Virginia Stumbles At SMU - Takeaways From First 0-1 ACC Start Since 2008

For the last two decades, Virginia basketball fans have been accustomed to getting out to a good start in ACC play.

UVA had won 16 straight ACC openers entering Saturday's trip to Dallas to face SMU where former president George W. Bush was in attendance to watch SMU’s first ever ACC men's basketball game. Bush was also in office the last time the Cavaliers dropped their ACC opener as Tony Bennett posted a 15-0 stretch of wins.

But this was another reminder these are not Bennett's Cavaliers. The Hoos dropped the conference opener 63-51 to SMU, their first 0-1 start to ACC play since 2007-08 when they opened against Duke.

After the Mustangs went on an 11-2 run in the first half, UVA closed out with a 9-2 answer to only trail by two going into halftime. SMU was powered by a career-high 14 first-half points from 7’2” freshman Same Yigitoglu. The Cavaliers took the lead on an Isaac McKneely 3-pointer to start the second half, though, as the teams went back-and-forth. McKneely later hit back-to-back 3's, including a four-point play, to give Virginia its largest lead of the game at 45-38.

UVA never made another field goal, going the final 10:16 without a made shot over an 0-9 shooting stretch. SMU on the other side closed the game on a 9-0 run, which helped the Mustangs cover a -10.5 point spread. McKneely was the only Virginia player to finish in double figures with 17 points, while SMU was
lead by Kario Oquendo with 21 points and Yigitoglu with 16 points.

Here are three takeaways from Virginia’s ACC opening loss to the Mustangs.

Offense Out of Sorts

All the talk around Virginia basketball this offseason, until a certain sudden retirement stole the headlines, was a revamped offense.

The early returns show the Cavaliers might be right back where they started and they went back to their traditional mover-blocker offense early on at SMU. UVA is currently ranked 358th in offensive pace and entered the game ranked 200th in offensive efficiency. Virginia also ranks dead last in the ACC in scoring for the second-straight season, averaging only 63 points a game, not aided by the 51 scored in Dallas.

Part of the offensive struggles could be attributed to the lack of consistent play at point guard, unlike years past with Reece Beekman, Kihei Clark, Ty Jerome, London Perrantes, and so on running the show there. Saturday's effort added another challenge for that matter as starter Dai Dai Ames never came back into the game after the second media timeout with a suspected injury.

Interim head coach Ron Sanchez still sounded positive with some of the offense displayed, keying on a few stretches.

"We had some really good stretches of offensive play tonight that I think resembled more of the Virginia way of basketball," Sanchez said on Virginia Sports Radio postgame show.

One of the few bright spots was Isaac McKneely, who scored 17 points, including several 3's in critical moments for UVA. But after McKneely hit back-to-back triples with 10:19 left in the second half, SMU coach Andy Enfield called a timeout a zeroed in on the ACC's 3-point shooting leader. For the remainder of the game, the Mustangs denied the ball to McKneely. The extra pressure on McKneely coincided with a more than 10-minute field goal drought by the Cavaliers.

"They really started denying me after that and it was hard to get catches," McKneely said postgame. "But we've got to figure out ways to keep me in the game when teams start denying me like that."

Only McKneely, Andrew Rohde (9 points), and Jacob Cofie (8 points) made more than one field goal.

Same Old Problems

If you polled anyone watching Virginia basketball right now, the two biggest weaknesses showing up time and time again right now are turnovers and offensive rebounding. SMU entered the game leading the ACC in offensive rebounds, while forcing opponents into a middle of the road 11.3 turnovers per game.

The Cavaliers fed into both categories again on Saturday giving up 8 offensive rebounds, mainly in crucial moments, and turning the ball over 14 times. The latter fed into an ongoing issues both from their two games in the Bahamas and in the ACC-SEC Challenge game against Florida. They had 15 turnovers against the Gators.

"We need to continue to sharpen," Sanchez said. "We gave up too many offensive rebounds at the wrong time, that team is big and athletic and older, but we've got to do a better job on the glass."

SMU scored 18 points off of Virginia 14 turnovers, a piece Sanchez pointed to as turning the game. The turnovers on the day for the Cavaliers felt even sloppier at times though with players missing simple passes or forcing passes into a crowded defense.

"We didn't take care of the ball, some of the turnovers that we had were simple hand-to-hand passes," Sanchez said. "So it wasn't pressure, it was not passing the ball at the right time, not cutting, letting the moment get too big and just not being sure-handed."

Andrew Rohde and McKneely combined to make 7 of the 14 turnovers with most of the ball-handling duties falling on the two juniors without Ames available.

Youthful Mistakes

In what was turning into a good performance for freshman Jacob Cofie will likely be remembered by one bad sequence down the stretch. Trailing by six with 3:30 to go, Cofie missed a wide open dunk at the rim and then got back on defense only to pick up a foul. The freshman big was not alone on the day with several Cavaliers making simple mistakes in key moments, which lead to their fourth double-digit loss of the season.

"The key factor today was our youth really showed in the tight moments," Sanchez said. "We had multiple turnovers, a missed dunk, things of that nature that were not forced, that were just simple hand-to-hand passes that we didn’t execute well enough."

Virginia is one of the youngest teams in the ACC this season as the only program without multiple seniors in the lineup, Taine Murray being the only one. Outside of Murray and McKneely, no other player has been in the program for more than two seasons.

The lack of experience is most clear in the second half of their four losses. Outside of the loss to St. John's, Virginia has been in close games at halftime in each loss, but were outscored 164-107 in the second half of those four games.

"I think we had chances to win it, we were up seven late in the game," McKneely said. "We've got to find a way to close that game out."

Virginia will only play three games over the next three weeks due to final exams and holiday breaks. Sanchez says during that time UVA will hold a "mini-camp" focused on execution and limiting the turnovers which have plagued the Cavaliers through nine games.

"Going to continue to work on the things that eliminate losing for us, that’s going to be the main focus for the next couple weeks," Sanchez said.

The Cavaliers are 5-4, the program's worst start to a season since starting 5-4 under Tony Bennett in his first season in Charlottesville. Despite starting at 0-1 start in ACC play, McKneely is hopeful the Hoos will still find their stride come February and March.

"Obviously the loss sucks, but I think we’ve taken a step in the right direction in each of these last couple games," McKneely said. "It’s early in the season, we’ve still got a long road ahead, 19 ACC games left so we’ve got to keep our heads up."

Final Stats | Discuss it on the message board