From the Richmond Times-Dispatch

[Apis Bull]

Early wins, losses don't mean much

BOB LIPPER

POINT OF VIEW

Monday, November 29, 2004

CHARLOTTESVILLE You eyeball Virginia's Cavaliers and Richmond's Spiders for 40 please-Mr. Referee-put-that-whistle-in-your-pocket minutes, and what do you see? You see one team that might be looking at a brighter tomorrow, but who knows? You see another team that might be looking at diminished returns, but who knows?

It's not even December. Christmas presents haven't been wrapped and returned yet. The first conference encounters are five weeks and an auld lang syne away.

Meaning we should not read a whole lot into yesterday's 85-58, wire-to-wire U.Va. romp.

Except: This was fairly impressive stuff for the 4-0 Cavs, who've now book-ended a muddled effort against Appy State with pastings of then-No. 10 Arizona and the Spiders. Jerry Wainwright teams don't routinely lose by four touchdowns. They defend, search for good shots, play you tough. U.Va. broke from 31-27 tension to 47-29 breathing room at intermission and never let this UR edition even dream about challenging again. Not a bad day's work.

Except Part 2: With December road tests looming at Wake Forest, VCU, Pitt and maybe Arizona, the Spiders have some issues to address. They committed 22 turnovers and didn't reveal much of a long-distance game. They didn't put a natural scorer on University Hall's floor. Everyone not named Kevin Steenberge and Daon Merritt combined for 12-for-35 scattershooting.

And whereas everybody in last year's lineup could handle the ball, only Merritt among this group looked comfy with the rock - and he's still working through the hangover from his 84-assists/86-turnovers rookie campaign.

All that said, neither coach was ready to make any pronouncements based on this return.

 

"Too early to tell," said U.Va.'s Pete Gillen. "I can't gauge anything. I think we have a chance to have a good team, but I can't say right now. We beat Kentucky two years ago. We wound up 16-16."

Similarly, Richmond won on the road at Stanford that season - and labored across the finish line 16-13. So Wainwright wasn't about to get cosmic about this setback.

"It's like when somebody learns how to cook," he said. "Sometimes you're surprised when it's good food. You're certainly not surprised when it's awful. I think what happens in your early going is people show you what you need to work on. Hopefully, these are things that will help us grow."

The 6-11 Steenberge already has. He averaged 4.5 points as a sophomore. He's up to 21.6 through three November outings and overmatched U.Va.'s Elton Brown early on yesterday. But he scored only four points over the concluding 27 minutes. UR's shooting evaporated to the 30-percent level in the second half, and that pretty much was that.

U.Va.'s defense had much to do with UR's collapse. Meanwhile, at the other end, the Cavs converted turnovers into baskets and spread the floor to ring up 11 makes from 3-point territory. Good omens there. With Brown its only proven low-post threat, U.Va. needs to score in transition and from long range to generate offense. Freshman playmaker Sean Singletary is the key guy in both areas. He's savvy. He can penetrate, he can distribute, he can shoot some. He also can dream.

"We want to go undefeated," Singletary said. "That's our goal."

Memo to irrepressible youth: Won't happen. Beyond that, it's tough to reach conclusions about these two teams. The Spiders are missing four starters from an NCAA team - but compete in a depleted Atlantic 10. The Cavs retained four starters from an NIT entry - but suit up in the brutal ACC.

They met yesterday, and one squad demonstrated it's further along than the other. It might end up that way. But those developments are still pending.

Contact Bob Lipper at (804) 649-6555 or blipper@timesdispatch.com

This story can be found at: Times-Dispatch

[dabull80]

Gotta love his e-mail address_Blipper@  LOL

[Guest HowieP1]

Let's hope our 3 point shooting stays hot against Richmond!  ;D

U.Va. takes it easily

3-pointers spur Cavs in a matchup of two of state's best teams

BY JEFF WHITE

TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Nov 29, 2004

U.VA. 85 UR 58

CHARLOTTESVILLE - He had seen the statistics, which suggested the Virginia basketball team struggled to shoot accurately from long range. Jerry Wainwright put little stock in those numbers.

"I saw a bank balance one time of my wife's, before we were married, and that was false, too," Wainwright said yesterday at University Hall. "I don't mean that disrespectfully, but I was holding my breath."

By the time the University of Richmond coach exhaled, his team was in trouble. In the first meeting between these teams in nearly five years, U.Va. made eight 3-pointers in the first half and finished with a season-high 11 in a 85-58 rout of UR before 7,506 fans.

The 85 points were the most allowed by the Spiders since a 98-86 loss at George Mason in January 1996.

 

"We're a young basketball team, and we were exposed today," Wainwright said. "But I still think we're going to be more than competitive throughout the season, and I think this'll turn out to be a real good win for Virginia."

In its first three games, U.Va. had made 14 of 52 attempts from beyond the arc. Against UR, it went 11 for 27. Senior forward Devin Smith led Virginia (4-0) with five treys, and sophomore guard J.R. Reynolds added three. Freshman point guard Sean Sing- letary, 1 of 10 from long range in the first three games, went 2 for 4 against the Spiders (2-1).

"We've got great 3-point shooters," Reynolds said. "The first couple of games, we weren't hitting, but we've just got to keep shooting, and sooner or later they're going to go in for us."

After Virginia opened a 24-16 lead on freshman swingman Adrian Joseph's trey with 9:21 left in the first half, Richmond crept back behind junior center Kevin Steenberge and freshman guard Courtney Nelson. A Steenberge tip-in pulled UR to 27-25, but the Cavaliers closed the half with a 20-4 run that included 3-pointers by Singletary, Smith and Reynolds. The Spiders trailed 47-29 at the break, in part because they had gone 0 for 7 from the free throw line.

"That kills you in games," Wainwright said. "Those are turnovers."

The defeat was UR's most one-sided since a 77-46 loss at Cincinnati in December 2001. The Spiders, who made nearly half of their field goal attempts in the first 20 minutes, shot 30 percent in the second half against U.Va., which harassed them with a sticky zone defense and came up with 11 steals.

Only two players scored in double figures for UR: Steenberge (14 points) and sophomore point guard Daon Merritt (10), who was limited to 24 minutes because of foul trouble. Steenberge went 0 for 3 from the floor in the second half after making 5 of 6 attempts before the break.

"Tonight we made perimeter shots, which we had not been making, and we did pretty good defensively," Virginia coach Pete Gillen said. "But the score differential is no indication of the difference between the teams. They're a very good team. We just had a good game."

Smith, coming off a three-point outing against Appalachian State, torched UR for a game-high 26 and grabbed seven rebounds. Senior center Elton Brown, with 12 points and 10 rebounds, posted his seventh career double-double. Reynolds finished with nine points, a career-best six assists, four rebounds and two steals.

"He's a great player," Gillen said of the Roanoke resident. "The more you watch him, the more you appreciate what he does. When he has the ball in his hands, you feel good."

Next up for Virginia is its first road game, Wednesday night against Northwestern in the ACC-Big Ten Challenge. That same night, UR entertains South Florida at the Robins Center.

"This was a great lesson," Wainwright said. "I don't think we were physically beaten today. I think we were technically beaten. Those kids were well-prepared, they did what they were told, and they really executed."

UR and U.Va. will meet next season at the Richmond Coliseum.

Contact Jeff White at (804) 649-6838 or jwhite@timesdispatch.com

RICHMOND (2-1)

http://www.timesdispatch.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=RTD/MGArticle/RTD_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031779397420

[Markeymark]

Looks like a team that might not play well against a disruptive, up-tempo kind of opponent. I think it will come down to who plays better D.

[smazza]

my money is on bulls

[Omniscientbull]

This will be Solomon Jones' first test of the season.

It will be interesting to see how he matches up against a legit center.

[bulls96go]

go bulls!

this is the biggest test yet

go represent