I’m hearing today from UVA Basketball fans who, being UVA Basketball fans, are prone to looking the gift horse in the mouth, and thus, naturally – again, they’re UVA Basketball fans – think the sky is falling.
Hey, your team just rallied from 19 down, first time they’ve done that and won in 20 years, got a dub in a game that will pay dividends going forward.
But, yeah, sure, Notre Dame was supposed to be easy.
Whatever that means.
“Can’t say enough positive things about Notre Dame, Coach Shrewsberry, the players on his team, and the fight that they gave us today. Certainly, they played an awesome game,” Virginia coach Ryan Odom said after the 100-97 double-OT win Tuesday night in South Bend.
ICYMI
- UVA Basketball: ‘Hoos rally from 19 down, win at Notre Dame in two OTs
- ‘Hoos 100, Notre Dame 97: Odom, Virginia learn how to win by going small
At last check: Notre Dame pays Micah Shrewsberry a lot of money to coach his team, and gives him a decent amount of money to build a roster.
Maybe not as much as Virginia gives Odom, but still, they’re not Glass Joe.
There’s a certain value to a blowout win, but really, you learn more about yourself when you face adversity, and being down 19 in the first half, with the guys on the other side making everything they throw at the rim, that’s adversity.
One thing Odom learned about his guys last night: they’re unflappable.
“Get down 19 in the first half, and we were reeling a little bit, and that’s probably an understatement, of course, but in the timeouts, our guys came in, and they were, you know, communicating with one another in a positive way. Certainly, we did not intend to get down as much as we were down, but we were in that moment, and Notre Dame was putting a ton of pressure on us, and our guys had to answer, and fortunately, it began to turn a little bit,” Odom said.
Which is to say, the guys could have folded the tent, started thinking about the next one.
Seriously, it’s January, it’s not do-or-die, the games that matter are the ones in March.
Not what they did.
Alright, so, Odom learned his team, when cornered, will come out swinging.
He also learned something about himself – namely, how to win a game when the other coach is the one dictating the x’s and o’s.
“We had to play some lineups, really, for the majority of the game that we haven’t played all year,” said Odom, acknowledging that Shrewsberry had a great game plan to counter what Odom’s Virginia team can do to an opponent.
To mitigate the full-court man press, for instance, Shrewsberry had his bigs, Brady Koehler and Carson Towt, bring the ball up the court, sending his guards ahead into the frontcourt, saving their legs.
Next wrinkle: he kept the bigs out above the three-point line in five-out sets, to draw Virginia’s seven-footers, Johann Grunloh and Ugonna Onyenso, away from the basket, allowing for dribble-drives one-on-one to get shots in the paint and kickouts to the perimeter.
Shrewsberry also took advantage of Odom’s principle to have his guys switch on screens to get Grunloh, Onyenso and power forward Thijs de Ridder switched onto Notre Dame’s shooters, which you saw their guys take advantage of.
“When they get in a switching situation, and it’s a big guy out there, they’re just in unfamiliar territory. That’s the only way to describe it. You know, big guys aren’t used to guarding all the way out there, and they really tested us,” said Odom, who, eventually, made the adjustment, to just get Grunloh and Onyenso off the floor, going with de Ridder and Devin Tillis, a 6’7” forward, in a small-ball, for Odom, lineup, for key minutes in the second half and the two OTs.
“We had to play the smaller lineups, which we hadn’t played, so that we could switch a little bit more and try to keep bodies in front of them and pressure a little bit better,” said Odom, and it worked – Tillis had good counting numbers, 12 points and five boards in 30 minutes, but more important was his plus/minus of +10.
Tillis is only averaging 18.4 minutes per game, but you can now see better why he’s an important piece, in games involving opponents who can challenge you with small-ball lineups.
For a team with big aspirations in March, they’re going to need to be able to make that adjustment at least once, if they’re going to make a deep run.
It’s better to be able to stress-test that in January than in a win-or-go-home game in March.
All that said, as much as I’m trying to get across, it’s OK, really, it is, I’m sure I didn’t talk the Chicken Littles off the ledge with this.
Because Notre Dame was supposed to be easy.
Again, whatever that means.
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Chris Graham
