Cavs’ small ball pays off big time

Who needs 7-footers, set plays, or any kind of real half-court offense?
On Sunday afternoon at John Paul Jones Arena, the Virginia men’s basketball team sure didn’t.
UVa, playing a brand of small ball that would have made New York Knicks coach Mike D’Antoni proud, put on a free-wheeling,
offensive show that had the JPJ crowd begging for more.
Virginia, behind a school freshman record 28 points from Sylven Landesberg and a career-high 26 points and 18 rebounds from sophomore Mike Scott, held off pesky VMI in front of 9,955 fans to win its 11th straight season opener.
“We have a long way to go obviously, but I’ll take a win against this team any day,” said Virginia coach Dave Leitao.
Due to VMI’s up-tempo style, Leitao elected to start with a small lineup after watching the Keydets’ upset victory over Kentucky on Friday night. Landesberg started in place of 6-foot-11 inch Tunji Soroye, who didn’t see any action. Joining the 6-foot-6 McDonald’s All-American were
6-foot-2 Calvin Baker, 6-foot-4 Mustapha Farrakhan, 6-foot-5 Mamadi Diane and the 6-foot-8 Scott (who played center).
“I thought that if we went with a small lineup — more ball-handlers —that would be good,” Leitao said.
Landesberg certainly took advantage of the opportunity, breaking former Cavalier Jeff Lamp’s record for most points in a debut. He also dished out eight assists, grabbed eight rebounds and had three steals.
In addition, Landesberg showed tremendous poise for a first-year player, committing just three turnovers in his 36 minutes.
“When you flirt with a triple double right out of the box, that tells you something,” Leitao said.
Scott was just as impressive. The Chesapeake native was unstoppable on the offensive glass, where he collected 10 of his 18 boards. Scott’s first five baskets of the game were all on offensive put-backs.
“He was a beast,” said VMI coach Duggar Baucom. “We had no answer for him. If he can do that in the ACC, they’re going to be tough.”
Virginia (1-0) got great production off its bench. Led by Jamil Tucker and Sammy Zeglinski, UVa outscored VMI’s reserves 32-14.
Virginia built a 17-point lead in the first half, but led just 51-45 at the break after VMI closed the half on a
19-8 run.
In the second half, the Keydets kept within striking distance before eventually tying the game on a Keith Gabriel lay-up with just over 8 minutes to play.
Shortly after, Chavis Holmes (game-high 31 points) had a chance to put VMI up, but split a pair of free throws to make it 82-all.
From there, UVa went on a 12-5 run that was sparked by two 3-pointers from sophomore Jeff Jones.
Leading by five with just over 2 minutes to play, Zeglinski put VMI away when he beat full-court pressure with a nifty pass to Scott whose 3-point play gave the Cavaliers a relatively safe lead of eight.
“They handled our pressure very well,” Baucom said. “Zeglinski had a great game from the point-guard position…he was just dicing us up.”
While Leitao was happy with the end result, he certainly sounded like a guy who wasn’t very eager to play “small ball” again anytime soon.
“They play you against yourself,” he said, “so it was a difficult preparation for us in trying to go against what we do every day, so I’m just glad and fortunate that we won.”
Dunks
Virginia played without freshman big man Assane Sene. The school held him out of the game, pending the resolution of his eligibility status. “Because of a recent NCAA interpretation, there are some aspects of Assane’s pre-college enrollment that must be reviewed further,” said Virginia athletic director Craig Littlepage in a press release. “We’re looking forward to having this resolved quickly.”…UVa picked a good time to play well. In attendance was prep phenom Renardo Sidney, whom many experts feel is the No. 1 high school recruit in the nation. “I got to hang out with him a couple hours [on Saturday],” said Mike Scott. “Hopefully he enjoyed what he saw today.” Scott says he has definitely envisioned playing alongside Sidney in what would be a fearsome frontcourt. “I saw a couple of his clips online and I’ve definitely heard about him. Us two together would be [good].”