Dear Old U.Va.

The Best Defense is a Good Offense

Thursday, February 19 2009 by Ben

Let's be honest about last night's win: it was a great game against a strapped team.

I need to get the caveat out of the way first.  There's no way Virginia wins by 14 if Jeff Allen is playing.  His size in the post would have neutralized the roaming of both Assane Sene and Tunji Soroye.  Nevertheless, I think even if Allen played, Virginia wins this game.

The offense scored at 115 points per 100 possessions clip; their best mark in ACC play.  There's no way a (generously listed) 6'6" Jeff Allen breaks that up.  Boku!

It appeared to me that Virginia either: (1) ran a different offense; (2) are finally running the offense that Dave Leitao put in correctly; (3) some combination of (1) and (2).

I'm leaning towards the latter of those three options.  I can't remember any backdoor cuts before the last two wins.  They've also seemed to remove the useless dribble-drive three man weave they ran earlier in the season (I dubbed them "The Drives to Nowhere").  Maybe that wasn't part of the offense and Virginia ran it poorly?  I can't tell.

Undoubtedly, you've noticed that the three-point percentage has improved.  That's primarily a function of not having to chuck a fade away three with seconds left on the shot clock.  Virginia's getting open looks at threes and they're falling.  I thought both Jamil Tucker and Jeff Jones, two guys who haven't always had the best shot selection, looked especially sharp last night.

Not to go all John Madden on you,  it appears that the team is actually having fun out there.  Really, you'd have no idea that they're the only ACC team with single digit-wins.

Virginia's ability to score has given them new life on the defensive end (to bury the lead).  In this respect, Assane Sene deserves a lot of credit for the turnaround.  I've said this before, he brings a ton of contagious energy to the court.  The rest of the team feeds off of him. 

Tech's lack of an interior scorer to muscle up to Sene allowed the rest of the team to blanket Malcolm Delaney and AD Vassallo (11-31, combined, from the field).  They could rush out to shooters knowing that Sene (and Soroye when he was in) would be there to erase close shots. 

We need a good nickname for Sene.  I was thinking Assane-Chop? Sene-it-away?  Thoughts?

The box score betrays the impact Sylven Landesberg had - 6-17 from the field, meh - but he drew all kinds of fouls and had some great passes.

Either way, I'm looking forward to some Good Ol' song on the TSL website.