than them. But even more than the numbers is just how we look. We get beat so easily on defense. And this is against awful teams. That’s a real concern

[Cuts_from_The_Corner]

Sam and Jacari both played less than half of the game too… I imagine that won’t be the case in closer games (or it shouldn’t).

[norfolk_hoo]

Our 2019 team literally beat similar teams by similar margins

[haney]

That’s (1) 100% correct and (2) not at all in conflict with anything I’ve written

[norfolk_hoo]

I must be missing your point then lmao. But maybe I’m just over your motte and bailey contrarian act

[norfolk_hoo]

Also Navy blew out Yale by 31 watch out world lmao

[haney]

My main disagreement with @Cuts_from_The_Corner is this part:

@Cuts_from_The_Corner

I’d wager the first half of these two halves tonight is much closer to what they’ll play like in meaningful games than the latter part.

I don’t really disagree, it’s more so that I think that’s an optimistic outlook on what we are seeing, for which we don’t have much evidence. We are experimenting a bit, but the lineups haven’t been that wacky. Maybe some Yo-Go, but we need to try something to give TDR a breather.

Will leave it at this: It’s early. We need to tighten up. We probably will.

[norfolk_hoo]

Murray state blew out MVSU by 48 that’s a great team too

[norfolk_hoo]

@haney

I agree, but still… maybe I’ve been Kenpom pilled, but I think the ability to blow teams out is pretty highly correlated with being very good. And the opposite with the opposite.

Struggling to keep a ten point lead on Nova begets not being able to keep a 30 pt margin v NCC. Is it enough for a pattern? It’s enough to talk about IMO

It’s early and small sample size tho. And we are learning to play together so it’s even earlier…

But in all seriousness that’s not what you were saying. You were implying that this team might not be very good because it can’t blow out teams or hold leads. Then when you’re pressed on it you retreat to something far more moderate and reasonable. Class Motte and Bailey tactic

[SGHoo]

I thought Sam Lewis looked good but man hit your gd free throws.

Our highs were high.. I’m not that concerned. My expectation also wasn’t a top 10 team. If we hover in and around the top 25 all year and threaten the sweet 16 then I think that’s a positive result for this year.

[haney]

@norfolk_hoo

You were implying

I’ll save you the detective work and tell you what I think: if you do our “no preseason bias” Torvik plus Nova** exhibition, I’d bet it puts us between 45 and 60 or so, and probably right around low 50s if I had to guess.

That’s how good I think we are right now. With lots of room on the upside, given that our chemistry, etc will improve since we are still learning to play together.

[norfolk_hoo]

It’s not detective work: you said it yourself! You’re just backpedaling again, into something far more moderate. Motte. And. Bailey.

[wahoobelinda]

I was at the game and two of my major gripes – which have been mentioned – were that the team plays great in chunks and that we seem to play to our competition. I believe the consistency will come within a handful of games, and the latter will adjust with higher-level competition.

It’s frustrating, but these are growing pains we should probably expect. But man, free throws, and fouling…in the second half. Without all of that the score would have been much different, if that is what you care about. I am hoping the free throw percentage isn’t a carryover from last year, with the jerseys are something.

[haney]

What was my controversial position from which I’m backpedaling?

[wahoobelinda]

I am just asking here…can you explain why you obsess on computer-generated rankings after 2 games? I legitimately don’t understand.

[norfolk_hoo]

You said that being able to blow out teams is correlated with being very good. Not doing so is correlated with the opposite. We didn’t blow out NCCU. Therefore we aren’t very good. There ya go.

I could have just quoted your own post again. Said the same damn thing

[haney]

Ah, got it.

Very good teams are better than 45th or so. I think we aren’t quite there yet.

[norfolk_hoo]

But the opposite of blowing out teams is… not blowing out teams. And the opposite of very good is… very bad.

I know you don’t actually think we’re very bad. But forgive me for giving you some grace and moving that to not good

[Jwhelan33]

From NCCU coaching staff: “Virginia is better than NC State” came directly from their staff who I know. Also talked about if Virginia put it together for 40 minutes!!! I’ll talk more about what I heard and the background that goes into playing uva from other teams.

[wahoobelinda]

Also, I am sticking with, Mallory is better than Hall and should start. I had a really good look at Hall’s defense and it is atrocious. He is going to get smoked when we play high-major schools.