Zoll-less Cavaliers have high hopes

In the blink of an eye, Debbie Ryan watched as 10 players raced from one end of the practice court to the other and back.

The women’s basketball coach at Virginia had every reason to smile at the easy ability in which her athletic unit clicked in up-tempo fashion. Yet she elected to bark out some finer details that were lacking.

“It is go time,” said Virginia forward Lyndra Littles. “She has to be hard on us. We have to get things off on the right foot right now.”

Virginia, which officially opened practice on Friday, opens its season in less than four weeks on Nov. 14 at home against High Point.

The Cavaliers have a newfound level of hype surrounding the start — the Cavaliers are ranked as high as No. 13 nationally by one at least one publication and should factor in the race to win the ACC title.

“It matters very, very little because when you lose a player a like [former point guard] Sharnee Zoll you are losing a lot of court intelligence,” said Ryan, who noted that her team was rather healthy at this point. “We have to find where that [intelligence] is coming from.

“Now it is coming from different players.”

In one portion of Virginia’s practice Saturday, which was open to the media, Ryan elected to use a starting lineup that included Paulisha Kellum and Britnee Millner together on the court with center Aisha Mohammed, small forward Monica Wright and Littles.

Freshman Arianna Moorer joins Kellum and Millner in a three-way battle to become the heir apparent to Zoll, the ACC’s all-time assist leader.

“The point guard position is one that kids are learning to play,” Ryan added. “It’s just a matter of them being able to handle the leadership part of it because it is a huge part of the game and when Monica is not on the court, that’s the part that we have to see who is going to be able to pick that up from the guard position.”

Moorer appeared explosive at times in the practice and was not shy to drive the basketball into the post against taller, more intimidating targets such as Mohammed.

“Arianna is going to hear her name a lot in practice and she doesn’t like to hear it,” Ryan said, “but that is just the way that it is going to be, because she has to learn that this is different from high school and you have to grow up pretty quick.”