Virginia tightens grip on the ACC by squeezing the life out of Louisville
The play that inspired Saturday night’s biggest eruption from Virginia’s bench wasn’t a high-flying dunk, a game-clinching free throw or a momentum-changing 3-pointer.
It was the Cavaliers defense forcing a first-half shot clock violation that had the reserves exchanging high fives and Tony Bennett grinning and pumping his fist.
Virginia’s pride in its defense was on display throughout its 52-47 victory over ninth-ranked Louisville in a showdown between the top two teams in the ACC standings. The third-ranked Cavaliers held the visiting Cardinals to 37 percent shooting, prevented them from scoring at all for the final 10:32 of the first half and built a big enough lead to survive a late Louisville rally.
If Virginia’s grip on first place in the ACC appeared tenuous after it let an 11-point lead slip away against Duke last Saturday, the Cavaliers proved otherwise this week. They responded with wins over North Carolina and Lousiville, concluding their toughest stretch of the season with a lead of two or more games in the loss column over every ACC rival.
In a season that has featured plenty of handwringing over low scores and hard-to-watch games, it would be a shame if what Virginia has accomplished gets lumped into that. The Cavaliers are so disciplined in the way they take away post touches, help on dribble penetration and force contested jump shots that they force viewers to appreciate low-scoring games the same way en elite NFL defense or Cy Young-caliber pitcher does in their sports.
It was no surprise that Louisville struggled especially badly with Virginia’s defense because it’s a terrible matchup for the Cardinals.
Louisville’s biggest weakness is its anemic 30.7 percent 3-point shooting, which is far from ideal against a Virginia defense that prides itself on walling off the paint and forcing opponents to shoot contested shots from the perimeter. The Cardinals attempted 14 shots from behind the arc and only made three of them, two by Wayne Blackshear and one by Chris Jones.
Jones and Rozier enjoyed only sporadic success off the dribble in half-court sets and they had very few chances to attack before the defense was set. Virginia played at its customary methodical pace and turned the ball over only two times against a Louisville team that thrives in transition and leads the ACC in forcing turnovers.
Stingy defense was a necessity for Virginia since it shot only 33.5 percent from the field itself, missed all but two of its 3-pointers and allowed Louisville to get as close as three points in the final 30 seconds. It also didn’t help the Cavaliers that Justin Anderson injured his left hand early in the game and did not play after a 1-for-9 first half.
Anderson’s availability going forward is a concern for a Virginia team that needs his scoring ability, but that won’t detract from the Cavaliers’ joy after a big win. Virginia is in control of the ACC and it doesn’t play a single upper-tier ACC team the rest of the season until the regular season finale March 7 at Louisville.
Given the way the first game went, the Cardinals can’t be looking forward to it.
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Jeff Eisenberg is the editor of The Dagger on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
