Rounding up thoughts on Signing Day
By Jerry Ratcliffe / Daily Progress sports editor
February 4, 2005

Some leftover notes from college football’s National Signing Day after the smoke cleared around Virginia’s McCue Center on Wednesday …

Hagans and Hall. There has already been some comparisons between incoming quarterback Vic Hall of Gretna and rising senior starter Marques Hagans. Both are small and explosive.
Groh said he believed it was unfair to both players to make comparions.
“We saw a lot of Vic Hall in Vic Hall,” said Groh, who likes calling Hall the “V-Train.” The coach liked the poise under pressure that Hall displayed in leading the Hawks to back-to-back VHSL Group AA, Division 3 state titles. He also liked Hall’s ability to perform well in big games.
While there have been rumors that Hall won’t play quarterback at Virginia because of his size, Groh said those rumors aren’t coming from the Cavaliers’ football office.
“Our feeling on quarterbacks is that they come in all shapes, sizes and forms,” Groh said. “What every team is searching for in a good quarterback is a guy who can move the ball down the field and make the team better than it otherwise would have been. There are different types playing on Sunday [in the Super Bowl, Donovan McNabb and Tom Brady].”
Groh said what he liked about both Hall and Hagans, and another quarterback signee, Jameel Sewell of Hermitage High in Richmond, is that they have a significant background in winning.

Recruiting up I-95. The northeast corridor, up Interstate 95 from Maryland to New York was good for Virginia’s football recruiting class. The Cavaliers landed eight of their 22 prospects from the region, signing four recruits from New Jersey, two from Pennsylvania and one each from New York and Maryland.
“The 95 corridor was fruitful for us,” Groh said. “It’s a high population density area, good football and good academic orientation. We set out to work that area aggressively. We have three coaches with background there each with a good sense of where the players are. We’ll continue to put an emphasis on it.”

Big Gene. Groh couldn’t help his giddiness over signing massive offensive lineman Eugene Monroe from Plainfield, N.J. Monroe stands 6-foot-6, 318 pounds and could have signed with any team in the country.
Where will Monroe play?
Groh said that while Monroe has shown some natural left offensive tackle tendencies, that spot is taken next season by rising senior D’Brickashaw Ferguson, who looks to be an incredibly rare four-year starter at the spot. But the coach believes Monroe will play as a true freshman and could line up at guard next season, then possibly move to one of the tackle spots in the future.
Monroe has already graduated from high school and is currently taking college classes at a nearby community
college to gain credits that will transfer to UVa.

Fixing weaknesses. Most UVa critics believed the two places on the roster that needed to be shored up the most were in the defensive secondary and at wide receiver.
Groh believes there’s plenty of versatility and variety among recruits to fill those voids next season.
“Some of these kids played both offense and defense in high school,” the coach said. “Mike Brown was a dynamic running back and kick returner as well as a cornerback. Kevin Ogletree scored 23 touchdowns last year primarily as a receiver, but also as a defensive back and return man. Chris Cook of Lynchburg played both ways.
“Between those three, along with wide receivers Maurice Covington and Brandon Woods, they all played offense and defense. All have been part of winning teams.”

Bookends. The coach said that if you had never seen the faces of Branden Albert and Eugene Monroe and lined them up and were asked to pick out Monroe, it wouldn’t be easy.
Monroe is 6-6, 318. Albert is 6-7, 310.
“Albert is a very good story,” Groh said. “He had a limited high school football background, but was a very good high school basketball player with good movement. It was one of those deals last year in turning over a lot of rocks. Ron Prince unearthed him for us.”
Albert attended Hargrave Military last season and has another solid year of football experience under his belt.
“At this stage last year, we were the only team recruiting him,” Groh said. “The Hargrave coaches are very high on him.”

Backs-R-Us. The Cavs signed two solid running backs in versatile tailback Mikell Simpson of Harrisburg, Pa., and Rashawn Jackson, a
245-pound bruiser from Jersey City, N.J. In fact Jackson and cornerback Brown both played at St. Peter’s Prep.
“Simpson was down here for our junior day around Feb. 1 last year,” Groh said. “We were very impressed with him last year. We had already evaluated him as a junior and was very high on the board. Lucky for us, we stayed on the top of his list. He has multiple skills. He runs inside, outside, returns kicks, catches passes from the backfield.”
Will Jackson stay at tailback or possibly move to fullback as did Jason Snelling a couple of years ago?
“When Jason was signed, we didn’t say he was a fullback. It was a way to get him in the games early. Right now, you see Rashawn is a very talented runner. I’ve seen him dunk two hands in basketball. He’s very athletic. But our thought right now is he’s coming in as a running back.”

The other Hall. That would be linebacker Olu Hall, the state’s No. 1 player on the Daily Progress Gold List in 2003, who spent last season at Hargrave Military Academy.
“He looks like what we want an outside linebacker to look like,” Groh said. “He will be able to come off the edge with explosiveness. He’s athletic enough to get involved in man coverage and will be a presence in the tight end [coverage] area. He’s a tough football guy. A year at Hargrave will have started the process from the down defensive end position to the stand-up outside linebacker spot.”

Miscellaneous ... Asked if there was a nose tackle in the class who could spearhead the 3-4 defense, Groh pointed out Woodbridge’s Kevin Crawford, a 6-3, 275 lineman, who could play the nose or defensive end. ... Fans who want to get a closer glimpse of the 22 Wahoo recruits, can call up Virginiasportstv.com and view a mini-highlight reel of each signee along with a comment from Groh. ... Asked if any of the new recruits might be the at long last deep threat Virginia has been missing at wide receiver and Groh quipped, “We don’t have any category on our board for short threat. We would hope they would all provide some of that capability.” ... Fans can also get an extensive look at UVa’s recruiting class at DailyProgress.com, where they can click on the Cavalier Insider and seek the recruiting section, or check out the Gold List icon to follow state recruiting with constant updates.

Cavaliers are in need of answers
By Andrew Joyner / Daily Progress staff writer
February 4, 2005

Virginia freshman point guard Sean Singletary has displayed a maturity and insight this season that belies his 19 years.

He has become the one player - regardless of his performance - the media flocks to postgame. He offers his assessments and his basketball IQ is among the best on this squad.

Even the precocious Singletary almost couldn’t muster the words Wednesday after a 98-79 loss at Providence. It was the team’s seventh loss in its last eight games.

While much of the ire of Virginia’s fanbase has been directed at Gillen, Singletary said that the players themselves deserve equal if not more of the blame.

“You can’t blame this one the coaches at all. We’re just not doing it,” said Singletary as he shook his head and prepared to exit the visitors’ lockeroom at the Dunkin’ Donuts Center.

In perhaps a small nod to the fact that Singletary is still a freshman, he may be a little naďve in that one way or another the blame will be directed toward his coaches. It is simply the nature of college athletics.

Virginia Athletics Director Craig Littlepage has received a plethora of e-mails and messages inquiring about the current state of the basketball program and Gillen specifically. Littlepage has responded to most and maintains the same stand on Gillen’s status that he has for the past several weeks during this losing stretch.

“My feeling has not changed. We will look closely at this after the season is over,” Littlepage said Thursday via e-mail.

Gillen, emotionally dejected and drained after the loss, said he and his staff will have to keep looking at ways to improve and he reiterated that his team has a third of its season still to play.

When asked about that third of the season left to play, Singletary maintained the necessary mentality and attitude but one wonders if his is an isolated case at the moment.

“We have to have strong character and come to the next game like it is 0-0,” Singletary said.

Whether that’s clinging to an optimism that’s not there can’t be determined and can be debated. At this juncture the cause of Virginia’s hemorrhaging season is quite clear: defense.

On Wednesday, Providence’s Donnie McGrath tied a NCAA record by connecting on 9 of 9 3-pointers as the Friars made 14 of 25 as a team. In the past four games, which includes a win over Clemson, the Cavaliers have allowed opponents to make 49 of their 95 attempts from behind the arc.

“We have to contest the shots better. When a guy gets free, you have to knock him and be physical with him. You have to do something. Our defense was not good. We couldn’t stop anybody,” Gillen said. “We went zone and they shot the ball great. We were aggressive in contesting the shots. … We have to contest the shots better. There is no question that is our problem.”

McGrath validated Gillen’s thoughts when he claimed that he didn’t feel as if Virginia was aggressive in coming out on him in the zone.

Singletary, the point guard of a team searching for answers at the moment, offered his thoughts on the barrage of treys.

“Maybe we are over aggressive or lazy. I’m not really sure,” Singletary said.

Jensen's ouster remains puzzling
Clark let down program with academic negligence
By Doug Doughty
THE ROANOKE TIMES

On the occasion of Virginia's second straight defensive debacle on the basketball court, it was hard not to think about departed assistant coach Rod Jensen.

Jensen, a former head coach at Boise State, was known for defense before spending two seasons on the Virginia staff, 2002-2004.

Numbers would suggest that the Cavaliers showed improvement defensively during Jensen's two seasons, but he was fired last April, as was fellow assistant Scott Shepherd.

When asked about the move, head coach Pete Gillen said that he wanted everybody on his staff to have a hand in recruiting and indicated that Jensen wasn't wild about the recruiting aspects of his job.

Jensen never responded to that perception, but Gillen also promised changes after a third straight NIT bid and fourth in five years. He may have felt that getting rid of Jensen and Shepherd represented a commitment to change.

If the purpose was to impress his supervisors, Gillen misjudged their desires. Athletic director Craig Littlepage has said publically that he never told Gillen that he needed to make changes in his staff.

If Littlepage thought privately that a staff change was warranted, he would not have recommended Jensen's ouster. From a good source, I understand that Littlepage had Jensen at the top of his men's basketball staff evaluation.

Frankly, I'm not sure Gillen ever felt comfortable with Jensen and may felt that Jensen was pushed on him shortly after the arrival of Jon Oliver as senior associate athletic director. Oliver had not played for Jensen at Boise State but was familiar with him.

None of this is intended as an indictment of staff newcomer John Fitzpatrick, who was quick to assert himself on the recruiting trail. However, the defense has deteriorated over the course of this season and it's easy to point to the absence of Jensen.

CLEARLY, THE greatest dropoff has occurred since the Jan. 19 announcement that 6-8, 245-pound senior co-captain Jason Clark had flunked off the team. It's no coincidence that UVa has been outrebounded by 19 and 13 in its last two games.

Who do you blame? Should Virginia have recruited Clark, who repeated his junior year in high school before graduating from Hargrave Military Academy? Once he got to Virginia, did academic advisors let him down? Were the coaches delinquent in monitoring his progress?

Ultimately, the blame has to go to Clark, whose ineligibility for the first half of the 2003-2004 contributed to a shaky start. As a co-captain and respected team leader, it was incumbent on him to get his academic act together. Since his departure, Virginia has been unable to guard anybody in the post (or anywhere else, for that matter).

HERE'S HOW BAD things have gotten for UVa center Elton Brown: He's starting to remind me of J.C. Mathis, the unlamented ex-Cavalier big man who is spending his final college season as a reserve for disappointing Michigan.

In recent games, Brown seemingly has reinvented himself as a left-hander. A natural right-hander, he is launching left-handed layups and half hooks on an increasing basis, not unlike Mathis, he of the "signature move."

(Mathis, also right-handed, would take off down the left side of the lane and fire up a left-handed runner that invariably would carom off the backboard, but not into the basket).

Virginia could live with Brown's new-found fascination with his left hand -- anything to confuse an opponent and prevent blocked shots -- but twice Wednesday night he missed both ends of two-shot free-throw opportunities, the first with 5:09 left and UVa trailing 78-67 and the second with 4:24 remaining and UVa down 82-69.

Only two of Brown's five rebounds came at the defensive end, but, with the Friars shooting 57.4 percent from the field, there weren't many defrensive rebounds to be had. The Cavaliers got four defensive rebounds apiece from Jason Cain and Devin Smith, but Donte Minter's return after a two-game absence was mostly disappointing,

Minter, wearing a bulky splint on his left pinkie finger, had three points and one rebound in nine minutes and repeatedly either got in bad rebounding position or mistimed his jumps (he doesn't jump well to begin with). After playing 13 and 16 minutes in back-to-back games against Virginia Tech and North Carolina, 6-11 Tunji Soroye played one minute at Providence.

WHO WOULD HAVE thought, when Gillen promised changes after a 110-76 home loss to North Carolina, that Soroye would be the player whose minutes were cut? If Gillen really wanted to shake things up, he would start using walk-on junior Billy Campbell, who had a layup in the final minute Wednesday night and has gone 4-for-4 from the field in the last two games.

Campbell made more 3-pointers in the final 50 seconds Saturday than oft-used, back-up point guard T.J. Bannister has made all season. If Campbell isn't rewarded for hustle and dedication, nobody should be. If you haven't been to a UVa home game lately, Campbell is the first player to hit the floor for pregame shooting, more than two hours before tipoff.

West Georgia's Mapp proud of his resilience
By JACK WILKINSON
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 01/08/05

CARROLLTON — As recruiting visits go, their initial face-to-face was as unique as Majestic Mapp's given name. When Ed Murphy met Mapp last April, he hoped to persuade him that the State University of West Georgia and the smaller whirl of Division II basketball were ideal for a one-time McDonald's All-American.

"Majestic, you could get a master's [degree] here," said Murphy, the West Georgia athletics director and basketball coach.

"Well," Mapp said, "I finish that this summer, coach."

"Shoot, I don't have a master's," Murphy says now, laughing. No wonder he told Mapp, "Whether you come here or not, it's really great to meet you."

Mapp came here, and it's been really great to coach him, too. He's leading West Georgia in scoring (18.2 points per game) and has helped the Braves — ranked 12th nationally in Division II — to a 12-1 record entering Saturday's Gulf South Conference opener in Pensacola against West Florida. Basketball, though, is merely part of it.

Once a heralded high school prospect and prized University of Virginia signee in 1999, Mapp played extensively as a freshman, then missed the next two-and-a-half seasons after twice tearing the ACL in his right knee.

Five knee surgeries later, he finally returned in January, 2003. For the next season-and-a-half, Mapp came off the Cavaliers' bench, often used sparingly.

Last summer, no longer in Virginia's gameplan, he transferred here to play his final season — but not before having earned a degree in economics from Virginia, then a master's in education.

And now, finally, he's sticking the jumper again. "I can still play, and I'm happy," said the 6-foot-2 senior. "I know I can still play in the ACC. But I'm playing, and I'm playing 35 minutes a night."

"Here's a kid who came out of high school as the Catholic school player of the year in New York," Murphy said. "He goes to Virginia when everybody thought he was going to UConn [which had just won the 1999 NCAA title]. He played really well as a freshman. Everybody figured he was going to be a pro.

"And then he has these terrible disappointments," Murphy said. "The re-hab from five surgeries. The pain and the sleepless nights this kid fought through. To have a kid who has the courage to hang in there and graduate, and come back and play, and then get a master's from the University of Virginia?"

Now Mapp's taking management and computer science courses, working toward a management degree "in case I open up a little store or business someday," he said. "I've learned you can't win if you quit. It was tough to do, I won't lie. But what am I accomplishing if I go in the tank? I'd probably be somewhere, like seeing a therapist. I didn't want to go there."

So he went to class, diligently, during his two-year convalescence and rehabilitation in Charlottesville.

Mapp, who grew up in Harlem and whose father is a New York City Housing Authority maintenance man and mother works as a 911 police dispatcher, followed their earnest example once he was injured. "My Mom said, 'This is the time you've got to get your classwork together and prove you're more than a basketball player,' " he said.

Mapp earned his B.S. in economics in 3 1/2 years, then completed his master's last summer. "I worked fast, and hard, because you only get one opportunity to get two degrees from the University of Virginia," he said. "I wasn't paying for it."

In November, 2003, Virginia coach Pete Gillen announced Mapp wouldn't be asked to return for this season. Mapp could've applied to the NCAA for a medical-hardship sixth year at the school. Instead, he considered several Division II schools, including West Georgia, where his old teammate from St. Raymond's High School, Darnell Miller, a 6-foot-5 guard, had already transferred from George Washington.

"If you still want to play, come here," Miller told Mapp.

"The coaches told me from the jump I'd get a chance to play again, every minute, every night. I needed that. I was tired of not playing," Mapp said.

"I can't even explain what it feels like to play 35 minutes a night," he said. "It feels like high school all over again, like I'm at home, in a zone."

He's far from the ACC, too. Saturday night, having taken a bus 300 miles to Pensacola, the Braves will bus to Valdosta for Monday's game; Virginia, meanwhile, will play at Georgia Tech.

Once back here, Mapp will play out his college career in a 2,500-seat gym. "A high school gym," he said, smiling.

It's hardly the ACC. "Not the [same] scenery. No attention. Everything the ACC has, this is 10 times down 10-fold. However, it's a great school. I've got great teammates and great coaches.."

He still harbors his dream, too: Of playing in the NBA someday, or at least professionally overseas. "I don't know if he ever will. At his size, it's a long shot. But I wouldn't count him out," said Murphy.

Once again, he has the ball in his hands when the game's on the line. If he's not the original Majestic Mapp, his journey's proved far more than majestic.

"I didn't give up," Mapp said.

Gillen should stay, at least through season
By Andy Bitter / Lynchburg News & Advance
February 4, 2005

There are gracious ways to let an employee go, though oftentimes this courtesy is overlooked in the sporting world.

Take the case of Ashley McElhiney, the first female head coach of a men's pro basketball team. She was canned from her gig with the ABA's Nashville Rhythm this week when the female owner - apparently in an effort to make George Steinbrenner seem warm-hearted - stormed onto the court and demanded a player be removed from the lineup. McElhiney refused and got a one-way ticket out of Dodge after the game. She was reinstated on Thursday.

Based on some of the message board banter out there, there are some UVa fans who wouldn't be that tame with men's basketball coach Pete Gillen.

Gillen's time is almost up at Virginia. It's sad that a 20-year coaching veteran, who has had success at all three of his stops, could watch things get so out of hand with this Cavaliers squad, which at 1-7 sits alone in the basement of the ACC.

His departure is not really a matter of if, but when? Fire him now or wait until later?

Here's a vote for later.

Virginia's goal was very plainly stated at the beginning of the season - NCAA Tournament or bust. Barring a four-day miracle at the ACC Tournament, the closest the Cavaliers will get to the NCAA Tournament will be whatever distance their couch sits from the TV when CBS begins its wall-to-wall coverage in mid-March.

The point is, what difference will it make by axing Gillen now? The critic will say he's lost the team (true), that some players have quit (also true) and that Virginia is being embarrassed by its ACC competition (I think trailing by 50 in your home gym qualifies).

But what good would it do to let, say, top assistant coach Walt Fuller take over the reigns for the remainder of the season? If the coaching staff has lost the team, hasn't Fuller been a part of that? Haven't the players also quit on him? Is he not part of the group that is being embarrassed by the rest of the ACC?

There is a short list of reasons for abruptly removing a coach - massive academic impropriety (see Harrick, Jim) or gross personal misconduct (see Eustachy, Larry). That's about it.

Gillen's name shouldn't even be written this close to that paragraph.

In his seven years at Virginia, Gillen, normally quick with a self-deprecating joke, has epitomized class. It would be nice if Virginia's decision-makers continued to treat him in a similar vein, which, to their credit, they have so far.

The drawbacks from any other course of action are apparent. For one, firing Gillen now could alienate some of the younger players - Sean Singletary, J.R. Reynolds, Gary Forbes - who committed to play for him and will comprise the nucleus with which any future Virginia coach will have to work.

Secondly, coaches are a tight knit fraternity. Anyone who thinks otherwise should listen to the comments opposing coaches make when Gillen's future inevitably comes into question in the upcoming weeks. They know their head could just as easily be on that chopping block.

That coaching pool will be the same one Virginia uses to find a successor, and coaches sometimes shy away from situations where it

has been perceived that previous staffs have been given a raw deal. How else do you explain most everyone's reluctance with the Notre Dame football gig?

That is not to say Gillen's firing after seven mediocre seasons with UVa would be unwarranted. The Cavaliers are in essentially the same spot they were when Gillen took over the program and the university has to do something to gain momentum for when it opens the state-of-the-art John Paul Jones Arena in 2006.

Athletic director Craig Littlepage has strongly tied Gillen's future with the school to an NCAA Tournament bid. Gillen himself stated before the season that Virginia's proper place was in the NCAA Tournament.

Why change the criteria now? Let the season finish. See where things are. Make a decision then.

Going another route will just make Virginia look like the Nashville Rhythm owner - uncaring, boorish and generally foolish.

Not the best way to go selling your program.

Michael Hoover
Winnings Not Everything Says Who?
Saturday, January 29, 2005

“We have met the enemy and he is us.”—Pogo

Several hours ago the University of Virginia Cavaliers lost a very ugly basketball game to the University of North Carolina by a score of 110 to 76. What’s even more discouraging to UVa fans and alums like me is that, as the sports pundits like to say, “The score was not as close as it seemed.” When you lose a game by 34 points and the announcers still add that damning phrase, you know you’re in deep trouble. For at least a couple of years now it has been no secret around Charlottesville that UVa head varsity basketball coach Pete Gillen’s job is in jeopardy. If you go to the fan sites on the web, you’ll discover a substantial group of unbelievably angry fans who have been shouting for Gillen’s head for a long time now.

For the first time this year, this die-hard fan did not watch the slaughter, but not because I knew my team would lose. After all, somehow, amazingly, UVa had beaten the boys in Carolina blue five straight times at University Hall, a piece of sports trivia that continues to astound. No, I didn’t watch it because there’s something else going on down in Charlottesville other than just losing. Lots of good teams lose and I’m always reminding myself that in every game one of the two teams will succeed and the other will be disappointed.

I didn’t not watch because UVa would lose. I didn’t watch because somehow a very nice man who I really want to succeed would most likely find himself in a sink-or-swim position and it was clear that the waters would be deep today. I didn’t watch because I don’t like watching good guys suffer and, clearly, Gillen appears to be suffering, and today he barely held his and his players’ heads above water. Each game I have the feeling that someone should put this poor guy out of his misery. I also didn’t watch because my team has a group of pretty darn good athletes who for some reason are not going to realize anything close to their potential this year. Many critics say this is a result of deficient coaching.

When Gillen was hired to take over a very down Virginia program seven years ago, he conjured up miracles with a ragtag group of walk-ons and this excited the powers that be so much that, to ensure they could lock up Gillen’s services for a looong time they gave him a lucrative ($900,000) contract for 10 years, guaranteed. After all, if Gillen could do what he did with discarded players, imagine what he would do once he had several successful recruiting seasons under his belt. Everyone of us bought into the hype, everyone of us had stars in our eyes, especially this year as the program’s supposed savior, Philadelphia’s magnificent point guard, Sean Singletary, would finally be on board to carry the Cavs to the promised land, i.e., the upper echelon of the vaunted ACC and a legitimate bid to the NCAA tournament.

The early season started off promisingly. The Cavs manhandled a good Arizona team with speed and good passing and earned a respectable 10-1 record and a temporary ranking in the top 25 of the national polls. But every ACC fan knows that nothing makes any difference until the ACC season starts. After today’s lopsided loss, the Cavaliers are tied with Clemson for the worst record in the conference (1-7) with no real salvation in sight. And, we might as well acknowledge it; the extra pain for Cavalier fans is that the dreaded Virginia Tech Hokies stand at 4-2 in the ACC in their first year in the conference. Don’t think that this doesn’t eat at the craw of thousands of UVa alumni who may have come to terms with Tech’s usual superiority on the gridiron, but somehow can’t believe that a Tech basketball team is playing with more passion and far more fun than UVa has since it had that motley team of overachievers.

YES! That’s it! I didn’t watch today’s game because it’s not any fun anymore. I don’t mean that it’s not any fun for me; losing is never fun, but I can take a loss if the competition and intensity are there. But it doesn’t seem to be fun for the players who now seem to approach every game with the idea that they will be outhustled, outcoached, or outdisciplined. What fun is it to watch players who act as if they aren’t having any fun?

I realize that I’m starting to sound like all the nasty naysayers who have been after Gillen for years. Actually, I’ve been almost praying that things would work out for Gillen, like the brief late-season run of victories that saved his job last year. But the University is banking on basketball wins to sell mucho tickets for its half-built, very expensive new John Paul Jones Arena and halfhearted efforts are not going to cut it.I hate that mentality. It’s not right. There’s entirely too much emphasis placed on winning. There have to be winners and losers, right? But I also hate losing with what looks like little effort. For all my moral posturing, and as much as I hate to admit it, it seems that I am part of the problem and I dislike that most of all.

Late season struggles haunt Cavaliers' defensive play
Since loss to Deacs, Cavs have failed to stop opponent's three-point shooting
Becky Pidel, Cavalier Daily Senior Associate Editor

The rocky road through ACC play hasn't been very smooth for the Virginia men's basketball team.

Coach Pete Gillen thinks his offense is turning out, but the defense -- well, if anyone finds it roaming lost around Charlottesville, Gillen probably would be grateful for its safe return to University Hall.

The Cavaliers quickly have turned a 9-2 start into a 10-9 (1-7 ACC) struggle with eight games left to play. They can attribute their record to mediocre defensive play, which began with a Jan. 2 home loss to Wake Forest and erupted during a three-game string of losses over the past week.

On the road versus Virginia Tech last Thursday, Virginia shot 51 percent overall and 43 from behind the arc. But the Cavaliers' defense gave the Hokies bragging rights in yet another sport. Virginia Tech shot 53 and 47 percent overall and from three-point range, respectively.

The bad dream of conference opponents on fire returned home with Virginia last Saturday, and North Carolina turned it into a daunting nightmare.

The Tar Heels flogged Virginia with 60 percent shooting from the field and 61 percent from long range -- including 73 percent (8-11) in the first half -- to build an insurmountable double-digit lead by halftime.

The inability to stop the three ball followed the Cavaliers to Providence Wednesday night. The Friars shot 7-9 from three in the second half, and guard Donnie McGraw set an NCAA record for 3-point field goal percentage by going nine for nine in the game for Providence.

"We did a very poor job defensively," Gillen said after Virginia's 98-79 loss at Providence. "The bottom line is that we've got to defend. We've got to dig down, suck it up and guard somebody. That's my biggest disappointment."

Defensive weakness to that degree just won't cut it.

"We've got to have stops. We can't give up," Gillen said. "With our defense -- the bottom line is you've got to guard to play at this level."

Providence, the worst team in the Big East -- arguably the nation's top conference -- easily handled Virginia, and now the Cavaliers have to head back into their own terrain in the ACC, a conference that also stakes a bid for the nation's best.

Saturday's game at North Carolina State isn't on easy ground either.

Gillen has never beaten N.C. State in Raleigh. Virginia's last victory there over the Wolfpack was a 55-46 win in 1997 when Jeff Jones was the Cavalier coach. The Wolfpack has won five of the last six overall.

Entering last night, N.C. State was 3-4 and sitting at eighth in the ACC, three spots above Virginia (Note: The Wolfpack played a late game at North Carolina last night).

The Cavaliers recognize the importance of getting conference win number two.

"Right now it's a must-win game," Virginia guard Sean Singletary said. "We just have to go out as a team and fight."

First exhibition match sets the tone for lacrosse season
Walker Freer, Cavalier Daily Associate Editor

To sports enthusiasts and journalists, following sports is like following the ebb and flow of the tide: The college sports season starts with football in the fall, slowly eases into basketball in the winter and eventually ends with baseball in the spring.

However, actual athletes follow a completely different schedule, one in which they are rarely afforded the luxuries of off days and down time.

Saturday, the Virginia men's lacrosse team will emerge from an eight-month "hibernation" to take on the fourth-ranked Naval Academy at 1 p.m. at the Turf Field.

The first of three spring exhibition games for the team (they played two in the fall), it should provide Virginia head coach Dom Starsia with valuable insight to strengths and weaknesses of this year's squad.

"It's going be a great test for us Saturday," Starsia said. "[Navy] is one of the top teams in the country, and we'd like to think we have a chance to be one of those final teams. Right off the bat here, a week into practice, we get to find out how we measure up."

How they measure up now will hopefully be better than how they measured up last season, when the team stumbled out of the gates and finished with a 5-8 record.

Navy's results were exactly the opposite: it finished 15-3 and advanced to the NCAA National Championship game, where it lost to Syracuse 14-13 in front of a record crowd.

This year, the Midshipmen return many of the key players who led them to the Championship game last season. Junior goalkeeper Matt Russell, the 2004 winner of the Kelly Award, which is given to the nation's top goalie, returns, along with senior defenseman Mitch Hendler and attackman Ian Dingman. All three were selected as pre-season first team All-Americans by "Inside Lacrosse" magazine.

Many of Navy's strengths currently are areas of concern for the Cavaliers, as the team lost their starting goalie and star defenseman to graduation and have possibly lost senior attack Joe Yevoli, a proven team leader, to a back injury.

With that in mind, Saturday's scrimmage is much more of a litmus test for Virginia than it is for Navy. For Starsia, learning to deal with adversity is one thing he seems to have mastered during his many years as a college lacrosse coach.

"That's what college sports is all about: making adjustments," Starsia said. "If I had my way, Tillman Johnson, Brett Hughes, AJ Shannon, Chris Rotelli would all stay behind. We have guys who are getting ready to step into those shoes, and we're very pleased with how practice has gone to date. The kids have worked really hard."

The Virginia players also seem to share their coach's view.

"Well, last year was kind of a disappointment," junior midfielder Kyle Dixon said. "But this year we're a whole different team, so we're kind of going into it with the attitude of my freshman year [2003] when we won."

Just as the tide flows in and out continuously, everyone associated with the Virginia men's lacrosse team hopes that this year, instead of the tide flowing out on another losing season, the team can capitalize and ride the tide to Philadelphia, site of the 2005 Final Four. The hibernation is over, the 2005 quest starts now.