Pull this one out of the oven, baby. It's done.
Dead in the water. Wrapped up. Destroyed. Finito.
Flashback to late November. The Cavaliers' men's team was ranked No. 11 in the nation. And talk about high hopes!
"If we can beat Michigan State early and if Duke's having a down year..."
"And if we can play the same way at home as we did last season..."
"And if the four freshman can contribute right away..."
"And if Roger Mason Jr. can make a smooth transition to point guard..."
"Hey, we'll be the No. 1 team in the conference in no time!"
"Oh yeah. Third at the worst. We've got a good team here."
That was November. Yesterday, both Top 25 polls were released for men's college basketball, and Virginia didn't make the cut in either one.
So much for being a good team - you can lay those hopes to rest.
The Cavaliers missed four consecutive free throws Sunday in the closing minute. Good teams don't do that.
The Cavaliers allowed Georgia Tech - the worst shooting team in the conference - to make 55 percent of its shots. Good teams don't do that either.
|
Good teams can put away games they lead in the final minute. They win by playing the game at their own pace, not the opponent's. They can win when they force turnovers - as the Cavaliers do - and even if they don't - as the Cavaliers do not.
Let's face it: This is not a good basketball team. Not now. And it's not going to become one overnight.
But, you know what? You don't have to be a good team to make the NCAA tournament. Sometimes, you just have to play one great weekend.
One last gasp
There are two ways Virginia can guarantee itself a berth in the NCAA tournament, which begins two weeks from Thursday. One way is that the Cavaliers win their last two regular season games against No. 3 Duke and No. 2 Maryland.
Don't count on it. Virginia will play Maryland in Cole Field House's final game ever. The Terrapins and their sold-out crowd - some of whom have bought tickets for over $500 on ebay - will be more excited than Queen Elizabeth at her coronation.
The second way the Cavaliers can make the NCAAs is by winning the ACC tournament.
It just takes one great weekend. That's not likely, but it is possible. And it's happened before. If the Cavaliers, who certainly will stumble into the conference tournament, need inspiration, all they need to do is look back to 1993.
Only once in the past 12 years has a team that finished lower than third in the ACC regular season won the conference tournament.
That team, the 1992-93 Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets, started off the season ranked in the Top 15 and - after two big early-season victories - catapulted into the top 10. Sound familiar?
Then the Jackets started to slump. They lost two straight games to unranked teams and - after a short-win streak - they dropped four out of five games to conference opponents. The Yellow Jackets started 9-2. By the end of February, they were 15-9.
This is getting eerie.
The Yellow Jackets finished the regular season sixth in the ACC (Virginia currently is fifth) and were resigned to head to the NIT. But then the stars started to align. In Charlotte, Georgia Tech got its act together, first by pulling out a three-point win over nationally ranked Duke in the quarterfinals. Then they had an easy time beating seventh-seeded Clemson, which luck arranged to upset second-seeded Florida State.
In the final -- against the number one seed, North Carolina -- Georgia Tech's James Forrest played the game of his life: 27 points and 10 rebounds against the nation's No. 1 team.
The Yellow Jackets won by two and went on to a fourth seed in the NCAA tournament.
All thanks to one great weekend.
(Sam Le's column appears Tuesday in The Cavalier Daily. He can reached at sle@cavalierdaily.com.)
Read More
Virginia adds six promising players in second week of the transfer period
By Peter Kriebel | 2 days agoVirginia has reinforced several positions throughout its roster, and more additions may be on the way.
Reflecting on a year of incredible achievement by women’s sports at Virginia
By Eleanor Buchanan , Caroline Wulff and Cierra Lyles | 3 days agoThree Cavalier Daily staff writers share their thoughts on 2024 highlights.
Late run pushes men’s basketball past American
By Thomas Baxter | 4 days agoVirginia squeezed out a win to end non-conference play.
