Colonial Hall never really sat down Sunday afternoon. A loud and restless crowd — part Virginia orange, part Butler blue — hummed through every whistle, every collision and every contested rebound as the Cavaliers (5-1, 0-0 ACC) fell 80-73 to the Bulldogs (5-1, 0-0 Big East) in their second and final game of the Greenbrier Tip-Off in White Sulphur Springs, W. Va.
Just two days after grinding out a bruising win over Northwestern, Virginia (5-1, 0-0 ACC) endured another whistle-heavy contest, where Butler’s physical defense and timely offense stymied the Cavaliers. The loss marked the most points Virginia has allowed all season.
After winning the tip, Butler jumped to a 9-2 start and never looked back. The Cavaliers’ first and only lead of the game came 16 minutes in, when graduate guard Malik Thomas hit a short jumper to make it 49-48. That advantage evaporated 23 seconds later when Butler junior guard Finley Bizjack buried a floater in the lane to retake the lead. From that point on, the Bulldogs never trailed.
“They brought the fight to us with their screens, with their physicality and just their aggression, and it shocked us for the first four or five minutes of the game,” Thomas said. “We kind of dug ourselves a hole, and we had to fight back.”
Crucially, Virginia only converted seven of 15 free throws, a sharp contrast to its efficient late-game free throw shooting that buried Northwestern. Those squandered points loomed as Butler went 20-29 from the line.
Thomas, who entered the weekend as one of Virginia’s most reliable free throw shooters, went an uncharacteristic 3-6 at the charity stripe. Several of those misses came in the final minutes, as the Cavaliers clawed at a two- and three-possession deficit.
Defensively, Virginia, which had largely muted Northwestern’s Nick Martinelli and Arrinten Page, struggled Sunday with a familiar problem. In Virginia’s opener, it was Rider’s No. 11 Flash Burton, and against NC Central it was No. 11 Gage Lattimore. Bizjack became the third No. 11 guard to give Odom’s defense headaches, repeatedly quieting Cavalier runs with jumpers and tough drives for a game-high 25 points.
The other two members of Butler’s most effective trio were graduate forward Michael Ajayi and sophomore guard Jamie Kaiser Jr. Ajayi bullied his way to 17 points and 14 rebounds, while Kaiser added 10 boards and four steals.
“I think their aggressiveness at the beginning of the game shocked us a little bit,” Thomas said. “In a lot of ways, Ajayi was similar to [Martinelli] from Northwestern … I think the difference between today and Friday was we brought the fight to Northwestern, and we were playing a little on our heels against Butler.”
Odom pointed to breakdowns at the point of attack and in ball-screen coverage.
“We had some miscommunications out there on back screens,” Odom said. “When we did go over the screen, those two guards did a really nice job of what we call hostaging, and kind of holding our guys behind them and then putting us in a difficult position.”
Even amid those issues, Virginia’s rim protection kept it afloat. Seven-foot senior center Ugonna Onyenso blocked eight shots, the most by a Cavalier since Jay Huff’s 10-block masterpiece against Duke in 2020.
“[Ugonna] is a talented shot-blocker that provides a presence down there — even if he doesn’t block the shot, he alters it in a lot of ways,” Thomas said. “So he brought a different look for us today. That’s what he’s been doing his whole career.”
Onyenso’s performance was especially crucial with starting graduate guard Dallin Hall tethered to the bench. Hall picked up early fouls and finished scoreless with only 11 minutes of playing time, leaving Virginia without its primary organizer for long stretches and turning the offense over to freshman guard Chance Mallory.
Somehow, Virginia nearly wrestled back before halftime. Trailing 41-30 late in the first half, the Cavaliers ripped off a 12-3 run. Mallory knifed to the rim for a driving layup with 42 seconds left to tie the game at 42-42 — the first time Butler relinquished its lead since scoring 12 seconds into the afternoon, and capping a stretch of nearly four minutes without a Bulldog field goal.
Bizjack ended that drought, slipping behind the defense for a layup with 1.9 seconds remaining, and Virginia ran into the locker room trailing 44-42 despite ending the half on a scoring burst. Mallory, Thomas, White and freshman forward Thijs De Ridder each had eight points at the break, with Mallory dishing three assists.
The animosity in the ballroom was at least partially softened by one unlikely Bulldog contributor — Butler Blue IV, the team’s mascot, who cruised around the court at half in a remote-controlled children’s sports car while wearing a Christmas tree costume, eliciting smiles from an otherwise earnest crowd.
Every Virginia surge encountered a Bizjack-sized roadblock. When junior guard Sam Lewis hit a jumper to cut the deficit to 52-51, Bizjack immediately answered. When Onyenso found White on the wing for a three that trimmed the margin to 66-62, Bizjack slashed right back with a layup and two free throws.
“We struggled scoring in the second half,” Odom said. “Offensively, we’ve got to pass the ball better. There was too much dribbling throughout the weekend, and I think when we pass and we’re crisp and aggressive, we can be tough to guard.”
One of Virginia’s only offensive sparks came from graduate guard Jacari White. The grad transfer, who torched Butler for 27 points and six three-pointers last season at North Dakota State, again looked comfortable attacking the Bulldogs’ defense. He finished with 14 points on 5-7 shooting and 4-6 from three, standing out on a night when the Cavaliers shot just 40.8 percent overall.
As Virginia's frustration mounted, tempers flared midway through the second half. Odom was assessed a technical foul after furiously disputing a travel call on De Ridder. Graduate guard Yame Butler sank both free throws alone at the line, extending the lead to seven, and Virginia never got closer than four the rest of the way.
“My technical certainly hurt our team, which I’m sorry for, unacceptable for me to do that at that given time,” Odom said. “These guys know that and understand how important it is to keep your poise and your composure in a hard-fought game.”
The mood was subdued in the postgame press conference. As Odom opened his remarks, a dejected Thomas and White sat to his sides, gazes fixed downward.
“You have to give Butler a ton of credit,” Odom said. “Throughout the game they answered every challenge that our guys gave them.”
There were flashes of the free-flowing offense that powered Virginia’s five-game streak of 80-plus points to start the season — a program first — but Butler’s rebounding and the Cavaliers’ own late-game execution issues kept those short spurts from turning into a comeback.
Now, after the season’s first setback, Virginia heads back to John Paul Jones Arena where Queens awaits Friday before a high-profile ACC-SEC Challenge trip to Texas.
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