Marching to the beat ...

Published January 22, 2003

Can somebody explain why so many people involved with the University of Virginia either as an employee or football customer regard the "Award-Winning Virginia Fighting Cavalier Indoor/Outdoor Precision Marching Pep Band and Chowder Society Revue, Unlimited!!!!" as a Communist plot?

Apparently, a lot of folks who in most other things cling to the Southern Ivy League facade cultivated at Mr. Jefferson's University want to turn over football halftime shows to some kind of horn-blowing army, as if Virginia was some kind of SEC or Big Ten place.

A Cavalier Daily editorial about the band reads: "With the University entrenched as one of the nation's best, it's about time we began to act like it."

Presumably the writer believes dispatching West Virginia in the Continental Tire Bowl in Charlotte, N.C., elevated Virginia in national stature, a criterion usually missing when U.S. News and World Report lists its top schools.

The "Award-Winning, etc." is a scramble band, which means that it doesn't bother marching in a straight line or learning a lot of stuff by John Philip Sousa. Scrambling is a concept oft-used in the Ivy League and by Stanford, which has honed its program to an art form that included a performance outside a courtroom in Los Angeles in which it once serenaded O.J. Simpson with "Runaway."

Stanford somehow manages to win football games and produce the occasional scholar, even with people laughing through halftime shows that entertain fans and make a point, rather than draw first-grade block letters with trombones.

The quest shouldn't be to get like Tennessee or Ohio State; it should be to better Harvard or Stanford.

Oh yeah, in the classroom, too.

23 turnovers costly for Cavs
By Dave Johnson
Daily Press
Published January 22, 2003

BLACKSBURG -- Virginia Tech coach Ricky Stokes was careful not to equate what had just happened to a moon landing or the discovery of penicillin. His players, who danced as if they had won the Big East championship, and the fans, who stormed Cassell Coliseum's floor for the first time in seven years, knew otherwise.

The Hokies, who lost at home to Wofford not all that long ago, started and finished strong in a 73-55 upset of Virginia on Tuesday night. Bryant Matthews scored a career-high 30 points and Carlos Dixon added 15 as the Cavaliers had no answer for Tech's lanky pair of wings, inside or outside.

How special was the Hokies' first win over its chief in-state rival since Dec. 28, 1995? Dixon's game jersey bled a rainbow of colors, compliments of the fans - and their body paint - who mobbed him.

"I've got all kinds of paint on me now," he said. "It feels great just seeing all the fan support tonight and just what we did on the court. This was a great victory. It was for bragging rights in the state."

Stokes, whose job might be on the line this season, said he particularly liked the way his team won. At the game's 6-minute mark, Tech led 54-52. Down the stretch is precisely where the Hokies (8-8) blew it two weeks ago against Villanova. But from that point on Tuesday night, Tech outscored the Cavaliers 19-3. Virginia made three of its final 17 shots from the field.

The key sequence: With Tech leading 56-52, Virginia's Majestic Mapp penetrated the lane and dished off beautifully to Elton Brown under the basket. Brown missed the chip shot, and on the other end Matthews followed to bump the lead to six.

It was over from there. Matthews had a couple of exclamation-point jams in the final minute as the crowd of 8,152, the largest at Cassell since this matchup two seasons ago, couldn't wait to spill over the rails.

Even without that four-point swing, the result probably would have been the same. The Cavaliers (10-6) committed 23 turnovers, their second-worst total of the season. Keith Jenifer and Todd Billet, Virginia's starting backcourt, turned the ball over six times each. And when the Cavs did hold on to the ball, they failed to get good looks. Travis Watson had 11 attempts from the field and none from the line. Billet, on a three-game shooting tear, was 2-of-10.

"Usually we take care of the ball well," said Virginia coach Pete Gillen, whose team entered the game averaging a league-low 15 turnovers a game. "You've got to take care of the ball, especially in a physical game like this."

Tech had 16 steals, a combined eight from Matthews and Dixon. On the offensive end, Tech repeatedly used Matthews and Dixon (both 6-feet-7) in the post. Virginia could only counter with Billet (6-feet), Jenifer or Jermaine Harper (both 6-3) before finally going zone. Nothing worked.

"Whenever we have a mismatch, we try to expose it," Matthews said. "Tonight, it was the guards."

Tech got five assists from center Dimari Thompkins and two from 290-pound behemoth Terry Taylor.

"Our post guys did a great job of passing the basketball," Stokes said. "Just a great job of executing."

Stokes, whose team has won two straight in this four-game homestand, knew everybody would expect him to call it the greatest moment of his turbulent tenure here. He didn't play along.

"Every win is important," he said. "We didn't put any more pressure on this game as opposed to any other game. You know, we wanted to win this game. We had played them close the last three years and naturally, we know what a great rivalry it is. It was a good win, a great win for the team and the school. Still, it's no more important than the Providence game or the next game we play."
 

Tech's Stokes gets a big win
By David Teel
Published January 22, 2003

BLACKSBURG -- Ricky Stokes ran his first marathon in November. His tenure as Virginia Tech's basketball coach has been equally grueling.

Tuesday night at Cassell Coliseum, the persistence that fueled Stokes' running quest showed in his team.

Clearly this is the most important victory of Stokes' four seasons in Blacksburg and one of the most dispiriting defeats of Pete Gillen's five years at Virginia.

Not convinced? You should have seen Stokes dance. You should have seen Virginia guard Keith Jenifer, alone, slumped against a wall outside the locker room.

Are the Cavaliers the best team the Hokies have conquered recently? Maybe not. Maybe it was Miami in 2001 or Michigan earlier this season. Maybe Virginia is incapable of winning on the road.

Doesn't matter. This is still Virginia, the state rival from the ACC and Stokes' alma mater, the program that has towered over Tech for the last 25 years.

So there was point guard Eric Branham, piggy-backing on forward Bryant Matthews as students stormed the court. There was Stokes, pumping both fists and tapping both feet. There was center Terry Taylor, towel-whipping and chest-bumping his coach.

"That's the most excited I've ever seen him," Taylor said.

Stokes, as usual, stubbornly refused to let down his public guard. All wins are important, he said as 6-year-old daughter Sydney, his dance teacher, sat nearby.

But all you had to do was observe the beaming faces of Stokes' wife, Karen, and his older brother, Bobby. They see first-hand the toll this job takes. They hear the rampant speculation about his job security.

The players hear, too.

"We get tired of hearing he's not a good coach," guard Carlos Dixon said. "We have to stay behind him, because we know he's going to be there for us."

Dixon and Matthews, both 6-foot-7 wings, created matchup problems for Virginia at both ends. They were too long, too athletic for the 6-3 Jenifer and 6-foot Todd Billet.

Matthews scored 30 points, a career-high, and added nine rebounds and five steals. Dixon contributed 15 points and three steals as the Hokies recorded their most lopsided victory in the series since 1986.

Still, Tech (8-8) is a .500 team, and a winning record come March would surprise most. Still, the Hokies are 42-60 under Stokes.

Who knows how seriously, if at all, Tech athletic director Weaver is contemplating a coaching change? To his credit, he keeps such matters private. But suffice to say, after early-season defeats against William and Mary and Wofford, Stokes needed a credible performance versus his alma mater.

The Hokies gave him much, much more.

The 10-6 Cavaliers? They gave Gillen 23 turnovers and a third consecutive road defeat that had the chatrooms teeming with disgruntled fans before the final buzzer.

Tuesday's contest marked the start of a win-or-else three-game stretch for Virginia. Win or risk falling hopelessly behind in the ACC race. Win or risk a second consecutive January/February meltdown that erases most, if not all, of the goodwill generated by quality victories in November and December.

Win or, please spare us, a third NIT bid in the last four seasons. Win or risk blaring criticism of the 10-year contract the university awarded Gillen two years ago.

The opponents in this stretch: Tech, Wake Forest and Florida State, the latter two conference home games. Wake and Florida State now loom even larger as Gillen and his players attempt to shake their collective funk.

Travis Watson, Elton Brown, Jenifer, the entire coaching staff: They all appear dazed. Gillen burns timeouts like a pyromaniac does matches, a sign of mistrust and/or panic that surely filters down. His players lose their composure at critical junctures.

But as Stokes quickly pointed out, we're still in January. Almost half of the marathon that is a season remains.

 

Va. Tech snaps six-game skid against U.Va.
By MARK BERMAN, LANDMARK NEWS SERVICE, The Virginian-Pilot
© January 22, 2003

BLACKSBURG — In a rare chance to play on national television in front of a big home crowd, the Virginia Tech men’s basketball team achieved an even rarer result: a win over archrival Virginia.
Bryant Matthews scored a career-high 30 points Tuesday night to help the Hokies win 73-55 in front of 8,152 cheering fans at Cassell Coliseum. Tech (8-8) snapped a six-game losing streak in the annual series.

Senior point guard Brian Chase jumped for joy when the buzzer sounded, then climbed onto the scorers’ table. Dimari Thompkins jumped onto the press-row table on the other side of the court as Tech students rushed onto the floor.

Eric Branham raised his forefinger in the air as the students lifted Carlos Dixon onto their shoulders.

“No win we’ve had has had a greater feeling than this one,” Chase said. “An in-state rivalry, we’re 2-12 against them the last 14 games (entering Tuesday). … I think back to when we took them to the wire and had them in overtime in Richmond (his freshman year). They came down here and put a pounding on us my sophomore year. We felt like we should’ve beat them last year.

“It means a whole lot to this organization, to this basketball team, to this university.”

U.Va. point guard Keith Jenifer, who had six of U.Va.’s 23 turnovers, sat glumly on the floor outside the visitors locker room, his head in his hands.

It was Tech’s first win over U.Va. (10-6) since the 1995-96 season. U.Va. had won 23 of the previous 28 meetings.

“I’m just so hyped right now,” Matthews said.

Dixon said it was an emotional victory for Tech coach Ricky Stokes, who had been 0-3 against his alma mater.

“It was a great win for us,” Stokes said.

Tech, playing in front of its biggest home crowd since a capacity crowd of 10,052 turned out for U.Va.’s last visit in November 2000, improved to 2-0 in its pivotal four-game homestand.

“We’ve started to turn the corner,” said center Terry Taylor, who had 10 points and 11 rebounds. “I’m just overwhelmed right now.”

Virginia lost for the third straight time and for the fourth time in its last five games, with all four losses coming on the road. U.Va. has dropped 11 of its last 12 road games.

“We had three killer games,” said U.Va. coach Pete Gillen, referring to losses at Duke, Clemson and Tech. “I’m disappointed losing three in a row, but the people we play, that can happen.”

Branham hit two free throws to give Tech the lead for good at 50-48 with 9:54 remaining. Branham scored after a steal by Matthews for a 52-48 advantage. U.Va.’s Elton Brown scored to cut the lead to 54-52 with 6:03 left.

Chase hit a jumper, Matthews scored on a tip-in, and Chase sank two free throws for a 60-52 cushion with 3:46 left. U.Va.’s Todd Billet ended the run by sinking a 3-pointer with 3:19 to go, but Tech scored the final 13 points.

“The ball seemed to be bouncing all over the place tonight. They took advantage of that,” said Billet, who had six turnovers.

Matthews had five of Tech’s season-high 16 steals.
 

Hokies shock Cavs
Matthews propels Tech to first win over rival in more than seven years
BY JEFF WHITE
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Jan 22, 2003

Bryant Matthews celebates a dunk in the closing moments of Virginia Tech's 73-55 rout of Virginia. Matthews finished with 30 points.
(AP)
BLACKSBURG - The final horn sounded, and wave after wave after wave of jubilant students stormed the court at Cassell Coliseum for a long-overdue celebration. The party started around 9:30 last night and may still be raging.

Virginia Tech vanquished rival Virginia in men's basketball for the first time in more than seven years, and it did so in stunning fashion. Tech scored the game's final 13 points and humbled the Cavaliers 73-55 before 8,152 fans and an ESPN2 audience.

The Hokies hadn't posted such a one-sided victory over U.Va. since Dec. 10, 1985, when they romped 84-66 in Roanoke.

"It's unexplainable," junior guard Carlos Dixon, who had 15 points for Tech, which outscored Virginia 25-7 in the final 10 minutes.

Unguardable would have been an apt description of Dixon's teammate Bryant Matthews last night. The 6-7 junior from Columbia, S.C., scored a career-high 30 points - 22 in the second half - to lead Tech (8-8). That's the most points by a Hokie since Troy Manns scored 30 against Xavier on March 2, 1997, at Cassell Coliseum.

He made three 3-pointers, but Matthews might have hurt the Cavaliers (10-6) more inside, where he repeatedly scored after posting up shorter defenders. Dixon burned U.Va. in the paint, too.

"Not many college teams have a 6-7 [shooting] guard," said Virginia shooting guard Todd Billet, a 6-0 junior.

A season ago, Tech blew a 19-point lead and had 27 turnovers in a 69-61 loss to U.Va. at University Hall. This time, the Cavaliers couldn't hold on to the ball.

"We knew they didn't like being pressed," said Matthews, who had five of Tech's season-high 16 steals to spark a swarming defense that forced 23 turnovers. Virginia's starting guards, 6-3 Keith Jenifer and Billet, struggled against the long arms and quick feet of Dixon and Matthews, turning over the ball six times apiece.

"You can't have 23 turnovers anywhere and win," Virginia coach Pete Gillen said.

The Cavaliers have lost three straight games, each defeat coming on the road. They'd won six straight over Tech and 12 of their past 14 meetings, but they crumbled down the stretch last night, scoring only three points in the final six minutes.

U.Va.'s last points came on a trey by Billet that made it 60-55 with 3:20 left. Matthews answered with a slam 12 seconds later, and he dunked twice more for good measure in the final minute.

Senior center Travis Watson, the only Cavalier to score in double figures, had 11 points and five rebounds before fouling out with 1:48 left. Tech senior Terry Taylor outplayed the more heralded Watson, scoring 10 points and grabbing 11 rebounds, four at the offensive end.

The victory was the Hokies' first over the Cavaliers since Dec. 28, 1995. It was also the first for Tech's fourth-year coach, Ricky Stokes, against his alma mater.

"I told him, 'Coach, this is for you. You got 'em,' " Taylor said. "We wanted to get this for him."

A tip-in by reserve center Nick Vander Laan gave U.Va. a 46-43 lead with 12:20 left, but the Hokies responded with an 11-4 run. They took the lead for good on reserve guard Eric Branham's two free throws with 9:54 left.

With 5 minutes remaining, though, Tech's lead was only four, and Virginia hadn't conceded. But the Cavs' comeback hopes absorbed a huge blow when 6-9 sophomore Elton Brown missed a point-blank shot after catching a deft pass from point guard Majestic Mapp, who sparkled in his six minutes off the bench. Tech quickly stretched its lead to eight following Brown's miss.

"That was a big play in the game," Gillen said. "I thought we had an opportunity in the second half, shots in the lane, and we didn't convert."

Tech led by 10 with 13:25 left in the first half, but Virginia ran off 11 straight points to take its first lead. The Cavaliers led 30-29 at the break.
 

After breakthrough, usually stolid Stokes lets excitement spill
BOB LIPPER
TIMES-DISPATCH COLUMNIST Jan 22, 2003
Contact Bob Lipper at (804) 649-6555 or e-mail blipper@timesdispatch.com

BLACKSBURG or Virginia Tech, it was the big thrill. For Virginia, it was the big chill.

For Ricky Stokes, it was sheer ecstacy to the nth degree.

We've seen Ricky Stoic ever since he was a kid at Highland Springs High. With 43.6 seconds to go last night and Cassell Coliseum about to vaporize into delirium, we saw Ricky Stoked. That's when Bryant Matthews threw down his first of two exclamation-point dunks to punctuate this 73-55 Hokies runaway.

And when Ricky Stokes went, well, nuts.

This is what Stokes did at that festive juncture. He bellowed like a rugby-scrum banshee. He punched the air with a series of Sugar Ray Leonard uppercuts. Then he whirled and performed a modest chest thump with Hokies center Terry Taylor, a slab of a young man who carries some 300 pounds on his 6-8 frame.

Stokes goes 5-10 and doesn't require counseling sessions with Richard Simmons.

He somehow survived the collision with Taylor.

Many more wins like last night, and he'll survive the Grim Reaper as well.

"That's the most excited I've ever seen him," Taylor said. "This game is for him. I'm glad we could get it for him."

Tech's students rushed the floor in the aftermath, but they couldn't sweep Stokes off his feet. Placid as can be during the postmortems, he praised the crowd - Tech's largest in two years - and his squad's effort. Yes, he agreed, it was a great win. But no, he insisted, it was no more important than last Saturday's conquest of Providence or the upcoming assignment against St. John's.

Right. Not to diminish making headway in the Big East, but this was U.Va. The state's (supposedly) elite basketball program. The place that routinely imports top-50-in-the-country schoolboys (Tech is waiting for its first such arrival since 1982). The school Stokes attended and helped spark to a pair of Final Fours. The opponent Tech rooters lust to one-up like no other.

Tech hadn't beaten these guys since 1995. Stokes was 0-3 against them and 41-60 all told for his three-plus seasons in Blacksburg. He's got one more year to go on his contract, and he hasn't been getting many warm embraces from AD Jim Weaver of late. So, yes, I'd say this maybe was a tad larger than Providence.

The Hokies won this matchup on the perimeter and at the foul line. They stretched U.Va.'s zone (I hesitate to use the word) defense and nailed 50 percent of their shots after the break (to the Cavs' 36.7). They took advantage of U.Va.'s step-slow coverage for a 17-1 bulge in free throws (the Cavs have been outscored 133-71 in that department in their six losses). They harried U.Va. into 23 turnovers - six apiece by backcourt starters Keith Jenifer and Todd Billet. Carlos Dixon - 6-7 and wiry - forced Billet into 2-for-10 shooting misery.

They reveled in this breakthrough.

"We had 'em beat last year," Dixon said. "We knew we could play with them. We just had to come in here and play hard. And we executed down the stretch."

Tech executed. Virginia evaporated. Over the closing six minutes, the Cavs were outscored 19-3 - their only points coming on a 3-pointer by Billet that clanged high off the rim and plummeted straight down into the mesh.

"We were right in there," U.Va. coach Pete Gillen lamented. "We just went into a drought. We got flustered."

That went both ways for a while. Virginia gave the ball away on three of its first six possessions, for instance. Tech managed only one basket in five minutes after a 14-4 breakout. Jenifer tossed away an inbounds pass and had an air-ball jumper during a brief flurry. Tech counterpart Brian Chase tried to leave a lob so Bryant Matthews could wow the crowd with a showy dunk and wound up creating a turnover instead.

The difference is Tech found equilibrium. Well, except maybe for their coach. Yes, that really was Ricky Stokes, so steam-heated with a couple minutes to go when a ref's call didn't go his way that assistant coach Mark Cline had to bear-hug him into submission.

Just another win. Hardly.
 

Deacs' Howard getting respect from ACC foes
Senior will lead Wake Forest against Virginia on Thursday
By Dan Collins
JOURNAL REPORTER

If there's a better player right now in college basketball than Wake Forest's Josh Howard, then he's not playing in the ACC.

At least that's the assessment of Coach Pete Gillen of Virginia, whose Cavaliers have the stiff challenge of trying to contain Howard when the 17th-ranked Deacons visit Charlottesville for Thursday night's game.

"He's a monster," Gillen said. "He could be the MVP of the conference. He's playing great.

"Certainly right now if you put a gun to my head, I'd say he would be the MVP. You could name other players, certainly, but he has done a marvelous job."

Gillen said he is all too aware of Howard's play when the Deacons have needed him most. In what may be the four most impressive victories of the season, at Wisconsin and Richmond and at home against Maryland and Richmond, Howard averaged 26 points and eight rebounds while shooting 73 percent from the field and 87 percent from the free-throw line.

Howard, a 6-6 senior with long arms and exceptional quickness, speed and explosiveness, has also routinely guarded the opponents' most dangerous perimeter threat, or else manned the point of the triangle on what has been a largely effective triangle-and-two defense.

Consequently, he's knocking on the door of one of the most elite clubs in ACC history. With 16 more steals, he will join Shane Battier, Christian Laettner and Grant Hill - all of Duke - as the only players in league history to accumulate 1,000 points, 500 rebounds, 200 assists, 200 steals and 100 blocked shots.

He has 1,387 points, 683 rebounds, 209 assists, 184 steals and 118 blocked shots, with at least 15 games remaining in his college career.

Gillen was asked how a team prepares for a player who can do so many things so well.

"You have problems," Gillen said. "We're trying to see if we can put six guys out on the court.

"He's tough to guard because he does a lot of different things. He goes to the offensive boards great, he shoots threes, he's making free throws. You just hope he doesn't take over the game, but he can.

"They have other good weapons, and he takes pressure off the other guys. He's going to score. You just hope he gets 18 rather than 28. That's our thinking."

Easy to overlook in Howard's flurry of excellence has been the uncertainly that surrounded his physical condition coming into the season. Plagued by a stress reaction in his shin, Howard was unable to participate in preseason conditioning and was slowed during the early practices.

But he has yet to miss a game, and is averaging 29.7 minutes a game, second on the team to point guard Taron Downey.

"At the beginning of the year we were extremely concerned," Coach Skip Prosser of Wake Forest said. "And it didn't just go away. We had our medical staff working on it and Greg Collins, our trainer, did a great job. And Josh rehabbed, and did what he was supposed to do.

"We still don't feel we're out of the woods, but he has been able to play and we feel very fortunate."

Freshman guard Justin Gray, sidelined since he suffered a broken jaw on Jan. 12 at Duke, dressed for practice yesterday but was able to participate in only a few non-contact drills. Gray underwent surgery on Jan. 13, at which time his jaw was wired shut.

Collins said that a rough estimate for when the wires will be removed is four weeks from the time of the surgery, after which time he can again begin participating in full practice.

One concern is that Gray has been unable to eat solid food. He has been forced to eat pureed food through a straw.
 

Hokies Win First in 7 Tries vs. Cavs
By Jim Reedy
Special to The Washington Post
Wednesday, January 22, 2003; Page D04

BLACKSBURG, Va., Jan. 21 -- Virginia Tech could not close the deal last season at Virginia, letting a 16-point halftime lead slip away in the face of a second-half surge by the Cavaliers. Tonight at Cassell Coliseum, the Hokies did the surging. They outscored their in-state rivals 25-7 over the final 10 minutes and earned a 73-55 win, their first in the past seven meetings with Virginia.

Virginia Tech junior Bryant Matthews torched the Cavaliers for a career-high 30 points, including 22 in the second half. Defensively, the Hokies (8-8) forced 23 turnovers and held Virginia (10-6) to three points in the final six minutes.

"It was a strange game. The ball seemed to be bouncing all over the place," said Cavaliers guard Todd Billet, who scored six points on 2-of-10 shooting. "They had a couple-point lead at the end, then we missed some shots and we weren't able to get back in it."

The Cavaliers had won 23 of the past 28 meetings with Virginia Tech, but tonight they continued their losing ways on the road, where they are 1-5 this season. Virginia has lost four of its past five games, including an 0-3 road trip that concluded tonight.

Trailing 56-52 with 5 minutes 30 seconds left, Virginia had a chance to cut the deficit in half when Elton Brown caught a pass underneath the basket, but he could not score the layup.

"That was a big play in the game," Virginia Coach Pete Gillen said. "We had some opportunities; we just didn't convert them. Some power layups in traffic -- you've got to be able to convert those shots and we didn't make them."

On Virginia's next possession, Billet, Travis Watson (team-high 11 points) and Keith Jenifer tried similar putbacks inside, but none fell.

"It was just like it wasn't our night. That possession epitomized that," Billet said.

The Cavaliers scored only once more for the remainder of the game -- Billet's three-pointer with 3:30 left -- as the Hokies cruised along for 15 more points, much to the delight of the 8,152 in attendance.

Virginia shot a better percentage from the field than Virginia Tech, but the Hokies made 17 of 26 free throw attempts. The Cavaliers shot 1 for 6 from the line -- all by Brown. On the 0-3 road trip they were outscored 67-37 on free throws.

Defensively, Virginia had no one to stop Matthews, a 6-foot-7 wing forward who became the first Hokie in almost six years to score 30 points. He added nine rebounds -- including seven on the offensive end -- and five steals.

"He was fantastic," said Virginia Tech Coach Ricky Stokes, a 1984 Virginia graduate who earned his first win in four tries against his alma mater. "We felt all along that he had a world of potential. I think he's coming into his own, starting to play under control."

The Cavaliers opened as if they expected to roll over their sub-.500 rivals. Virginia scored on the opening possession, then watched as the much more energetic Hokies put up 12 straight points and forced five of U-Va.'s 12 first-half turnovers.

But the Cavaliers woke up with an 11-0 run and took a 30-29 lead into halftime when Billet curled around Watson's screen to make a three-pointer with 19 seconds left.

Notes: Virginia point guard Majestic Mapp, who missed the past two seasons because of a knee injury, had three points, one rebound, one assist and no turnovers in six minutes, his first significant action of the season. . . .

Virginia Tech averaged 3,649 fans in its seven home games before tonight.