If poor Pete had not engaged in coaching style drift, one our players might be saying this: "We always try to play passing lanes," Dowdell said. "Teams don't like to be pressured, and they're going to turn the ball over."  Completely abandoning the approach that got you where you are...when will they learn...

Hokie high leaves Cavs low
Virginia falls to Virginia Tech, back into ACC cellar
By Andrew Joyner / Daily Progress staff writer
January 28, 2005

BLACKSBURG - Virginia may want to rethink its vote on ACC expansion because it’s quite clear now that Virginia Tech’s entrance to the league has hurt UVa more than any other conference school.

Propelled by 22 forced turnovers and 52.7 percent shooting from the floor, the Hokies toppled Virginia, 79-73, in the first ACC meeting between the schools Thursday night at Cassell Coliseum.

Coupled with a loss to Virginia Tech in football here just two months ago, an honest observer can only claim that UVa brought these particular troubles upon itself some 18 months ago.

Coleman Collins had 20 and Carlos Dixon added 16 for the Hokies (11-6, 4-2 ACC), who have now won four straight ACC contests and are the hottest team in their new league at the moment.

“I’m really proud of the way we competed. We executed our offense well in the second half and were very active,” Virginia Tech coach Seth Greenberg said. “It came down to turnovers and we won that category, 22-11.”

Virginia? It is the coldest team in its same old league. The loss was the sixth in the last eight games for the Cavaliers and dropped them to 10-7 overall and 1-6 in the ACC.

Devin Smith paced Virginia with 24 points while Elton Brown had 19 points and 15 rebounds. J.R. Reynolds, now playing with a chipped bone in his hand, added 10.

“To win on the road, you have to do three things: take care of the ball, rebound and make your free throws. We did just one of those things,” said Virginia coach Pete Gillen, whose team outrebounded the Hokies 38-25 but was just 10 of 17 from the stripe with some crucial misses late. “You can’t have 22 turnovers and you have to do better than 10 of 17 from the line.”

The Hokies entered the game leading the ACC in steals but you would have been hard pressed to figure if the Cavaliers knew that. The Hokies had 12 steals Thursday. Some were earned and some, well, they just were the only thing between the sidelines and an errant Virginia pass.

Gillen insisted that his team had been adequately prepped on the Hokies and their quick hands. One has to take his word on that.

“We stressed it like crazy. We talked about that three straight days. That was our biggest fear,” Gillen said.

Actually, it became a nightmare in the game’s critical moments.

After Virginia Tech expanded its six-point halftime lead to 16 on a jumper by Zabian Dowdell that made it 62-46 with 10:43 left in the game, the Cavaliers scratched back into the game with a 21-8 run over the next seven minutes. When Smith connected on a 3-pointer and made the ensuing free throw for a rare four-point play, Tech led just 70-67 with 3:25 to play.

Virginia, however, could never get closer until the very waning seconds and turnovers were of course the reason.

First, in frenetic sequence with 2:25 to go and Tech holding a 73-69 lead, T.J. Bannister made an errant pass coming up the court that was intercepted by Jamon Gordon. Gordon then himself lost control of the ball and Reynolds snared the loose ball. Promptly, and perhaps expectedly, Reynolds then threw it away.

“We just threw it away too often. You can’t do that on the road,” Gillen said.

Moments later. trailing 74-71 with 1:11 to play, Reynolds drove the lane and fired a pass to an open Smith in the corner. Smith couldn’t handle the high hard dish delivered by Reynolds and the ball went back to Tech.

That play punctuated the entire game for the Cavaliers. They briefly cut the lead to two in the final seconds but that play was their obvious chance to alter the outcome.

“I would like that pass back,” Reynolds said.

Bannister finished the game with five turnovers, matching the total by Brown. Bannister was forced to play down the stretch due to a sprained ankle suffered by Sean Singletary early in the second half. Virginia, which played without reserve forward Donte Minter (broken finger) Thursday, may not have Singletary for Saturday’s game with North Carolina.

Injuries are one thing but another bothersome item surfaced for Gillen during the game.

In what is the final sign of a team that is cracking, the players showed quite visible frustration Thursday. At times, in the first half some of the players were seen screaming at each other during timeouts and their body language was as lifeless as it has ever been.

“They were frustrated and that will happen in the heat of the battle but we have to address that,” Gillen said.

Frustrations mounting for spiraling UVa
By Jerry Ratcliffe / Daily Progress sports editor
January 28, 2005

BLACKSBURG- Virginia hoped the jaunt down Interstate 81 would give the Cavaliers new life in their quest to escape the ACC cellar.
Instead, UVa’s frustration grew with a 79-73 setback to state rival Virginia Tech before a passionate and packed house at Cassell Coliseum. Hokies jammed every nook and cranny of the joint to cheer on their upstart basketball team, a group that wasn’t expected to figure into the conference race.
Well, surprise!
With the win, Tech is breathing the rarified air, the same air that is shared by the likes of such hoop barons as North Carolina, Duke and Wake Forest. In fact, the Hokies woke up today tied for third place in the tradition-rich ACC with Wake at 4-2.

Clutch Hokies
Outsiders might wonder how. Evidence shows that the Hokies have ownership of Crunch Time, having now won all four conference contests that were settled by five points or less.
After Virginia’s horrific and usual second-half implosion, when the Cavaliers fell from only a three-point halftime deficit to trail by 16 (60-44 with 11:30 to play), then staged a dramatic comeback, the host Hokies didn’t flinch. Well, maybe a little.
Somewhere along the way in the latter stages of the game, the Cavaliers rediscovered themselves and stormed back with a 15-6 blitz and kept pouring it on. The Hokies’ lead dropped like the Dow Jones on a bear-like day, from seven, to five, then to three with three minutes to play, then two with 11 seconds remaining on a stickback by UVa center Elton Brown.

Confidence booster
All the success in close calls this season hasn’t hurt the Hokies’ confidence, a confidence that finally came through in the waning moments as Jamon Gordon broke away for a slam dunk to give Tech a 77-73 lead with six seconds showing.
It was over.
The Cavaliers lost for the sixth time in their last eight games, sank to 1-6 in the league and 10-7 overall. Tough to swallow for a team that once stood 6-1 with a Top 25 ranking and a convincing win over a Top 10 opponent.
“We’re frustrated,” said UVa coach Pete Gillen, who with each mounting loss must feel the heat rise from disappointed Cavalier fans. “We’re a better team than we [showed] tonight.”
Virginia boosters would agree.
“To win on the road, there are three things you have to do,” Gillen said.
First, the coach explained, a team must rebound the ball.
Check.
The Cavs won the battle of the boards 38-25, one of their most lopsided advantages in rebounding all season.
Second, a team has to take care of the basketball.
That’s a big NO. After committing only half a dozen turnovers against steal-happy Clemson last Saturday, the Cavaliers gave it away a whopping 22 times against the Hokies, who rank fourth in the nation in steals.
It wasn’t like that was a big surprise.
“We stressed that like crazy,” Gillen said. “We talked about it for three days.”
Something was obviously lost in translation. Gillen’s greatest fear was for his players to get picked clean, leading to easy, breakaways for the Hokies and that’s exactly what happened.
Third, a team has to make free throws.
No check there, either. The Cavs connected on 10 of 17, mostly before they made their impressive run.
Gillen said his team was aware of how big this game was in the big picture. A win in a hostile environment would have boosted confidence and would have meant a two-game conference winning streak and momentum heading into Saturday’s showdown at high noon with North Carolina, a team that UVa has knocked off five years in a row in Charlottesville.
Instead, the Wahoos will be fighting for their basketball lives against the Heels.
It’s not a pretty picture.
Meanwhile, the Hokies are on a roll. Who would have thunk it?
“I told the players this week that Virginia Tech-Virginia is a huge rivalry, but that we’re part of something bigger than that now - the ACC,” said coach Seth Greenberg, who has convinced this team that hustle will get you far. “It’s a league game. The conference is bigger than the rivalry.
“It used to be for bragging rights,” Greenberg said. “Now, it’s for standings.”
The Hokies have a significant advantage in both at this point and time. Boosted by 6-foot-9 center Coleman Collins, a guy who almost gave up the game because of intense pain, Virginia Tech is now a player.
Collins supplied ESPN’s SportsCenter with enough highlights to fill up all of its next six shows en route to a jam-filled, 20-point night.
“Not bad for a guy who was in so much pain before his operation that he was going to be a student and not play basketball anymore,” Greenberg said. “He played seven games in excruciating pain.”
Collins had a cyst the size of a quarter removed from his foot and obviously is playing like the lion who had the thorn pulled from its paw by the rabbit.
Afterward, Collins said he felt like the shackles had been taken off, to which Greenberg said, “That sounds good to me ... I’m not going to argue with him.”
Greenberg feels that as tough as the league is, and as fragile as his team might be in spite of the toughness it has displayed, he’s almost afraid to exhale.
“The reward for this is we get Duke on Sunday,” the Hokies coach said. “An angry Duke.”
Meanwhile, Gillen returned to his laboratory at University Hall late last night, looking for an answer to a problem that perhaps he cannot solve.
Saturday’s home game against the Heels may be Virginia’s last stand in the ACC. Losing and dropping to 1-7 in the league could be the point of no return.
Winning could do wonders. Having won the last five in a row against Carolina within the friendly confines, history is on Virginia’s side. Probability isn’t.

IN-STATE SQUEAKER
Tech tops UVa for 5th straight win
By Mark Berman
981-3125
The Roanoke Times

BLACKSBURG - Once again, a Virginia Tech men's basketball game was up for grabs in the final minute. And once again, Virginia Tech grabbed the victory.

The Hokies fended off arch rival Virginia 79-73 on Thursday in front of a near-capacity crowd at Cassell Coliseum. It was the teams' first meeting as ACC rivals. "I'm sticking to the formula - play a close game and win at the end," said Tech's Jamon Gordon, who had 10 points, eight assists and four steals.

Tech (11-6, 4-2) won its previous three games by a total of four points. In each of those games, Tech scored the winning basket in the final 37 seconds and had to defend at least one late shot by its foe. Virginia Tech wasted all of an 11-point second-half lead at Georgia Tech last weekend but still won.

The Hokies kept the lead for the entire second half this time, but UVa (10-7, 1-6) whittled a 16-point deficit to three points with 3:25 to go. The lead was still only three points in the final minute and was down to two with 11 seconds to go.

"I'm sorry for having the fans hold their chests," said Tech's Zabian Dowdell, who scored 14 points. "That's what makes the game good, I think."

Virginia Tech tied Wake Forest for third place in the ACC. Tech won its fifth straight game, its longest winning streak in nine seasons. Tech, in its debut ACC season, won its fourth straight conference game.

"We had to make it interesting, but we pulled it out," said Coleman Collins, who had 20 points for Tech. "We took their best shot and didn't fall down."

"We just beat a good Georgia Tech team down there and come back to Cassell and beat a desperate UVa team," said Tech's Carlos Dixon, who had 16 points in 40 minutes.

The Cavaliers, who also lost at Tech in 2003, dropped back into a last-place tie with Clemson in the ACC.

Down 60-44 with 11:27 left, UVa went on a 23-10 run to cut the deficit to 70-67 with 3:25 to go. Devin Smith, who had 24 points, capped the run with a 3-pointer and foul shot but never scored again.

"We came back. We showed courage; we showed toughness. But you can't dig a hole like that," UVa coach Pete Gillen said.

After Dixon scored, UVa's J.R. Reynolds sank two free throws. After Tech's Deron Washington made one of two free throws, Dowdell stole the ball and Washington made one of two foul shots to extend the lead to 74-69 with 1:58 left.

Elton Brown, who had 19 points and 15 rebounds, made two free throws to cut the lead to 74-71 with 1:46 to go. UVa's next two possessions ended with a Reynolds turnover and a missed layup by Brown. Dowdell then sank one of two free throws to put Tech up 75-71 lead with 19.9 seconds left. Brown scored with 11 seconds left, but Gordon answered with a dunk with 6.6 seconds left.

UVa had 22 turnovers, twice as many as Tech. The Hokies, who lead the ACC in turnover margin, had 12 steals.

"We stressed it like crazy. We talked about it for three days," Gillen said of Tech's knack for forcing turnovers.

"We always try to play passing lanes," Dowdell said. "Teams don't like to be pressured, and they're going to turn the ball over."

The Hokies went on a 13-3 run to build a 55-41 cushion with 12:33 left. Collins had seven points and Dixon two 3-pointers in that run.

Fortune continues to smile on Hokies

BLACKSBURG - That smile.

See that, midway through the second half? That crooked grin on Coleman Collins' face, right after he fumbled an inbounds pass but still had time to make a wide-open, flat-footed layup? That told you everything you needed to know. For Virginia Tech basketball, times couldn't get much better than this. Even when things go wrong, they go right.

"That's the kind of thing you do when you're 4 years old in rec ball," said Collins, the sophomore center who scored 20 points Thursday to help the Hokies dump Virginia 79-73.

"Little plays like that, a sheepish grin on your way up the court, it's the reason why you play the game.

"You play to sneak something past somebody. I felt like I got away with something."

In a way, he has.

Collins and his teammates have stolen our skepticism.

Call the devil and tell him a cold front's coming through. The ACC winning streak has reached four. For yet another night, the Hokies were too stubborn to let it end.

This was billed as a major test for the young Hokies, who were favored in a conference game for the first time in their brief ACC history. But they showed no signs of the pressure: Collins kept dunking, Zabian Dowdell and Carlos Dixon kept hitting 3-pointers and the team-wide smiles kept coming.

Some will say this game meant more for UVa - and specifically, for the future of coach Pete Gillen - than it did for the Hokies.

I say bologna. Gillen's fate was sealed earlier this month, when one of his three captains, Jason Clark, was lost for the year because of academic problems, a decisive cannon ball through the hull of a sinking ship.

The Cavaliers are left with one outstanding player - Devin Smith, who scored 24 points Thursday - and a cast of others who are either slumping terribly or trying too hard.

Post player Elton Brown will force a shot even if all five opponents are draping him in the paint. Roanoke's J.R. Reynolds has yet to find his shooting touch from a year ago. And freshman point guard Sean Singletary, while quick and talented, is hitting less than 40 percent of his shots from the field.

Meanwhile, the Hokies still feel they have much to prove. But Collins has already met at least one of his goals.

Three years ago, when he made his first visit to Tech, he and guard Jamon Gordon attended the Hokies' football game against LSU.

"There were 50,000 people there, screaming," Collins said. "We were like, man, if we could just get some of these people to come to see basketball and give them something to cheer about, they'll stick to it. That's something you saw today. We had 10,000 strong in there.

"People love success. People love winners. Here is no different. These are faithful fans. Once they get behind you, they'll stick with you."

It's enough to make a guy smile.

Brown espouses joys of passing, teamwork
Cavaliers' hopes with Gresham seen as fading
By Doug Doughty
THE ROANOKE TIMES

There is one image from the Virginia-Clemson basketball game last Saturday that I can’t get out of my head.

Elton Brown, having just spotted Donte Minter for an easy layup, was running upcourt with a broad grin on his face, wagging a finger back at Minter.

It happened twice, twice in the space of three possessions, sandwiched around a Brown putback after he had rebounded a Devin Smith miss.

“I always say, ‘You’ve got to get other people involved,’ ” Brown said after the Cavaliers’ 81-79 victory at University Hall. “When you get other people involved, that’s when people step up. You’ve got to have confidence in your teammates.

“I’m going to look for anybody who’s open. It can be a walk-on coming on the court. If he’s open, I’m going to give it to him. Bottom line is, I’m just trying to win games here.”

Those are some noble sentiments, but just when did Brown become so magnanimous?

He certainly wasn’t getting other people involved during an eight-game stretch when he had two assists and 20 turnovers.

He has had four assists and one turnover in the last two games, the two games since friend and longtime UVa and AAU teammate Jason Clark was declared academically ineligible.

Is there a coincidence?

There shouldn’t be. While Clark didn’t have the most diversified offensive game, he certainly was capable of catching the ball, and at 6-8 and 245 pounds, dunking with authority. Clark had a team-high nine dunks at the time of his suspension, eight in a seven-game span in December and early January.

Minter, on the other hand, doesn’t have a dunk all season. He doesn’t jump well, which might account for his unimpressive rebounding, but he does have a nose for the basket. In many respects, Minter is a left-handed Brown, seemingly looking to shoot the ball as soon as he touches it.

One of Brown’s assists against Maryland came when he spotted Jason Cain for a foul-line jumper, but Minter is a guy who can make teams pay for doubling Brown, provided Brown is willing to look for him. Minter was not in uniform in College Park, Md., as the result of a broken finger on his left hand.

Cain temporarily has moved ahead of Minter on the depth chart, possibly owing to Cain’s 2-inch height advantage and greater mobility, and while Minter could increase his minutes by becoming a second post threat, that’s not up to him. It’s up to Brown and, in many respects, Gillen.

After four years, you would think that Gillen might have knocked some sense into Brown’s head. Shoot when you’re open, take shots you can make, look for the open man when you’re double-teamed, launch a fadeaway only if you’re “feeling it.” Never allow yourself to get in a situation where you’re 4-for-18 from the field on a night when seven of your shots are blocked.

It’s reminiscent of Ralph Sampson’s career, when he invariably would take an early jumper from what would become be the 3-point area in a subsequent era. Virginia fans would always hope that he would miss; if he connected, he would keep shooting, which was the worst possible scenario. Unlike Sampson, however, Brown doesn’t know when to stop.

OF THE THREE Virginia football recruits who have decommitted, the most painful for UVa to lose would be William Fleming High School linebacker Darryl Gresham, now likely to sign with Florida after a July commitment to the Cavaliers.

The Cavaliers have put considerable time and energy into the recruiting of Gresham, whose father lives in the Atlanta area. Gresham’s father, Darryl Sr., played basketball for the Gators in the mid-1980s, but Virginia believes that both Darryl Sr. and mother Yvette would like to see Darryl Jr. in Charlottesville.

It is possible that Gresham told the Virginia Tech staff that he would sign with Florida just to get the Hokies off his back, but he gave every indication to the Hokies that he is Gainesville, Fla.-bound. UVa is still hoping to get him on campus for a men’s basketball game Saturday with North Carolina, but it may be too late.

As for the other players who decommitted, Penn State-bound offensive lineman Matt Lowry and Oklahoma-bound linebacker Lamont Robinson, the Cavaliers almost cut Lowry loose when he expressed earlier misgivings and didn’t mind picking up the scholarship that became available with his departure for State College.

Virginia offered a scholarship to Robinson just after he had been involved in a near-fatal auto accident in which he had suffered two broken veterbrae, and there was some question whether he would play again. The Cavaliers may have been banking on the loyalty factor in their early offer but there was always the knowledge that competition would heat up once it was determined that Robinson would return in one piece.

If all committed players had kept their commitments, SuperPrep All-America running back Mikell Simpson would have been No. 25, the Division I-A limit. As it is, he became No. 22 and there actually will be a 23rd newcomer, transfer Andrew Pearman from Hawaii.

Pearman, younger brother of All-ACC running back Andrew Pearman, will go on scholarship upon his arrival next summer, but UVa coach Al Groh has the option of counting him as a member of Pearman’s original entering class in 2004.

With word Thursday that Bethlehem, Pa., linebacker Kyle Newell had committed to N.C. State, uncommitted players with whom UVa remains involved include All-Group AAA wide receiver Todd Nolen from Hampton High School and late bloomer Will Davis, a 6-2, 220-pound all-purpose player who had 24 sacks this past season for Eleanor Roosevelt in Greenbelt, Md.

Davis was on campus at UVa today (Thursday).

The way it's supposed to be
Published January 28 2005
David Teel

BLACKSBURG -- Now this is more like it. Crazed home court; improbable shots; frantic final minutes.

Virginia Tech defeated Virginia 79-73 at Cassell Coliseum on Thursday in what we can only hope is a first step in the renaissance of a dormant rivalry.

This series, you see, needs a jolt. A 12-pack-of-Red-Bull, double-espresso, finger-in-the-socket jolt.

For 20-plus years it languished at neutral sites, usually rotating between the dank Richmond Coliseum and dingy Roanoke Civic Center. Yeesh, those games were grim.

Oh, there was the occasional eye-opener. Virginia's 113-106 overtime victory in Richmond 16 years ago comes to mind. Bimbo Coles went off for 43 that night.

But for the most part we endured scores in the 60s, listless crowds and minimal television coverage.

In 2000, administrators wisely returned the series to home sites. Swiping a page from Florida-Florida State, they twice staged the game the night before the annual Virginia-Virginia Tech football clash.

Every little bit helped.

Virginia Tech's ACC membership changes everything. State rivals become conference rivals, their games not only for water-cooler boasting but also for league standings. This season is the first since 1977-78 that the Hokies and Cavaliers play twice, and this time the arrangement figures to be long-term.

Long-term, given tradition and the construction of a new arena, Virginia's program holds more promise than Tech's. Short-term, given the teams' directions this season and Thursday's result, you gotta like the Hokies.

"I know it sounds redundant," Tech coach Seth Greenberg said, "but I'm just really proud of the way we competed."

Virginia coach Pete Gillen could not say the same.

The Cavaliers (10-7) fell to 1-6 in ACC play because the Hokies (11-6, 4-2) exposed their baby-fat soft frontcourt. The alleged leader of that frontcourt, senior Elton Brown, was the primary problem, 19 points and 15 rebounds notwithstanding.

First half: As Brown wheeled in the low post, Coleman Collins reached low to strip the ball away. Jason Cain regained possession for Virginia, only to be stripped in the same manner by Zabian Dowdell.

Be strong with the ball: They teach you that in rec league.

Virginia, Brown especially, was no better in the second half. He allowed a cheap offensive rebound to Deron Washington with Tech nursing a four-point lead. With the Hokies leading by three in the final minute, Brown spun toward the goal and front-rimmed a left-handed layup.

Here's the difference between the two frontcourts: Early in the second half, Brown rebounded a Sean Singletary miss and missed a meek stickback; at the other end, Collins (20 points and seven rebounds) threw down a wicked dunk over Tunji Soroye.

The game wasn't an instant classic, but with Virginia's comeback from a 16-point deficit and both teams shooting better than 50 percent, it was a start. What this rivalry most needs is better teams, NCAA tournament teams.

Since 1976, Virginia has earned 15 NCAA bids, Virginia Tech six. Yet only twice, in 1976 and '86, have the Cavaliers and Hokies both made the field. And in those years, both lost their opening games.

Think about all the talent these programs showcased: Dale Solomon and Dell Curry; Al Young and Perry Young; Ralph Sampson and Othell Wilson; Bryant Stith and Cory Alexander. Still, only a pair of joint NCAA appearances.

Alas, those names seem ancient. Virginia has not produced a first-team All-ACC player since Stith in 1992. That's the longest drought for any team in conference history, no help for Gillen's job security.

Bryant Matthews last season was the first Tech player since Ace Custis in 1997 to earn first-team all-conference honors. These Hokies don't boast any potential first-teamers, but they are hyperactive on defense and usually poised on offense.

You can't say the same for the Cavaliers.

Rematch Feb. 12 in Charlottesville. High noon.

Hokies Hold Off Cavaliers
Tech Goes to 4-2 in ACC, Virginia Slides to 1-6: Virginia Tech 79, Virginia 73
By Michael Arkush
Special to The Washington Post
Friday, January 28, 2005; Page D01

BLACKSBURG, Va., Jan. 27 -- -- The calendar still shows January, plenty of time, presumably, for the Virginia Cavaliers to play their way into an NCAA tournament berth. After all, nine conference games remain.

Forget the calendar. Unless there is a major turnaround, and that doesn't seem likely, the Cavaliers, for the fourth straight year, will not be invited to college basketball's biggest spectacle. Still need proof? Look no further than the latest defeat, 79-73, to the Virginia Tech Hokies on Thursday night at Cassell Coliseum.
Virginia's Elton Brown tries to get around Coleman Collins, who led the Hokies with 20 points. (Matt Gentry - AP)

The Cavaliers (10-7, 1-6 ACC) were hoping to build on a winning streak, even if it numbered only one, Saturday's victory against Clemson. Nonetheless, despite an impressive late rally, cutting a 16-point deficit to two with nine seconds left, the Cavaliers were unable to prevail. Instead, with North Carolina visiting University Hall on Saturday afternoon, the situation could not become more perilous.

The biggest problem was turnovers. In all, Virginia committed 22, including several key ones down the stretch when the game was still up for grabs. They outrebounded the Hokies 38-25, but could not overcome the mistakes. Virginia also missed 7 of 17 free throws.

"There are three things that let you win on the road," Virginia Coach Pete Gillen said. "You've got to take care of the ball, you've got to rebound and you've got to make your free throws. We did one of those things."

For the Hokies (11-6, 4-2), it was their fourth straight conference victory in their inaugural season in the ACC. The Hokies, remarkably, only one game out of first place in the conference, go on the road next to play Duke, which is coming off its first loss of the season (to Maryland).

"To win four games in a row in this league is not an easy thing," Virginia Tech Coach Seth Greenberg said. "Our reward for that is to play at a very angry Duke on Sunday."

The Cavaliers were led by Devin Smith, who scored 24 points. Elton Brown added 19 and pulled down 15 rebounds. For the Hokies, all five starters finished in double figures, led by sophomore center Coleman Collins with 20 points. Forward Carlos Dixon added 16, while forward Deron Washington and guard Zabian Dowdell scored 14 apiece. The Hokies finished with 12 steals, compared to only three for the Cavaliers.

The crowd was pumped up from the start, eager to show its solidarity with a squad that, along with Miami, must be classified as the biggest surprise in the conference. Virginia Tech was picked to finish 10th.

It didn't take long for the Hokies to respond. They hit their first three three-point attempts, and when Collins slammed it home midway through the opening stanza, Virginia Tech went ahead, 18-10.

On their next possession, the Cavaliers appeared likely to come up empty, but were bailed out by a three-pointer by freshman Adrian Joseph that barely beat the shot clock. Yet the Hokies were hardly deterred, penetrating almost at will against a vulnerable Cavaliers defense. Soon, with his team trailing, 28-19, Gillen called a timeout. It did little good. The Hokies continued to dictate play, seizing a 34-24 advantage.

But, thanks to Smith, the Cavaliers finally closed the gap. He scored eight points, including two three-pointers, in the final three minutes of the half. At halftime, the Hokies were on top, 37-34.

Early in the second half, the Hokies assumed control again, leading 48-38. Cavaliers guard J.R. Reynolds hit a three-pointer with less than 14 minutes left to cut the advantage to seven, but Dixon immediately answered with his own jumper from long range. Collins followed with two buckets, and the Hokies were, suddenly, up by 14. The hole was getting deeper for Virginia.
 

Hokies keep climbing
Hokies' hot play in the conference continues with win over Cavaliers
BY MIKE HARRIS
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
Jan 28, 2005

BLACKSBURG -- Chalk up another one for the hottest team in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

Virginia Tech's Hokies won their fifth straight game and fourth in the league last night, thrilling a jam-packed house at Cassell Coliseum with a 79-73 decision over arch-rival Virginia. No other ACC team has a winning streak longer than two games.

"We're starting to believe," said freshman forward Deron Washington. "We're starting to believe that we can do this, that we can be one of the top teams.

"Everything is coming together."

The Hokies' victory combined with Georgia Tech's overtime victory over Wake Forest puts Tech in a third-place tie in the ACC at 4-2 (11-6 overall).

Virginia, which got as close as two late after trailing by 16, falls to 1-6, 10-7 and is tied for last in the league with Clemson. The Cavaliers have lost five of their past six.

"You can't dig a hole," Virginia coach Pete Gillen said. "We're a better team than we played tonight, I think. We missed a lot of easy shots, missed too many free throws, too many turnovers. It was a big game, we just didn't play well early. We came back, we showed courage, we showed toughness.

"You just can't dig a hole like that."

Like a number of Tech games this season, a look at the stat sheet doesn't do the game justice. Virginia shot better than 50 percent in each half.

It outrebounded the Hokies badly, 38-25. It had the game's high scorer in Devin Smith, whose 24 points came on 9-for-12 shooting. It got 19 points and 15 rebounds from Elton Brown.

Brown also had five turnovers and several of his misses were from very close range. Tech forced 22 turnovers, 12 of them coming on steals (Carlos Dixon and Jamon Gordon had four each). The Hokies only had 11 turnovers.

"It comes down to 22 and 11," Tech coach Seth Greenberg said. "The game comes down to taking pretty good care of the basketball overall. We were very consistent in trying to dig balls out and be active. We showed a competitive spirit on the defensive end, not getting stops as much as being persistent and active, being fairly alert with our hands."

Tech scored 18 of the first 25 points of the second half. The Hokies' lead was 16 points with 11:28 to play after Marquie Cooke hit a long jumper moments after Gordon collected one of his steals.

Virginia was within three, however, after a four-point play by Smith with 3:25 to play. Smith hit a 3-pointer from the corner and was fouled by Washington, a low point in what was probably his best game of the season. The ensuing foul shot made the score 70-67.

Smith didn't score again.

With 1:11 to play, he was open in the same corner but J.R. Reynolds' bullet pass sailed off Smith and into the stands.

"He has to move without it, maybe he got a little tired," Gillen said. "We just ran motion offense. Our set plays weren't working great. They did a good job on him.. We ran a couple of plays for him, he just couldn't get free. They were concentrating on him. They have good athletes, they can do that."

Brown scored on a follow shot with 11 seconds left to get Virginia within two, but the Cavaliers lost sight of Gordon and Zabian Dowdell fed him for a slam. Cooke stole the inbounds and Washington sealed things for Tech with two foul shots.

All five Tech starters scored in double figures, led by Coleman Collins with 20 points. The Hokies scored the most they have against Virginia since 1989 and shot 52.7 percent, their best mark of the season.

"We had to make it interesting but we pulled it out," Collins said. "A win is a win.

"We've just kind of gelled over the last few weeks. We don't want to peak too early. Hopefully we'll keep rising, keep climbing."

Tech plays again Sunday night when it goes to Duke. Virginia has a much shorter turnaround. It is home tomorrow for a noon game against North Carolina.

Down Cavs look for way up
Frustrated U.Va. team drops fifth game in past six despite climbing out of 16-point hole
BY JEFF WHITE
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
Jan 28, 2005

BLACKSBURG -- In the tunnel leading to the basketball court at Cassell Coliseum, Elton Brown called his teammates together last night. Game time approached, and the senior center spoke to his fellow University of Virginia basketball players about taking a step toward "the tournament."

Brown presumably meant the NCAAs, but that no longer looks like a realistic destination for the fading Cavaliers. At this rate, in fact, they won't qualify for the NIT.

Against Virginia Tech, a team they once owned, the Cavs led only once, at 2-0. Virginia came in having won 13 of its previous 16 meetings with the Hokies, but the ACC newcomers weren't the least bit intimidated. Tech opened a 16-point lead midway through the second half and held off a furious U.Va. rally to win 79-73 before a raucous crowd of 9,847.

"That's basketball," Brown said. "You ain't going to win every game. That's just how it is."

Brown's comments notwithstanding, Virginia (1-6, 10-7) is in freefall. The loss was the fifth in the past six games for the Cavaliers, who played most of the second half without starting point guard Sean Singletary (sprained ankle). Several times during the game, U.Va. players argued with each other, and it was not a happy team that trudged to the visitors' locker room after the final horn sounded.

"Every team yells at each other, not just us," said Brown, who finished with 19 points and 15 rebounds but missed several crucial shots from the floor and the line. "That's part of basketball."

In seven seasons under coach Pete Gillen, the Cavaliers have a 10-42 record in ACC road games.

"To win on the road, in my opinion, you've got to rebound the ball, you've got to take care of it -- don't throw it away too much and you've got to make your free throws," Gillen said. "We did one of the three."

Virginia outrebounded Tech 38-25 but finished with 22 turnovers -- Brown and reserve point guard T.J. Bannister had five apiece -- and shot 10 of 17 from the line.

U.Va.'s defense, as usual, was another problem. The Hokies (4-2, 11-6) came in ranked last in the ACC in scoring offense and field-goal percentage. You wouldn't have known it. In its first ACC game against its state rival, Tech learned what the other teams in the conference have long known: Virginia's defense can make even the shakiest offense look good.

The Hokies hit 8 of 17 shots from beyond the arc and shot 52.7 percent from the floor. Eighteen of their points came off U.Va. turnovers. Senior swingman Carlos Dixon and sophomore guard Jamon Gordon had four steals apiece for Tech, which finished with 12.

"We talked about it for three days," Gillen said of Tech's propensity for thievery.

Virginia's Devin Smith led all scorers with 24 points. With 3:25 left, the senior forward was fouled while making a 3-pointer, and he added the free throw to pull U.Va. to 70-67. He only touched the ball once the rest of the way, however, on a high-velocity pass from sophomore guard J.R. Reynolds that slipped through Smith's hands and out of bounds.

"We dug too big a hole," Gillen said. "We came back, but it's tough to climb back from a 16-point deficit, on the road, against a good team, in this type of atmosphere."

Different strokes for Tech and U.Va.
BOB LIPPER
POINT OF VIEW
Jan 28, 2005
Bob Lipper
Contact Bob Lipper at (804) 649-6555 or e-mail blipper @timesdispatch.com

BLACKSBURG One team showed fire from the get-go. The other team stirred charred ashes. One team played with purpose. The other team needed a road map. One team found a rhythm and stayed with it. The other team couldn't find open shooters and paid for it.

One team has a very nice run going for itself.

The other team and its 900-grand-per-annum leader are tumbling into the abyss.

Virginia Tech is better. That's what you can take from last night's 79-73 conquest of Virginia. The Hokies don't have as many schoolboy hot-shots on the roster. They haven't received a 50-year membership pin from the ACC. They don't boast a fancy new arena on the horizon.

But they're a better team. They play off each other. They find the open man. They bust it on defense. They're not sloppy with the ball.

Those assets separated Tech from U.Va. on this night. The Hokies never trailed during the closing 38 minutes and were ahead from the moment Zabian Dowdell nailed a 3-pointer for 9-6 with 13:55 left before intermission. The only thing they didn't do well was handle prosperity. They built a 10-point lead in the first half but were on top by only three at the break. They were up by 16 with 10˝ to go and by a scant two with 11 ticks on the clock.

Typical of U.Va., it then lost track of Jamon Gordon, who broke upcourt like Torry Holt on a go route, gathered Zabian Dowdell's home-run pass and dunked for 77-73. Elton Brown followed with the last of Virginia's 22 turnovers, Deron Washington swished two free throws and the celebration was on for a crew that's knocked off four straight ACC opponents and is now tied for third in the league with - get this - fifth-in-the-country Wake Forest.

"We could've put 'em away and let everyone on the bench get in," Tech center Coleman Collins said afterward. "Instead, we made it a close game. If we have too many close games like that, we're going to have to put defibrillators in the stands."

U.Va. needs a case of Excedrin. The Hokies are feeling no pain. The Cavs have a jackhammer headache. They've dropped six of their past eight starts and are tied with Clemson for last in the standings. They desperately needed this night to go well to jump-start a stretch that continues with a home encounter tomorrow against North Carolina and away outings at Providence and N.C. State.

None of the four - rivalry game on your floor, three on the road against teams that won't frighten you - seemed unwinnable at tipoff last night. But if you don't guard anyone and throw the ball all over the gym, you won't beat anybody.

"Our effort was not lacking," summed up U.Va. coach Pete Gillen, "it was our execution."

Execution being coachspeak for we-played-lousy.

Neither of these old rivals roared into this matchup. The Cavs and Hokies came to Cassell Coliseum rated 10-11 in the league in field goal percentage and field goal percentage defense, for instance, no ready-made formula for success. The Hokies don't score much, the Cavs don't defend a lot.

They'd combined for four wins against ACC rivals. Total point differential: six. They'd been tagged with seven setbacks. Average margin of defeat: 17.4.

In the end, Tech proved it still can win the close ones, and U.Va. proved its got more flaws than an Enron tax filing. It trimmed its deficit to seven early in the second half, for instance. Then Gary Forbes lost Carlos Dixon, who sank a trey. Collins beat Brown down the floor and dunked off Gordon's feed. Collins was left alone on an inbounds play and scored on a layup. Goodbye rally, hello 14-point cushion.

"It's frustrating," Brown grumped. "That's a team where no way we should've lost that game."

Quick. Somebody show him the tape. Maybe he and his bunch will learn something.

 

Hokies strike again
By Nate Crossman / Lynchburg News & Advance
January 28, 2005

BLACKSBURG - It is not a fad. The Virginia Tech men’s basketball team is good.

In its first matchup with Virginia as a member of the ACC on Thursday, Tech jumped out to a big lead early in the second half against the Cavaliers and held on late for a 79-73 victory at Cassell Coliseum.

The win was the Hokies’ fifth in a row, their longest winning streak since the 1995-96 season. More importantly, it was their fourth consecutive ACC win, improving their record to 4-2 (11-6 overall), and making them the hottest team in the conference. With Wake Forest’s loss to Georgia Tech, the Hokies moved into a tie for third place in the conference. This from a team that many people thought would spend plenty of quality time at the bottom of the ACC.

“To win four games in a row in this league is not an easy thing,” Tech coach Seth Greenberg said. “Our reward for that is to play at a very angry Duke on Sunday.”

The Hokies travel to Cameron Indoor Stadium on Sunday to play second-ranked Duke, which lost its first game of the season to Maryland on Wednesday.

All five Hokies starters scored in double figures led by Coleman Collins’ 20 points. Among those 20 were several thunderous dunks that fueled the near-capacity crowd of 9,847. But as has been the case all season, the most important stat was turnovers: Tech committed 11 and caused 22, a season-high for UVa. Those turnovers, 12 of which came off steals, led to 18 points.

On the other side of the ledger, the Cavaliers lost for the fifth time in their last six tries and moved to 1-6 (10-7) in the conference, tied for last. That’s a tough vantage point for a team that expected to be in the position that the Hokies now find themselves. Devin Smith scored a game-high 24 points and almost single-handily kept his team in the game despite being less than 100 percent because of an earlier injury. Elton Smith scored 19 points and grabbed 15 rebounds, but his statistics were misleading. He went 5 of 9 from the free throw line and turned it over five times.

“There are three things that let you win on the road,” UVa coach Pete Gillen said. “You’ve got to take care of the ball, you’ve got to rebound, and you’ve got to make your free throws. We did one of those things.”

The Cavaliers outrebounded the Hokies 38-25.

The reeling Cavaliers must recover quickly with No. 3 North Carolina visiting on Saturday.

Zabian Dowdell’s bucket gave his team a 62-46 lead with just over 10 minutes to play, and it appeared as though the Hokies were about to turn the game into a rout. But the Cavaliers refused to go away quietly. Led by some hot shooting from beyond the 3-point arc, UVa went on a 21-8 run to trim the deficit to 70-67 with 3:25 to play.

“We knew they were a hungry team,” Tech senior forward Carlos Dixon said. “They’d lost a couple and were desperate for a win. We knew they were going to make a run and we just had to answer their run with a run of our own.”

Tech didn’t exactly make a run, but it stayed one step ahead of the Cavaliers. Virginia had several chances to whittle the lead down more, but a steal by Dowdell and a costly turnover by J.R. Reynolds on a pass to Smith kept it a two-possession game. Brown’s layup cut it to 75-73 with 11 seconds left, but Tech quickly inbounded the ball and Dowdell found Jamon Gordon for a breakaway dunk to put the game away.

“He thinks he’s Michael Vick because he’s lefthanded, so I knew he was going to throw the ball,” Gordon said about Dowdell’s outlet pass. “I just made a good decision and Zabian made a good pass.”

Virginia has built a reputation this season of being a first-half team and folding in the second. That was not the case against Tech. The Cavaliers saved their best for the latter stages of the game, but struggled early. They struggled most of all on the defensive end. The worst defensive team in the ACC could not make a stop. They tried to play a zone, so Tech dumped the ball down low then kicked it out to Dixon and Dowdell, who both hit 3-pointers.

When UVa went man-to-man, Collins took over. After coming up with an offensive rebound, Coleman threw down a two-handed jam to give his team an 18-10 lead. He finished with nine points in the first half. His final points of the half put his team up 34-24 with just under three minutes to play.

The Cavaliers responded as Smith’s 3-pointer on his team’s next possession sparked a 10-3 run to cut the deficit to 37-34 heading into the locker room. Smith began and ended the run with 3’s.

But the Hokies, brimming with confidence, began the second half on an 11-4 run to go ahead by double digits, and that’s how it stayed until the eight-minute mark.

Tech hopes that confidence will translate into more wins, starting with Duke.

“As long as we’re getting in the win column, that’s all I care about,” Dowdell said. “We’ll get the respect later after we shock the world I guess, that’s what we have to do. Right now it doesn’t really matter if people respect us or not. We’ll go out and earn that eventually.”

Believe it or not, Virginia Tech basketball is the real deal
BLACKSBURG, VA.

At ACC men's basketball media day in November, you couldn't pay anyone to talk to Virginia Tech coach Seth Greenberg. Or Hokie forward Carlos Dixon. Or guard Jamon Gordon.

While other conference players and coaches were swamped in a throng of reporters, the Virginia Tech representatives sat largely by themselves, aside from the occasional venture from a reporter concerning the difficulties of entering the best basketball conference in the nation.

Yet, on January 27, 2005, just two months later, you could swear you were in some kind of college basketball wonderland. Or hell, depending on where you hold your allegiances. Despite predictions for a finish in the cellar of the ACC, Virginia Tech sat in fourth-place at 4-2.

"Who would have thought that Virginia Tech would go down to Georgia Tech and won," Virginia center Elton Brown said as he answered questions in the team meeting room last Saturday. "I'm sure nobody in here thought that, and if you did, then I don't believe you."

Sitting at Cassell Coliseum in Blacksburg, the stands bounced like it was football season. The fans were obnoxious as always -- yet the Hokies finally have a basketball team to be obnoxious about. The capacity crowd of 9,847 rumbled the foundation of the arena with every Hokie success.

Though it pains me as I type it, at the very least, Virginia Tech proved that they can compete with any team in the ACC. They will not win the conference, instead finishing in the middle of the pack. But they have and will continue to be the biggest surprise in the ACC this year.

In a strong contrast, frustration marred the Cavaliers during the initial 20 minutes of play. Teammates yelled back and forth at one another on the floor. After a first half turnover, sophomore forward Jason Cain kicked a chair on the Cavalier bench upon being removed from the game, then was quickly reprimanded by Virginia assistant coach Walt Fuller.

After this peak of aggravation, however, the team did play through stints of the game with heart. Forward Devin Smith created the elusive four-point play with 3:25 remaining to bring the score to 70-67. Elton Brown hit a lay-up with nine seconds on the clock to bring Virginia to their high-water mark at 75-73, but then missed deep coverage on defense to allow the Hokies to pull ahead for good.

"Early in the second half, we fell down 16," Virginia coach Pete Gillen said. "We came back, we showed courage, we showed toughness, but you can't dig a hole like that."

What is being decided in the next few weeks is who will sit with the adults and who will eat at the kiddie table in the 2005 ACC. Outside of all previous speculation, the Hokies have proven thus far their ability to sit far above the cellar in the conference. The Cavaliers have much less to brag about, firmly exhibited by the infighting which occurred in the first half.

Yet, what happened after the buzzer sounded on the 79-73 Virginia Tech victory is what pristinely exemplifies the new mentality of the Hokies. Instead of rushing the court, as fans did after a win in Blacksburg two years ago, the Hokie faithful turned the decibel level down for the first time in the evening and quietly left Cassell Coliseum.

As painful as it is in Charlottesville, the program has earned that kind of swagger.