For many seasons, the Virginia basketball team could count on the John Paul Jones Arena to be a salve for any struggles.
The Hoos, after all, entered this season with 10+ home wins for 15 straight seasons and an 81.2% win percentage over 19 seasons at the JPJ. UVA went 15-2 in the building a year ago and had gone 38-6 in the last 44 games there. The fortress doesn't have the same antidotal power this season, though.
So while Notre Dame had yet to win at the JPJ when it came to town for Saturday's contest, it rolled out with a lopsided 74-59 victory. The Irish led by double digits at halftime, the fifth time the Hoos trailed by 10 or more points at intermission this season, and by as many as 27 points along the way. Virginia fell to 9-11 overall and 2-7 with the loss as it failed to build on Tuesday night's 74-56 win against Boston College.
It marked the second time in the last four home games that the Cavaliers lost by 15+ points. Given that the Hoos rarely lost at home in general in recent seasons, you have to dig back a ways to find the last two losses of 15+ points at the JPJ. In fact, the last two were 10 years apart as those defeats came in December 2021 against Clemson (50-67) and February 2011 against Boston College (44-63). Fans, in other words, could count on Virginia to fight at home even in losses.
That's one reason why Saturday's setback stood out so starkly for a lack of fire and tenacity. The Hoos didn't seem to have the urgency or battle spirit needed. So whether it was visible frustration flowing from the bench or fans streaming for the exits early, that part didn't seem to sit well for anyone.
"As disappointing as this is, I tell you as the head coach of the program right now, I know that our fans want to win and there's not a single fan out there that wants to win more than I do," Virginia interim coach Ron Sanchez said. "I'm extremely disappointed in the way that the team came out and that is on me as their head coach, that I did not get them rallied up and ready to compete with their hair on fire like we needed to today. So I've got to do a much better job of that."
Here are three takeaways from another disappointing home loss for the Cavaliers.
Virginia Struggles To Score ... Again
For the seventh time this season, Virginia fell short of 60 total points with only a middling win against Bethune-Cookman among those games. This time, that low output came against a Notre Dame team outside the 200 in defensive efficiency (1.042 points per possession allowed) and outside the top 100 in points per game allowed (71.2).
The Hoos just struggled to put the ball in the basket with any consistency. They shot 40.4% overall (23-57) and produced only 5 free throw attempts (3-5, 60.0%). The only thing to prevent it from looking any worse was a 10-23 shooting night from 3-point range (43.5%) as UVA made at least 6 triples for the 18th time this season.
Individually, it shook out with two players in double figures. Jacob Cofie led the way with 17 points, while Isaac McKneely added 14. Cofie shot 7-13, while McKneely went 5-11. Elijah Saunders made 4 of 11 attempts for 9 points, while Dai Dai Ames made 3 of 5 for 8 points. For McKneely, most of that production came early as he tallied the team's first 9 points on a trio of 3's and he scored all 14 points in the first half. For Cofie, Saunders, and Ames, a chunk came late with the game well in hand as they combined for 20 points in the final 8:02 after Notre Dame led 63-36.
Andrew Rohde (1-8), Taine Murray (1-3), Anthony Robinson (1-2), and Blake Buchanan (1-3) each made a single basket.
The Irish on the other hand went 48.2% shooting overall (27-56) and 52.2% from 3-point range (12-23) as UVA's defense just melted for most of the evening.
"I think when you don't shoot the ball well, it impacts your defense, especially when you're not as experienced as you need to be," Sanchez said. "Offense definitely impacts your defense. When the ball goes in, everything seems to flow a little easier."
Jacob Cofie Posts Points
Even though some of the scoring came late for Virginia true freshman Jacob Cofie, it was still his best production in orange and blue. His career-high 17 points put him in double figures for the eighth time this season, but for just the third time in 10 games. Cofie also made a 3-pointer for the just the second time in the seven games since the calendar flipped to 2025.
Cofie said he's been trying to get in extra work lately on his shooting.
"I've just been training a lot more and just trying to get in the gym as much as I can and work on my shot," Cofie said. "I feel like when your body is sore all the time, it's hard to get in the gym and just keep working on my shot. I feel like in the summer I put in so much effort in and at the beginning of the season it felt really well. Just over time, I stopped working on it as much and now that I'm working on it that much again, I feel like it came back."
UVA seemed to make a concentrated effort to get him more involved in the second half. Cofie took only 4 shots in the first half, but doubled that to 9 in the second half. He made 1 of 4 before intermission and 6 of 9 afterward. His second half work started with a couple of mid-range jumpers and he made that aforementioned 3-pointer with 5:41 remaining in the game. He finished the game with a dunk.
Sanchez said there was some focus on attacking a little differently in the second half.
"We wanted to play through the high post. They were switching a lot of the ball screens and they were trapping the post so we had to find a different way to get interior touches," Sanchez said. "The back to the basket probably wasn't going to be the best so we decided to attack it a different way."
As for fans wondering why Cofie passes up open shots at times when he gets the ball uncovered on the perimeter within the Hoos' offense and motion plans, Sanchez provided a little context there too.
"We just don't want to shoot the ball on the first side, we want to make sure we make teams defend some," Sanchez said. "Jacob's 3-point shot is going to be there whether it's the first 10 seconds or the next 15 seconds. What we want to do is make teams work a lot harder on defense."
Markus Burton Latest To Bust The Hoos
If Notre Dame's shooting numbers don't give a hint to how the Virginia defense continues to have some issues, the line for Markus Burton will. Notre Dame's point guard poured in 21 points on 7-14 shooting overall and 4-6 shooting from 3-point range. He also made 3 of 4 free throws and dished out 3 assists.
In other words, Burton busted the UVA defense regularly. That included scoring his team's first 9 points.
"I think his shot's really good and he's a fast guard," Cofie said. "When he gets in the paint, he's got the shot fake and plays off two and knows how to draw the fouls. I thought he was a really good player and did a good job doing that. I think he did a good job last year as well on a top defender of ours so I knew it was going to be a hard one."
"He's an all-conference performer preseason for a reason," Sanchez said. "He's averaging 20 points a game. That's consistency. He's good. He's really talented. He can shoot it from the 3, he can get to the mid-range, he can get to the free throw line as well so he was a major focus today and we didn't the job we needed to on him. So credit to him for his ability to still perform at that level even though he's the focus of the scouting report."
Not doing the job defensively has been a trend this season.
Burton is just the latest to join the 20-point club this season with his 21 points. He's the seventh member. Tennessee's Chaz Lanier (26), Florida's Walter Clayton Jr. (27), SMU's Kario Oquendo (21), Memphis' PJ Haggerty (27), California's Andrej Stojakovic (23), and Stanford's Maxime Raynaud (24) all hit that mark as well.
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