The best thing I saw today out of UVA Basketball was Ryan Odom standing up for his team.
If you’re a lip-reader, you might be wondering how Odom didn’t get tossed for what he said as he argued an obvious bad call on Ugonna Onyenso at the 16:41 mark in the second half.
At the time, Virginia was up 44-31, but State was on an 11-2 run after being down as much as 22.
The home crowd at whatever they’re calling the arena in Raleigh now – I’m seeing Lenovo Center – was trying to will the Pack back into it.
The issue with the call: Onyenso had pretty obviously cleanly blocked a dunk attempt by Ven-Allen Lubin, and the ball was already advancing up the court when the whistle blew.
The discrepancy in fouls that was the main culprit in the triple-OT loss at Virginia Tech was rearing its head again – the call on Onyenso was the fifth in the first 3:19 of the second half against Virginia; State, at that point, had been whistled for one.
State ended up going 17-of-18 at the line in the second half; Virginia was 5-of-7.
I prodded Odom, in a video that I posted online after the loss at Tech, to do more to stand up for his guys, to not let the zebras bully his team.
The lip-readers saw him say words that rhyme with Duck, Hugh; and, in the interest of cutting Odom some slack, maybe that’s what it was he actually said.
Maybe what happened was, off in the distance, he saw that Hugh Freeze, the former Liberty and Auburn coach, was about to get hit in the head by an errant boomerang, and Odom was like, you know, duck!
Probably not.
State made the four free throws to cut the lead to nine, and a Paul McNeil three would get the Pack as close as eight.
But Odom’s kids responded to him telling off the refs, outscoring State 30-12 over the next 10:08 to blow the game back open, on the way to a 76-61 win that wasn’t nearly that close.
Player notes
- Sam Lewis had 23 points, 20 in the first half – and he was 7-of-8 from the floor, and 4-of-5 from three, in the first 20 minutes, as Virginia led, 40-20, going into the locker room.
- Thijs de Ridder had 14 points (4-of-6 FG, 1-of-2 3FG, 5-of-7 FT), 12 of his points in the second half.
- Malik Thomas had 13 points (5-of-15 FG, 3-of-8 3FG), 11 in the first half, and a team-high seven rebounds.
- Devin Tillis had 10 points (4-of-4 FG, 2-of-2 3FG), seven in the second half.
- The two point guards, Dallin Hall and Chance Mallory, each had nice floor games: Hall finished with five points, six rebounds and four assists (one turnover) in 33 minutes; Mallory had seven points, two rebounds and four assists (one turnover) in 26 minutes.
- Elijah Gertrude, the third point guard, got four minutes, as Odom went more with two point guards to fill the minutes void left by the injury to Jacari White, who is a third option at shooting guard.
- The seven-footers didn’t do much: Johann Grunloh had two points (1-of-2 FG), four rebounds and two blocked shots in 23 minutes; Ugonna Onyenso had two points (2-of-2 FT), five rebounds and one blocked shot in 17 minutes.
Odom Ball
- Threes: Virginia 13-of-33, State 5-of-20. Huge 24-point advantage here for the ‘Hoos.
- Offensive rebounds: Virginia had nine ORs, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but the OR rate wasn’t awful (34.6 percent), and the ‘Hoos had a 13-8 advantage in second-chance points.
- Points in the paint: State had a 24-22 advantage here.
- Forced turnovers: Virginia had 14 TOs, State had 10, so, Virginia was -4, and State had a 17-9 advantage in points off turnovers.
- Effective field goal attempts: State had 50 shots from the field and 25 free-throw attempts, Virginia had 52 shots from the field and 15 field-goal attempts, so, Virginia was -3 in EFGA.
Shooting zones
- Paint: UVA 11-of-17, State 12-of-27
- Three: UVA 13-of-33, State 5-of-20
- Midrange: UVA 2-of-2, State 1-of-3
- Free throws: UVA 11-of-15, State 20-of-25
Analysis
It’s obvious – hot shooting from three fueled this one.
State basically held its own on the defensive boards, had the advantage in transition, got its share of points in the paint and got to the line.
Resume builder
- This is the second true road win for Virginia, and second Quad 1 win (UVA is 2-2 in Quad 1 games: Ws at Texas and NC State, Ls to Butler and at Virginia Tech).
- The win moves UVA to 20 in KenPom and 21 in BartTorvik.
Video: ‘Hoos get back on track
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Chris Graham
