Cavs go cold against Noles

Three ghastly efforts in Puerto Rico during the 2006-07 season. A wretched loss at home to Bradley in the CBI last season. A putrid performance against Liberty this season.

Well, they can all take a back seat now — there is a new low point in Virginia basketball during the Dave Leitao era.

It occurred on Saturday afternoon at John Paul Jones Arena in a performance that would likely have Dr. James Naismith wondering why he bothered to hang those peach baskets.

Virginia put forth a stinker for the ages. Playing a team as young as them, the Cavaliers couldn’t do a thing right in dropping their fourth straight game to visiting Florida State, 73-62, in front of a frustrated crowd of 10,981.

“They systematically and methodically wore us down,” Leitao said. “They wore us down mentally and physically.”

Florida State (16-4, 3-2 ACC) was led by Toney Douglas, who had 21 points and five assists. Sylven Landesberg had a game-high 24 points to lead Virginia, but most of them came after the game had already been decided in the first 20 minutes.

Think Virginia’s first-half performance against Maryland on Tuesday night was bad? How about this — UVa scored just one basket in the first 18 minutes and 26 seconds of the game versus FSU. For the majority of the half, Virginia had more turnovers than points.

The only thing that kept Leitao’s crew from getting completely blown out of its $130 million arena was the Seminoles’ 13 first-half turnovers.

Virginia’s first-half stats were almost too atrocious to believe: 3 of 22 from the field, (including 0 of 8 from 3-point range), 12 turnovers and one assist.

Florida State, which came into the game as the second-ranked defensive team in the ACC, was in the face of the Virginia players from the opening whistle. The tenacity that Seminoles players exhibited was reminiscent of those Hoya Paranoia teams of Georgetown in the 1980s.

The phrase “deer in the headlights” would be too kind of an assessment for how Virginia players looked on the court.

“They really, really guard you,” said Leitao, whose team is off until a visit to Duke next Sunday. “The few open looks that you get, you have to make…we obviously didn’t do that and paid a heavy price for it.”

Remarkably, Virginia only trailed 30-16 at the half after a Landesberg coast-to-coast driving layup at the buzzer. Landesberg said Leitao tried to fire everyone up during the intermission.

“He came in there and told us that this was a gut-check and we were going to man up now or never,” Landesberg said. “They were blowing us out and embarrassing us at home. We either had to turn the game around or it was going to get worse.”

Briefly, things got better. Virginia (7-9, 1-4) hit more shots in the first five minutes of the second half than it had all game.

When Jamil Tucker stole the ball from Douglas and raced in for a one-handed jam to cut the lead to 44-31, there was a glimmer of hope. But as soon as fans started to make some noise, Douglas swished a 3-pointer at the other end as he was being fouled by Sammy Zeglinski, setting up a four-point play.

“That was a point in time where the crowd got back in the game and the door was slightly opened back up — and then closed real quick,” Leitao said. “Anytime you put yourself in a hole like that, you’ve got to play damn near perfect basketball.”

For the umpteenth time this season, Virginia — which is starting three freshmen — was far from that.

“We’re all disappointed with the way we played,” said sophomore Mike Scott. “There’s just a lot of disappointment going around.

“Today we just couldn’t get into any kind of rhythm…it wasn’t a physical thing, because we definitely match up with them.”

Leitao believes FSU is a lot better than people think.

“I look at them as a very good team and not getting quite the amount of attention or respect as everyone else on top of the league — the [North] Carolinas and Dukes and Clemsons of the world and Wake Forest,” said Leitao, who will see FSU again on Feb. 10. “There really isn’t that much difference, … We were playing a very good team.”

“They were excellent on defense,” added Scott. “They were just playing harder than we were.”

Dunks

At halftime, Jason Bauman, Virginia’s associate director of athletics for facilities and operations, received the ACC Men’s Basketball Officials’ Association’s Skip Prosser Distinguished Service Award. The association presents the award annually to someone who has helped the cause of officiating in the ACC.