Cavaliers set to go for ACC titles
By Andrew Joyner / Daily Progress staff writer
April 25, 2004

CHAPEL HILL, N.C - The Virginia men’s and women’s lacrosse teams have been on divergent paths for the season and for most part, remain so in the postseason.

The No. 3 Virginia women know they will be in the NCAA tournament where they will try to chase down the NCAA title that eluded them last season.

The Virginia men, the defending national champions, are scratching and clawing just to get a chance for an NCAA tournament bid. Just one loss and that quest is over and the Cavaliers will not reach the NCAAs for a 12th straight season.

At least for today, however, the Robert Frost-like analogies end there because their goals, and their path to that goal, are almost exactly the same.

In the ACC women’s lacrosse title game, second-seeded Virginia will meet top-seeded Duke. In the men’s title game, third-seeded Virginia meets top-seeded Maryland.

The commonality between the two UVa teams today? Revenge.

The Virginia women’s most disappointing loss of the season was to Duke. The Virginia men’s most disappointing loss of the season was to Maryland.

Those losses still haunt both teams in their own ways. For women, who have won five straight and 10 of their last 11, the 10-9 setback to Duke on April 3 was their last loss.

For the men, their 11-2 loss at Maryland (also on April 3) was their worst performance of the season and the exact definition of some of their season-long woes.

After their wins Friday in the semifinals, members of both squads had literally the same expression when asked about the championship game opponents: Very wry, very telling and very knowing smiles then followed by the respective answers.

“This is who we wanted to play. We are really pumped. If I were them I’d almost be scared right now but I shouldn’t say that,” said junior Amy Appelt, who scored two goals in Virginia’s 9-7 victory over Maryland on Friday.

Tillman Johnson, who made a career-high 19 saves in the Virginia men’s 11-9 win over North Carolina on Friday, admitted that the Cavaliers aren’t exactly upset with who their opponent is today.

“We definitely will look forward to playing them. You don’t have too many opportunities to play the team you lost to earlier in the season,” Johnson said. “I think the situation is magnified when you are playing a team that you also played so poorly against. We played really like I’ve never seen us play before. Getting a chance to play them again is pretty exceptional.”

No matter what happens in the women’s title game today, those Cavaliers know there will be a next week and the NCAA tournament. That is not the case for the male counterparts. They’ll need to beat Maryland and then win at Penn State next Saturday to reach the NCAAs.

That remained an obvious question for the players and Coach Dom Starsia on Friday night.

“We know the situation. We know are backs are against the wall but it doesn’t help for us to talk about it or remind ourselves of that. We really don’t have to be told,” Johnson said.

Added attackman Joe Yevoli: “Before last Saturday’s game against Duke, Coach Van [UVa assistant coach Marc Van Arsdale] told us is was a new season. We’re 2-0 in that new season and that’s how we are looking at it.”

Starsia was a little more philosophical in his assessment.

“There will be some psychological advantage I guess but I don’t think it will be the thing that carries the day. The fact that we lost to Carolina the first time wasn’t really going to help us [Friday night]. That will be the case against Maryland, too,” Starsia said. “We are all big boys here and we all want to win these games. I’m sure Maryland will be ready to play and I think you’ll see a great game.”
 

Falcons take Schaub in third round
By Jay Jenkins / Daily Progress staff writer
April 25, 2004

Matt Schaub’s newest destination changed in a New York minute.

Well, after a lengthy first round in Saturday’s opening day of the NFL Draft, it actually took just more than 10 hours for the former Virginia quarterback to learn his fate.

One placekicker, one punter and 89 picks later, Schaub was taken in the third round (90th overall) by the Falcons.

Despite the fact that Atlanta appears to have a mainstay at quarterback - Michael Vick - it did not faze Schaub to learn his NFL fate.

“I am real excited,” Schaub said. “They are a team on the rise and doing big things so I’m definitely excited to go and join up with the organization and do whatever I can to help them out.”

While the Falcons were not a team that NFL experts had listed as a potential location for Schaub to end up in, it did not surprise him.

“Sure it was [one of the teams I thought would draft me],” Schaub said. “I talked to them a bunch at the Senior Bowl, at the combines and they showed some interest and as it came to … it just fell in their lap. They took advantage of it and I couldn’t be happier to go to a team like that and a town like that. It is a great opportunity for me.”

As far as draft day, Schaub’s day in Charlottesville was filled with family, friends, teammates and a round of golf.

“[Today] went great,” Schaub said. “I had a lot of family and friends here and we went out on the golf course and we played a little bit. It was fun and it was a nice day. We came back here and had some food and hung around and enjoyed each other’s company.”

While you would imagine that it would be hectic in waiting to learn his fate, Schaub said he just took it in stride.

“It wasn’t that nerve-racking but I was sitting around and waiting and biding my time,” Schaub said.

Schaub also had the luxury of knowing that the Falcons were going to select him before it was announced.

“I did [get a phone call from Atlanta] right before they took the pick. They said they were going to take me right before they did on the TV,” Schaub said.

One bonus for Schaub will be the proximity that Atlanta is to Marietta, Ga.

In 1999, when Schaub entered UVa, his parents moved to Marietta from West Chester, Penn.

“It definitely won’t [be a tough move],” Schaub said. “It’s somewhere I know and my family is down there which is good. I will get to go down there and be with my parents. It will be great.”

In addition to Schaub, the Falcons selected another player from the Commonwealth - Virginia Tech cornerback DeAngelo Hall - with the eighth pick in the opening round.

With Hall and Vick on the roster and Schaub joining another former UVa standout Patrick Kerney on the team, it could make it interesting when the Hokies and the Cavaliers meet on the gridiron.

“We will give each other a hard time,” said Schaub, who plans to go to Atlanta this week to meet with the coaches. “[Vick] beat us both times we played them so I can’t really say a whole lot since I didn’t play against him when we played him.”
 

UVa's Ward, Johnson get the job done
By Andrew Joyner / Daily Progress staff writer
April 24, 2004

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - Tillman Johnson did his part early, Matt Ward did his middle and late and that combination was good enough for a Virginia victory.

Johnson registered a career-high 19 saves - many of the spectacular variety early on - and Ward scored a career-high six goals as third-seeded Virginia dispatched second-seeded North Carolina, 11-9, on Friday in the semifinals of the ACC men’s lacrosse tournament at Fetzer Field.

The Cavaliers (5-6) now advance to the ACC title game on Sunday and will face top-seeded Maryland. The Terrapins defeated Duke 10-7 in Friday’s first semifinal.

Joe Yevoli added two goals for the Cavaliers while Mike McCall led the Tar Heels (7-4) with four goals.

“It was a very typical ACC tournament lacrosse game. It was not a work of art by any stretch but it was a battle from beginning to end,” said Virginia coach Dom Starsia. “I think our best lacrosse is still out there but I was very pleased to get this win.”

Virginia was able to gain the early control of the contest and ultimately led 5-3 at halftime and Johnson was primarily to thank for that as he notched 13 first-half saves. Ward did supply the bulk of the offense in the first half with three goals.

“They were getting good opportunities early and Tillman definitely kept us in the game early on. The lead we had at halftime was basically Tillman,” Starsia said.

Added North Carolina coach John Haus: “Tillman is a great player. He’s an All-American goalie and probably the best in the country.”

Virginia’s momentum carried over into the second half as goals by Ward and then a pretty dive-and-shoot goal by Joe Yevoli pushed the Cavaliers to a 7-3 advantage with 8:15 left in third quarter.

Foster Gilbert would push that lead to 8-3 on a tally with 6:11 remaining in the third.

Gilbert stationed himself behind the goal with the ball and waited there nearly 15-20 seconds. As the boos and hisses rose up from the partisan Carolina crowd, Gilbert darted toward the cage and stuck a shot from the tight angle past UNC goalie Paul Spellman.

The play was almost identical to the one executed previously by Yevoli. It was also a play the Cavaliers had scouted well from their loss to North Carolina here just two weeks ago.

At the time, the goal at least appeared to be the proverbial knockout punch but it wasn’t.

“It’s a play we worked on and we knew from last time. Foster and I were able to execute it well and I think the fact that it was something we worked on and then it worked for us in the game, gave us confidence at that point,” Yevoli said.

Virginia entered the fourth quarter with an 8-4 advantage but that margin shrunk to just two, 8-6, on a goal by North Carolina’s Jed Prossner with 6:20 remaining in the contest.

The Tar Heels’ resurgence was short-lived as they were quickly sent staggering and then finally down for the count.

A goal by Ward made it 9-6 with 4:53 left and then Yevoli pushed the lead to 10-6 with 3:04 remaining and the Cavaliers had successfully removed themselves from any danger.

Ward’s six goals were certainly more surprising than Johnson’s 19 saves as he glanced at the stat sheet after the game. He even did a double-take when looking at it.

“Six goals? Wow. I didn’t even seem as if he had the ball that much. He must have had the ball six time and scored six times. That’s a pretty good ratio,” Starsia said.

Since walking off this field two weeks ago with a loss that dropped it to 3-6 overall, Virginia has looked like a completely different squad. The Cavaliers pounded Duke 13-4 last Saturday and then controlled most of the game en route to Friday’s win.

What’s been the difference? There are slightly different opinions.

“Our confidence level is completely different now and we knew we could play at a higher level and we’re doing that now,” Ward said.

Added Starsia: “I think primarily it’s just growing up. We weren’t ready for this game here two weeks ago and we weren’t ready earlier in the season at times. I’m not telling you are a finished product now but we’re starting to get it.”
 

Cav women rally to beat Terps by two
By Andrew Joyner / Daily Progress staff writer
April 24, 2004

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - The Virginia women’s lacrosse team is quite comfortable with its new trend against Maryland.

The second-seeded Cavaliers rallied from a

6-3 halftime deficit to defeat third-seeded Maryland 9-7 on Friday in the semifinals of the ACC tournament at Henry Stadium.

The victory was the third straight for the Cavaliers against the Terrapins, who had won 17 of the previous 18 contests against Virginia until this current streak.

Amy Appelt and Caitlin Banks each scored two goals to pace the Cavaliers. Delia Cox led Maryland with two goals.

The Cavaliers (14-3) now advance to face top-seeded Duke in Sunday’s final.

“I’m incredibly proud of the effort and intensity we played with. We needed to tweak a few things at halftime and we did that,” said Virginia coach Julie Myers.

Tweak might be an understatement.

After scoring the game’s first goal, the Terrapins (13-3) rattled off five straight goals to take a 5-1 lead with 7:33 left before intermission on a tally by Annie Collins.

The Terrapins eventually took the 6-3 halftime lead into halftime.

If there was a bullet point to the first-half woes for the Cavaliers, it was the play of junior Amy Appelt.

Appelt, who leads the nation in scoring (83 points) and was named the ACC’s Player of the Year on Thursday, misfired on six shot attempts in the first half and did not register an assist, either.

Among Appelt’s attempts were two shots of the pipe and two near-misses.

“I wasn’t real frustrated and I knew that if I kept playing, the shots would state to fall,” Appelt said.

They did.

Appelt scored two quick goals to open the second half and that seemed to provide the necessary momentum shift for the Cavaliers. Virginia scored six straight goals to begin the second half and vaulted to a 9-6 advantage on a goal by Ashleigh Haas with 11:15 remaining.

“We had generated a lot of chances in the first half and were missing the mark. We told them to just keep shooting and adjust their sticks and the shots would go in and they did,” Myers said.

Virginia held Maryland to just one goal the rest of the way as UVa keeper Andrea Pfeiffer made several key saves down the stretch that didn’t allow the Terrapins to get back into the game.

As for her team’s current streak against the Terps, Myers admitted to a certain sense of accomplishment that it’s a hurdle her program has cleared or at least put in the past.

“I think it’s awesome when you beat a great program no matter whose wearing the uniforms. I don’t think we looked at this as we had to win to make this three in a row. To beat Maryland three times in a row means you are doing something pretty darn good,” Myers said.

Now the Cavaliers face Duke, a team that beat 10-9 in the regular season. No one needs to remind the Cavaliers of that fact.

“We definitely want to play them. That’s who we wanted to play,” Appelt said.
 

Gillen keeps job,doesn't lose critics
Cory Alexander interested in coaching vacancy
By Doug Doughty
Exclusive to roanoke.com by 5 p.m. Thursdays

The furor had barely died down from Virginia’s decision to retain Pete Gillen as men’s basketball coach before UVa fans had some more issues to dissect.

In the span of five days, here's what happened:

On Friday, it was announced that Rod Jensen would not be returning for a third season on Gillen's staff.

On Sunday, freshman point guard T.J. Bannister was among a group arrested for disorderly conduct.

On Monday, 6--foot-9, 245-pound Blue Ridge School junior Laurynas Mikaluaskas made public his oral commitment to the Cavaliers.

On Tuesday, it was announced that sophomore forward Derrick Byars had been given a release from his scholarship and would be transferring to another school.

If you’re a Virginia fan, the best news — in fact, the only good news — is that Miklauskas has committed. This is a program that needed a Lithuanian connection.

I'm sure some people will disagree with me on this, but the most troubling news is that Jensen is leaving.

SOME PEOPLE WOULD say that Byars’ departure is the biggest blow, especially in light of Gillen’s comments April 2, when he said he expected everybody back.

About a week later, when I was in Charlottesville for one of the open Virginia football practices, an assistant men's basketball coach told me that Byars had enrolled for summer school that day — an indication that he was at least contemplating a return.

When I heard about Byars’ departure, the first person I thought of was Lance Blanks, who, like Byars, was a fourth-team Parade All-American in high school. Blanks left Virginia after his second year in 1986-87 and transferred to Texas, where he became a first-round draft pick.

If Byars goes to another school and becomes an all-conference player or an NBA draft pick, it wouldn't surprise me. He’s got an NBA small forward's body and he can shoot with range, witness his nine 3-point field goals on his last 11 attempts this season.

You can say that Byars didn't play enough minutes to develop any consistency, but, to me, you've got to earn those minutes. Byars seemingly battled confidence problems throughout his two seasons at Virginia and, when his shot wasn't falling, he didn't contribute in other areas.

ON A TEAM that was crying out for rebounding, Byars didn't rebound. The Cavaliers ranked 310th out of 326 Division I men’s basketball teams in rebounding last year. If Byars or anybody else had made rebounding his No. 1 priority, he would have carved out a niche for himself.

The player on Virginia's roster to whom Byars was most comparable was 6-6 freshman Gary Forbes. Even when his shot wasn't dropping, Forbes always seemed to find ways to fill a boxscore — with rebounds, with blocked shots, with steals. Forbes was an energetic, if not always effective, defender.

In what will turn out to be the last game of his Virginia career, Byars played 25 minutes in a 73-63 loss at Villanova, where back problems kept double-figure scorer Devin Smith off the floor. With a chance to make statement, Byars had four points and three rebounds and at a key juncture dribbled the ball off his leg on a fast break.

My best guess at UVa's starting lineup for 2004-2005 would be Elton Brown at center, Jason Clark at power forward, Smith at small forward, J.R. Reynolds at shooting guard and Sean Singletary at point guard.

Virginia was looking at a situation where it had to find minutes for Byars and Forbes. And, what of fall signee Adrian Joseph, a 6-7 recruit whose athletic ability has brought comparisons to Adam Hall?

To me, Joseph sounds like another Derrick Byars — maybe better, maybe worse, but a similar kind of player. It wasn't going to be possible for Virginia to find enough minutes to suit Byars, Forbes and Joseph. Byars is a smart guy. He probably could see that his minutes weren't going to increase, so now was the right time to go.

He's a good kid and a good student and potentially he could be a very good basketball player. No program is well-served to lose a quality individual like that, but will it seriously damage the product that Virginia puts on the floor in 2004-2005? I doubt it.

AS FOR JENSEN, I submit that it would have been better for Gillen to have made no changes at all than to have gotten rid of Jensen.

I should stop and say that I have no confirmation that Gillen asked for Jensen's resignation, but, in Jensen's two years at Virginia, the Cavaliers improved defensively — one of the reasons Jensen was hired — and, as the former head coach at Boise State, he provided the "wise head" on the bench that many people felt Gillen needed.

Jensen shares a Boise State background with UVa's senior associate athletic director Jon Oliver, one of athletic director Craig Littlepage's closest advisors. I imagine that Oliver had some input in Jensen coming to Charlottesville. After what was no doubt a close call in bringing Gillen back, why would he want to alienate the basketball people in UVa's athletic administration?

When Littlepage referred to possible changes in the UVa men's basketball program, could he possibly have had Jensen's departure in mind? I doubt it.

The first change I would have made would have been to stop the ill-conceived rotation that had Alexis Sherard going on the road one year, then coming off the road and having Scott Shepherd take over road duties. This is no knock on Shepherd, who is universally liked in the profession, but Sherard was involved in the successful recruiting of Forbes and Joseph the past two years. Why change?

IF IT WERE IMPORTANT for Gillen to restore some good will, he would be well-advised to stay within the Virginia family — and not necessarily the Pete Gillen basketball family.

Personally, I think the Cavaliers need to see what John Crotty is doing but Boston University coach Dennis Wolff said he has spoken to Crotty "and I'm not sure he wants to be a basketball coach or governor of Florida," Wolff related.

Crotty, apparently retired from the NBA, would be the kind of attention-grabbing hire that would bring some UVa fans back to the Gillen fold.

Jason Wiliford, who works for Wolff at BU, is the ex-Cavalier player who has the best coaching resume for a spot on the Virginia spot. Another ex-UVa player who has always impressed me is Cory Alexander, currently wrapping up his pro career.

"How about Cory?" said Oak Hill Academy coach Steve Smith, who coached Alexander in high school. "Cory would do it, too. He called me and said, 'Coach, man, I'll go coach there.' He's probably realizing he's not going to get another [NBA] shot, so let's move on. He's probably got the bankroll, so they wouldn't have to pay him that much. They need somebody like him."

SMITH SAID HE was told by Stepas Karas, who has been instrumental in placing a number of Lithuanian players, that 6-9 Oak Hill junior Donatas Visockis was the best prospect his age in Lithuania. After watching Mikaluaskas account for 29 points and 14 rebounds against Oak Hill, Smith could see there was no comparison.

“I should rave about him," Smith said of Mikalaukas. "We beat them by 50 and he was by far the best player on the team. He scored on [Louisville-bound] Brian Johnson. He had 29 points and Brian Johnson was the guy guarding him. He beat him down the floor, he trailed and made a couple of threes, he scored inside, he scored on transition.

"Based on what I saw that night, he's very good. Athletically, I was like, 'I'm not sure,' but he had two or three dunks in transition and one was in traffic. He's more athletic than most kids you think about when you think about Lithuanians. He's more athletic than the kid [Vytas Danelius] at Wake Forest.

"I've got a Lithuanian who was supposed to be the best player in Lithuania, but this kid [Mikalauksas] was way better.”
 

Marcus Vick, Hagans following parallel paths
Hall most impressive of in-state QBs
By Doug Doughty
Exclusive to roanoke.com by 5 p.m. Fridays

The absence of coaches from the Nike All-Star Football Camp this past weekend in Charlottesville did not make a newspaper man’s job any easier, but that did not change my opinion of its worth.

I can’t imagine that the 300 or so players who descended on the football practice fields adjacent to University Hall could have gone anywhere and received the kind of testing and instruction that they received from the Nike staff over an approximately four-hour span.

Personally, I would have liked a roster, but, without college coaches on the scene, the people from Nike and their colleagues from studentsports.com did not feel compelled to share their information with, say, The Roanoke Times.

You can subscribe to studentssports.com and get all of their privileged information for $5.95 a month, but nobody stopped me at the gate or prevented me from interviewing the athletes or their coaches.

Two of the coaches I recognized instantly were Tommy Reamon from Warwick High School and Mike Skinner from Centreville.

Reamon had been in Blacksburg one day earlier and had stopped in Charlottesville with his quarterback, Cody Brodus.

Brodus is a lanky left-hander who has a physical resemblance to Aaron Brooks, who played quarterback for Reamon at Ferguson High School.

“You need to put Brodus in your top five,” was the last thing Reamon told me before heading back to Hampton.

For some time, Reamon and I discussed another of his quarterbacks, Marcus Vick, who is entering his third (redshirt sophomore) season at Virginia Tech.

There was mention of the charges that Vick and two teammates face for contributing to the delinquency of a minor, with Reamon saying he was comfortable with the way Tech has handled the situation, but mostly we talked about Vick’s playing future.

“If you want to knock out the heavyweight champion of the world, you have to knock out the champion,” Reamon said.

In other words, when incumbent Bryan Randall struggled in late October and November, Vick had a chance to take command of the Tech quarterback situation with a superior effort against Miami and Pittsburgh, but he didn’t wow anybody.

In my mind, Vick is where Marques Hagans was at Virginia going into the 2003 season.

The Cavaliers felt they needed Hagans on the field, so they moved him to wide receiver.

Ultimately, Hagans rescued the Cavaliers when he stepped in for an injured Matt Schaub against Western Michigan, but he continued to see time at wideout and finished the season with 28 receptions.

Now that Schaub has used up his eligibility, Hagans is in a position where he could start for two seasons.

Even if he does not wrest the job from Randall, Vick is in a position where he could start at Tech for two full seasons, but what does he do in the interim?

As a redshirt freshman, Hagans did not put up the kind of receiving stats to match Vick’s four-reception, 82-yard, one-touchdown performance in a 52-49 loss to California in the Insight Bowl, but Vick has practiced exclusively at quarterback this spring.

Reamon did not disagree that Vick could contribute in other areas if he is not playing quarterback, “but he has said he wants to be a quarterback,” Reamon said.

The impression I got was that Vick had painted himself into a corner and couldn’t return to wide receiver without looking bad, in light of earlier pronouncements.

In between gout pills, Roanoke Times reporter Randy King said Friday that he remembered Vick comments to that effect, but that they were made earlier in the season and that Vick had no major beef after playing wideout in the bowl game.

King said there’s no way Tech could use Vick at wide receiver now because there is no proven No. 3 quarterback. In order, what if Vick gets hurt at wide receiver and then something happens to Randall? Then, who plays quarterback?

Good point. But, if you don’t have a proven big-time wide receiver and Vick’s game against California was for real, can Tech afford to have him standing on the sideline in headphones?

VRIGINIA RECRUIT Vic Hall was the shortest of four prominent in-state quarterbacks at the Nike camp, but he was taller than I thought and probably taller than Hagans, listed at 5-10 1/2.

Gretna coach Rob Senseney huddled with quarterback instructor Bob Johnson after the camp and said that Johnson felt Hall needed some help with his footwork, which was understandable because Hall has spent most of his Gretna High School career in the shotgun.

Moreover, Hall has been playing center field for the Gretna baseball team this spring and had not been working on his passing. Nevertheless, nobody at the camp threw a tighter spiral and Hall threw the deep ball with a lot of oomph on it.

There has been considerable talk about Oscar Smith’s Greg Boone, who has 11 scholarship offers, but Boone did not throw the ball as accurately as several of the other quarterbacks and, at 6-4 and 250 pounds, did not look particularly mobile.

Hall, Boone, Brodus and 6-2 Bobby Rome were ranked among the state’s top 25 juniors by The Roanoke Times after the 2003 season, but 6-3, 200-pound Jameel Sewell from Hermitage High School in Richmond may be joining their midst. According to thesabre.com, Sewell has received offers from Syracuse and Virginia.

Reamon said Virginia and Virginia Tech have offered Brodus, and Boone also has offers from the state’s two Division I-A programs. Why the Cavaliers feel a need to sign two quarterbacks, I don’t know, but, from what I’ve seen, Hall has nothing to worry about. Hall probably feels that way, too, because he is as solid for Virginia now as he was when he committed early last October.

Senseney, who had floated the possibility that Hall might take recruiting visits to other schools, said Sunday that there is a good chance now that Hall won’t look anywhere else.

THERE WILL BE approximately 60 prospects on hand at Lane Stadium today for Virginia Tech’s spring game, including the state’s premier offen sive-line prospect, 6-6, 270-pound Pat Sheil from Centreville High School.

The Centreville coach, Skinner, said Sunday that Sheil nearly had committed to Virginia two weeks earlier. Tech is seen as the Cavaliers’ biggest competition for Sheil, especially given the presence of former Centreville players Blake Warren, Brett Warren and Will Montgomery on the Hokies’ roster.

WHAT WOULD BE the odds that two of the state’s pre-eminent young sports journalists would be struck down by the same insidious disease? Astronomical, you would think, but the above-mentioned King is now providing medical advice to an unnamed Roanoke area sports talk-show host.

King was watching his diet even before he was involved in a brouhaha Friday morning at the Bojangle’s in Daleville. After waiting 15 minutes for his chicken order, only to receive a breast and wing when he had requesting a thigh and leg, King made a 20-minute drive from his home in order to confront the manager.

Order was not restored until King was appeased with four free chicken legs.