Please excuse the Virginia basketball squad if they don't outdo themselves in their next, and last, exhibition game. That would be akin to asking the good folks at Jell-o to make a better Pudding Snack.
Last Friday against Lehman Lightning, a Division III opponent, the Cavaliers won by a total of 92 points and dominated in every statistical category. Virginia, for example, made 50 shots, while Lehman only scored 29 points. The Cavaliers shot 61.4 percent from the field; the Lightning, 17.9 percent.
Virginia will look to build upon that type of convincing win as the team takes on another D-III squad -- the Marymount Saints -- tonight at 7:30 p.m. in University Hall.
Although some fans may see tonight's exhibition game as merely a glorified scrimmage, the Cavaliers are taking the Saints and the game seriously. Virginia needs these games in order to build team chemistry, sort out working lineups and keep the fundamentals of rebounding, passing and defense in mind before heading into its first regular season game against Robert Morris.
"I think we just need to come together as a team more and just work on feeding off of each other and help each other out on defense," senior tri-captain Devin Smith said. "I think we did a good job [against Lehman], but there's always room for improvement, so I think we need to work on our defense and rebounding a lot more."
Virginia coach Pete Gillen echoed Smith's comments about the Cavaliers needing to work on defense. Just as Gillen used multiple lineups on the court in last Friday's win, he also would like to see the Cavaliers experiment with several different defensive looks tonight.
"We've got to get ready for our regular season opener against Robert Morris and work on some different things -- working on defense, not just man-to-man, doing some different things," Gillen said.
Against Marymount tonight, look for Virginia to keep the pace of the game at top speed. The Cavaliers fared well against Lehman when getting the ball out in transition, using their superior athletic ability to score points off turnovers and defensive stops. Tonight, against a fairly more athletic Saints squad, the Cavaliers will look to capitalize again on their ability to push the ball into the open court.
"I think we can score if we get out running," Gillen said. "When we run, we're pretty good -- we can alley-oop, we can catch it, we can dunk it, we can shoot threes."
The kind of transition offense Gillen speaks of works well when playing athletically inferior teams, but once the regular season starts, the Cavaliers will need to be able to produce points with a more balanced effort.
While another 92-point win is not expected tonight, the Cavaliers still need to finish out the preseason in convincing fashion. This is still a relatively unknown Virginia squad, and the players need as much experience as they can get in order to gel before their tough regular season schedule begins.
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