D.C.-area standout commits to Cavaliers
By Jeff White
Published: January 12, 2009

CHARLOTTESVILLE -- First came Hunter Steward, and then another offensive lineman, Oday Aboushi.

Yesterday, Jeremiah Mathis became the third high school football standout in the past week to commit to the University of Virginia.

Mathis is a 6-3, 240-pound senior at DeMatha Catholic High in Hyattsville, Md. His best friends include U.Va. cornerback Rodney McLeod, a former DeMatha teammate.

For the Stags, who last fall won their sixth consecutive Washington Catholic Athletic Conference title, Mathis starred at tight end and defensive end. Mathis, who's similar in size to Clint Sintim, is projected to play outside linebacker in U.Va.'s 3-4 defense.

Mathis said he also had scholarship offers from Maryland, Kansas State, Wake Forest, Clemson, N.C. State, New Mexico, Syracuse and Liberty. He arrived at Virginia with his parents for an official visit Friday and committed before heading home to Bowie, Md., yesterday.

"U.Va. was the perfect fit," Mathis said. "It just made sense. U.Va.'s not just building football players, they're building young men in their program."

Steward, a 6-7, 300-pound senior at Virginia Beach's Kellam High, is likely to spend next season in Fork Union Military Academy's postgraduate program before enrolling at U.Va. in 2010.

Aboushi is a 6-6, 300-pound senior at Xaverian High in Brooklyn, N.Y. He picked Virginia over Rutgers. -- Jeff White

 

U.VA. NOTES
By Jeff White
Published: January 12, 2009

Hourigan will do well, London says
Brandon Hourigan impressed Mike London in their one season together at the University of Richmond. The Spiders' football coach predicts continued success for Hourigan at the University of Virginia.

Hourigan was hired late last week as U.Va.'s director of football training and player development. He replaces Matt Balis, who left last month for Mississippi State.

"Brandon's going to bring his energy and passion," London, a former U.Va. defensive coordinator, said yesterday. "He reminds me of the guys that were there before him, Evan Marcus and Matt Balis."

Hourigan spent the four seasons as UR's head strength-and-conditioning coach for football. The Spiders won the NCAA's Football Championship Subdivision title last month.

"He's very up to date on the latest techniques, very innovative, and he cares for his players," London said. "He's a good man and a hard-working guy. He's among the best I've been around."

U.Va.'s 'X factor'
In talking last week about his team's upcoming opponent, Virginia Tech men's basketball coach Seth Greenberg said U.Va.'s "X factor" is forward Jamil Tucker.

"When he scores," Greenberg said, "they win."

That's overstating things, but not by much. As Tucker goes, so goes Virginia, it often seems.

U.Va. is 7-6 overall after losing 78-75 at Tech on Saturday. In the Cavaliers' wins, Tucker has averaged 11 points. In their losses, he's averaged 2.8.

The 6-9 junior went scoreless in four of those defeats. Against the Hokies, he was 2 for 8 from the floor and finished with five points. Tucker hit a 3-pointer with 3 seconds left to pull Virginia to 76-75.

U.Va., which leads the series 78-50, has dropped three straight to Tech for the first time since the late 1960s.

The Hokies beat the Cavaliers twice in overtime last season. Their next meeting is Feb. 18 in Charlottesville.

Scott is on roll
More consistent than Tucker has been the teammate he backs up at power forward, 6-8 sophomore Mike Scott.

Scott had 16 points and six rebounds against the Hokies. He's scored in double figures in five consecutive games, the longest streak of his career. Scott, who also hit his first trey of the season Saturday, is averaging 11.7 points and 9 rebounds and shooting 57 percent from the floor.

That Scott and Virginia's starting center, Assane Sene, battled foul trouble in the second half helped the Hokies immensely. Sene, a 7-foot freshman, matched his career highs in points (six) and blocked shots (four) and grabbed eight boards. Scott played only 26 minutes and Sene 25 against Tech.

Zeglinski downplays hit
U.Va. point guard Sammy Zeglinski was blindsided by a hard but legal screen set by Tech big man Jeff Allen late in the game Saturday. The impact knocked Zeglinski to the court, and he stayed down on his hands and knees for a few moments, trying to clear his head, while many Tech roared with delight.

In the locker room afterward, the redshirt freshman from Philadelphia tried to downplay the blow he took.

"I used to play football, so I'm used to getting hit like that," Zeglinski said. -- Jeff White

 

Despite loss, Virginia makes positive steps
By Whitey Reid
Published: January 12, 2009

Late in Saturday’s 78-75 loss at Virginia Tech, Virginia’s Sammy Zeglinski and Calvin Baker both ran into vicious Jeff Allen screens.
While both of Allen’s picks seemed perfectly legal, several other plays by the Hokies were not, according to UVa freshman Sylven Landesberg.
“There were a few blows,” Landesberg said. “It was definitely a physical game. I didn’t understand the rivalry until [Saturday], but there is definitely a rivalry going on.
“They took it to us. They were playing physical — with some dirty shots here and there. It was just a real physical, trash-talking game.”
A game that should make the Feb. 18 rematch between the schools at John Paul Jones Arena very interesting.
Virginia Tech’s physical play didn’t seem to bother Landesberg too much.
Virginia’s star freshman scored 20 points on 7 of 11 shooting. He also had eight rebounds and five assists. Landesberg’s only negative stat was in the turnover column — he tied a season-high with six.
“The guy’s going to get 20 whether it’s quiet or loud,” said Virginia Tech coach Seth Greenberg. “You can tell your guys to stay in front of him, but he got 20 without having to take a pull-up jumper.
“We told our guys, you have to stay in front of him and get lower than him, and he still drives to the basket. He’s a good player; you’re just not going to stop him.”
An encouraging sign for Virginia was the way it shot the ball. UVa, which has struggled with its motion offenses at many junctures this season, shot 53 percent from the field, including a respectable 41 percent from 3-point range.
Virginia (7-6, 1-1 ACC) also did a great job of holding Allen in check. The sophomore forward was 0 of 7 from the field and finished with just three points. On many occasions, Allen — who came into the contest averaging 13.6 points — seemed hesitant inside against Assane Sene, the Wahoos’ 7-foot Sultan of Swat (who tied a career high with four blocks).
“If someone told me that Allen wouldn’t make a field goal and we’d win, I’d say that’s a good day,” Greenberg said. “That’s probably not going to happen too often.”
When you consider that Virginia is starting three freshmen and a sophomore, Saturday’s performance — one in which it nearly overcame a 15-point deficit with under five minutes to play — could be viewed as a positive step (even though the final result was a loss).
“Coming here is a tough place to play,” said Zeglinski, who called his collision with Allen “a good screen.” “We could have just stopped playing when we were down [15], but we kept battling and made it a game. We just weren’t able to get a win.
“It was a fun game to play in. The crowd was loud. I think it will be a good experience for us later on — to let us know what we need to do in a hostile place like this to get a win. I think we showed a lot of poise at the end.”

 

Cavaliers Wake up, roll to win
By Jay Jenkins
Published: January 11, 2009

Wake Forest had its triangle-and-two defensive scheme. Virginia had its sixth man.
The latter was more valuable Sunday.
With a spirited crowd all but willing Virginia to a win, the Cavaliers shook off a sluggish start and closed out a 77-59 home victory over Wake Forest with one of the most
dominating scoring runs in the past decade.
Trailing 58-52 with 9:35 left, the 15th-ranked Cavaliers (14-2, 1-0 ACC) ended the contest with a 25-1 spurt that was fueled by eight points from Lyndra Littles and seven from Monica Wright.
Wake Forest, which entered the game ranked No. 25 in one poll, managed its lone point in the final nine minutes on a free throw by Corrine Groves with 2:20 remaining. As the Demon Deacons unraveled offensively, missing their final 12 shots from the field, the 3,737 faithful in John Paul Jones came to life.
“It was exciting,” Littles said. “Did you hear the crowd? They were like ‘Wahoos. Wahoos.’ That was great.”
Wright added: “I thought the crowd was the most into it today. Our defensive energy was really amazing and it is exciting playing in a game like that because you can see how the crowd is so supportive. They might not know it, but that really
fuels us. It really helps us. It gives us energy.”
The loudest burst from the crowd, of course, came after the Cavaliers finally took their first lead in the
second half.
Trailing 58-56, Virginia point guard Ariana Moorer sliced through the lane and kissed a layup off the backboard as she drew contact from Camille Collier.
Showcasing emotion for perhaps the first time during her rookie season, Moorer pumped her fist twice and connected on the ensuing free throw to give the Cavaliers the lead for good.
“It was really exciting and I was just into it,” said Moorer, who finished with six points and five assists. “I just showed my emotions and I never do it.”
Virginia needed the late-game heroics after Wake Forest attempted to deliver the knockout punch in the opening half. In fact, Wake Forest built a 16-point lead, at 36-20, on a layup by Courteney Morris.
“I was ready to kill them in the first half because they weren’t doing anything I was telling them to do,” Virginia coach Debbie Ryan said.
There were two good reasons: Wake Forest employed a face-guarding tactic on Littles and Wright with its triangle-and-two and Collier was almost unstoppable for the Demon Deacons.
Collier, a guard who entered averaging seven points, hit five 3-pointers in the opening half and scored 21 of her team-best 25 points in the first half.
“I was like ‘Oh, my God. We did not scout this,’” Wright said of Collier. “Wake Forest definitely came out in the first half ready to play. They came at us … and they didn’t give us anything easy.”
Virginia chipped into the deficit late in the first half as on-the-fly changes offensively eventually made it easier to free up Littles and Wright, who missed 16 of their 20 shots from the field in the opening half.
“We had no idea [about the triangle-and-two]. We hadn’t even planned for it,” Wright said. “I felt like making the last-minute decisions, the last-minute changes we did a great job with not knowing what they were throwing at us. We knew it was coming with ACC play … just not this soon.”
Virginia also used its dominance in the paint to create a lopsided margin in rebounding, a battle that it won 30-16 in the second half.
“The gut of this game, the two things that decided the game were offensive rebounding and us missing open shots,” Wake Forest coach Mike Peterson said.
It was a collective effort as Virginia had five players grab at least four rebounds in the second half. Wright, who scored a team-best 20 points, paced the attack with six offensive rebounds.
“Once we rebound and go it is tough to stop us,” Ryan said.
Virginia plays its first road game in the ACC on Friday as it travels to face No. 2 North Carolina. The televised contest starts at 8:30 p.m.