Salem grad back on field for UVa
Haley allowed to run amok
Confusion in his academic status put Dennis Haley on hold in 2002, but he's learning on the run now.
By DOUG DOUGHTY
THE ROANOKE TIMES

CHARLOTTESVILLE - To watch Dennis Haley streak onto the football field, turn back toward the bench and throw up his arms, it almost seems as if he's clueless.

A couple of years ago, he might have been.

"That's one of my responsibilities," said Haley, who is receiving the most extensive playing time of his Virginia football career. "I'm supposed to confuse the offense, so, if it looks like I'm confused, too, that's a good thing."

Haley, a fourth-year junior from Salem High School, is playing close to 30 plays per game on special teams and as a linebacker in the "nickel" and "dime" packages that UVa uses in obvious passing situations.

Until this year, Haley's college career had been marked by inactivity, so much so that he has yet to play against Florida State, the Cavaliers' opponent Saturday at 7:45 p.m. at Scott Stadium.

After starting the opening game of the 2002 season, Haley might have thought he would start at FSU in Week2, but he was not in uniform that day or for the rest of the season.

Haley learned on the eve of the Florida State game that there was a question about his eligibility, an issue that Haley doesn't fully understand even now.

The unfortunate part for Haley was that he made academic scheduling decisions in the summer of 2002 based on information that was inaccurate.

"Everybody felt bad about it," Haley said. "I still haven't talked to anybody at a higher level. It was pretty much a case of, 'That's the rule, that's how it goes.'"

Haley held out hope that he would be able to play in the Continental Tire Bowl, held after the conclusion of first-semester classes, but the NCAA ruled that he would have to miss an entire season. As a result, he remained on suspension through the first game of this season.

"That had been mentioned as a possibility," Haley said. "In the back of my head, with all the stuff that had happened last year, I was thinking, 'What else could go wrong?'"

Haley's fortunes began to turn when he played 23 plays against South Carolina in Week2. The next week, at Western Michigan, he was in for 47 plays and had six tackles, including four solo tackles, his first career sack and a caused fumble.

Last Saturday, he deflected a punt in the Cavaliers' 30-27 overtime loss at Clemson.

"I got a fingertip on it," said Haley, a 6-foot-1, 240-pounder. "I'd never even come close to blocking a punt before. In high school, I was returning them."

Haley was primarily a tailback for Salem and did not receive significant time at linebacker until his senior year. He frequently impressed former UVa coach George Welsh with his work for the scout team in 2000, but Haley was very much a work in progress.

A knee injury in the spring of 2001 prevented him from making a quick impression with new coach Groh, who elected to go with a fifth-year senior, John Duckett, the next fall. Haley played 46 plays all year.

"If I'd been a coach, I'm not sure I would have played me either," Haley said. "This is not a position I grew up playing. It was last year before I really felt like I knew what I was doing."

The only place to show it, once more, was on the scout team.

"I was still meeting with coach Groh and going over what I needed to do to improve," he said. "He was behind me the whole way last year. He watched over me. He kept my confidence high."

In UVa's base defense, Haley backs up Darryl Blackstock at one outside linebacker spot, with a chance to replace Raymond Mann on the other side next year. His play in the nickel will determine that and, as Groh is quick to admit, the more confusion the better.

"With Dennis, it's more by design now than it used to be," Groh said. "Particularly in the nickel, the protection can readily identify your intent. What I tell those guys is, you can't line up out there like an iron deer on the lawn."
 

Tech billed $229,657 for role in suit vs. the ACC
By MARK BERMAN, LANDMARK NEWS SERVICE, The Virginian-Pilot
© October 15, 2003

BLACKSBURG — The cost of Virginia Tech’s role in the ACC-Big East saga has gotten higher and could continue to soar.

Tech has gotten the bill for its five weeks of involvement in what was originally a lawsuit filed by five Big East schools against the ACC, Miami and Boston College. Tech removed itself from the lawsuit when it was invited to join the ACC in June but the athletic department still must pay legal and other fees of $229,657.

Meanwhile, Tech and the Big East are at odds over $1.5 million that the league says the school owes. When Tech joined the Big East for all sports in the 2000-01 school year, it had to pay $200,000 per year for its first five years in the league. Tech will fulfill that agreement by paying $200,000 in 2004-05, even though it’s in the ACC.

However, the deal for Big East membership also required that Tech pay the league $300,000 annually for five years beginning in 2005-06. Tech was to take part in Big East basketball revenue-sharing for the first time in 2005-06, so the league was planning to take out the $300,000 before giving Tech its slice each year.

The Big East still wants Tech to pay that money during those years. Tech contends it shouldn’t have to pay because it obviously won’t get any Big East basketball money.

“We’re working with our legal counsel on that,” Tech athletic director Jim Weaver said. “At the appropriate time we’ll take whatever action we need to, if any.” Tech’s general counsel office has been debating the Big East about the issue.

Weaver said the matter is on the “back burner” but will be resolved before Tech exits for the ACC next summer.

Tech’s other costs associated with the conference switch are a $1 million exit fee to the Big East and a $2 million entrance fee to the ACC.

The athletic department will dip into its cash reserves to pay the $229,657 legal bill.

“The way things turned out for this university, it was well worth the cost,” Weaver said.

With expenses piling up, Tech has raised men’s basketball season-ticket prices this year. A season ticket will cost $265. That covers 15 regular-season games; Tech has decided not to charge admission for exhibitions this year.

Tech, which has had three straight losing seasons, charged $181 for season tickets last year for 16 games, including an exhibition and a home game with Virginia.

Every other Big East school charged more than that for at least some, if not all, of their season tickets.

The season-ticket price will increase again for the ACC debut in 2004-05. Weaver said that increase hasn’t been determined but “it’s not astronomical.”

With ACC membership making basketball more of a hot ticket, Tech is planning to reassign all the seats in Cassell Coliseum to reward generous donors.

Weaver said Tech will probably do that in 2004-05, providing the school a test case before it reassigns the seats in Lane Stadium in 2005.
 

Expansion bound to earn ACC enemies
TOM SORENSEN

There is no way the ACC could grow from nine schools to 12 without making enemies. By expanding, the ACC upset the natural order of college athletics. College athletics likes to think of itself as civilized and covered in tweed, in one urbane hand a lofty book and in the other, look out, money to deliver under the table to its athletes.

The ACC charged into expansion. It cut covert deals and, when threatened with lawsuits, refused to back down. The ACC came across as greedy while the Big East, which supplied the three new members, came across as needy.

Guess what? The result was worth it. Miami, Virginia Tech and now Boston College enhance the ACC. With Miami and Virginia Tech, the ACC will have two schools that annually contend for football's national championship. And with 12 teams, the conference finally gets a lucrative and potentially thrilling game between the champions of its divisions.

Traditionalists are appalled. Traditionalists like things the way they were. If traditionalists did not like things the way they were, they would not be traditionalists.

Why did the ACC have to grow? Why did the conference have to rearrange rivalries? And while we're at it, why are television shows no longer in black and white? Wasn't life better when candy bars were a nickel? And don't you think the conference was better before Florida State?

There are times when you lose if you don't move, and this is one of them. The nine-team conference, which shared history and geography, was a beautiful thing. It was great. It was quaint.

And it was about to become outdated. Every major conference wants more power and leverage. There still are a few jewels of schools out there, and leagues will go after them the way a basketball coach goes after a stud point guard.

Did the NFL become lesser when it added wild card teams to the playoffs? Did Major League Baseball become lesser when it added a layer of teams and games to its? We get used to a thing being a certain way and we want it to always be that way. Change is scary. It also can be good.

The biggest problem with expansion is the ACC logo, which includes a map of the contiguous states in which the members are located. The current one is not much bigger than a silver dollar. The new one will be the size of a $10 bill.

Tuesday, the Big East, which has been to expansion what a butler is to his master, a punching bag is to a fist and a slipper is to a foot, sued ACC officials, Boston College and its athletics director. The Big East earlier sued the ACC, but the suit was thrown out because, I think the technical reason was, on account of lameness.

Yet, the Big East is likely to add Conference USA members Louisville, Cincinnati, Marquette and DePaul. The move will gut CUSA and leave the Charlotte 49ers anticipating their big game against Southern Mississippi.

I'd suggest Charlotte sue the Big East, but I'd hate to see the 49ers turn petty. So how about if Southern Mississippi sues?

 

Late look still suits the ACC
Published October 15 2003
David Teel

Clemson president James Barker compared the ACC's clumsy courtship of Boston College to buying a suit.

"You put it on, wear it a while and think it needs some alterations," Barker said Sunday after he and the conference's other CEOs voted unanimously to invite Boston College. "In this case, that was true."

Memo to Barker and his buds: This ain't The Men's Wearhouse.

Buy a suit from wild man George Jenkins, and you pay $9 to have the trousers cuffed. The ACC bought Miami and Virginia Tech in June and now must pay $14 million-$24 million to add Boston College, a jolting cost for athletic departments scrounging to make ends meet.

If the presidents are this inept with academic finances, chemistry department bake sales can't be far behind.

For those who purged the bad memories: Determined to expand into the Northeast and meet the 12-team minimum required to stage a conference football championship game, the ACC's Gordon Gekkos first targeted Big East members Miami, Boston College and Syracuse. Their raid was all but done until state politicians strong-armed Virginia president John Casteen into insisting on Virginia Tech's inclusion.

Tech's addition prompted expansionists to ditch Syracuse, the most reluctant of their targets. Miami, Boston College and Virginia Tech were ACC-bound.

But on Election Day, June 24, North Carolina State chancellor Marye Anne Fox - traveling in Italy (tipsy on Chianti?) - supported Miami and Virginia Tech but rejected Boston College, leaving the Eagles one vote shy of an invite and the ACC one member shy of the football playoff that is the financial linchpin of expansion.

Conference officials petitioned to lower the championship-game minimum to 10, but when the NCAA rebuffed those efforts, ACC presidents went groveling back to Boston College. Convinced its football fate hinges on affiliation with Miami, Boston College breathlessly accepted the invitation.

All's well that ends well? A simple alteration? Hardly.

In June, the Big East required $1 million and one year's notice from a departing school. Today, after a recent bylaws change aimed at protecting its borders, the conference requires $5 million and 27 months' notice.

So unless the Big East plays nicely and allows Boston College an early exit, the Eagles can not join the ACC until 2006-07. And unless the NCAA reverses course, the conference cannot play a football championship game until December, 2006.

Since the ACC believes such a game will net $10 million, a two-year delay costs $20 million. If the Big East cooperates and Boston College moves in 2005, the delay costs a mere $10 million. Add the extra $4 million Boston College must pay the Big East, and the ACC's tab comes to $14 million or $24 million.

Syracuse athletic director Jake Crouthamel sounds bent on wringing every nickel possible from Boston College and the ACC.

"Three months ago, the presidents, chancellors and athletic directors of the six remaining Big East football schools sat face to face and pledged their loyalty to one another and the Big East," Crouthamel said. "I guess handshakes don't mean much anymore. ... The whole process, quite frankly, stinks."

Credit or debit, Mr. Barker?

Some pin this squarely on Fox, but there's more than enough blame to go around. Blame ACC commissioner John Swofford, who knew 11 was a fiasco, for not having enough clout with his presidents. Blame the presidents for not consulting their athletic directors. Blame them all for not realizing how difficult (impossible?) it would be to lower the NCAA championship-game minimum.

But don't expect contrition from the presidents. They're going to like the way they look - no matter how foolish and callous they appear to others.

Trying to 2nd That Emotion
Cavs Beat FSU in 1995, They Want to Do It Again
By Jim Reedy
Special to The Washington Post
Wednesday, October 15, 2003; Page D05

CHARLOTTESVILLE -- Nearly eight years have passed since Virginia handed Florida State its first ACC loss. Many of the young men who played in that game have had children and 30th birthdays. And as current players and coaches from both teams are quick to point out, it bears no direct relevance to the game the Cavaliers and seventh-ranked Seminoles will play Saturday night at Scott Stadium.

Yet that 1995 game remains the most famous in the Virginia program's history, partly because it also remains the Cavaliers' only win in 11 meetings with FSU. For Virginia fans, the mere mention of the final score -- 33-28 -- conjures up memories of Mike Groh and Tiki Barber. Of Warrick Dunn fighting toward the goal line on the game's final play, stopped a few inches shy of a game-winning touchdown.

The players "believed. We didn't have to convince them," said George Welsh, who was then in the 14th of his 19 seasons as Virginia coach. "They believed -- because we had played pretty well, even though we had a couple losses -- that they could win."

Maintaining that belief often was easier said than done against the Seminoles, who steamed into Charlottesville with a No. 2 national ranking, a 7-0 record and an offense that averaged 56 points and 600 yards per game. In the days leading up to the game, Welsh praised it as "one of the best in the history of college football."

Virginia hardly shut FSU down, allowing 546 yards -- including 487 passing yards, which stands to this day as the most by a Virginia opponent. But the Cavaliers limited Dunn, a shifty tailback who had earned mention as a Heisman candidate, to 54 rushing yards. They made three interceptions, including one by safety Percy Ellsworth at his own 2-yard line.

Losing an ACC game "was something you knew was going to happen one of these days," said Florida State Coach Bobby Bowden, whose Seminoles joined the conference in 1992. "When I think back on it, I think of the opportunities we had to score where we didn't. It ends up haunting you."

Offensively, No. 24 Virginia was powerful in its own right, led by Groh at quarterback and Barber at tailback. With 11 days to prepare for FSU, the Cavs developed a plan of attack that helped them score 17 straight points to pull ahead, 24-14.

The Virginia defense, playing mostly in a 3-3-5 formation that utilized the talents of redshirt freshman safety Anthony Poindexter, held Florida State scoreless in the third quarter and through nearly nine minutes of the fourth. Rafael Garcia, meantime, kicked three field goals to boost the lead to 33-21.

But then the Seminoles closed to within five points. With four seconds remaining in the game, they lined up for one final try from the Virginia 6-yard line. The Cavaliers, who had lost games to Michigan and Texas on the final play earlier in the season, seemed headed for more heartbreak.

At his postgame news conference later that night, in fact, Welsh admitted he "thought for sure we were going to lose it." They came excruciatingly close when Dunn took a direct shotgun snap and plunged through the right side of the offensive line. Safety Adrian Burnim, a redshirt freshman who was only in because a senior starter had just been injured, hit him at the 3-yard line. Poindexter arrived a moment later. When Dunn finally stopped kicking, his shoulders had crossed the goal line, but not the ball.

Linebacker Jamie Sharper "made the play," Welsh said. "He reaches in and trips him up. . . . You had to look very closely at the tape to see it, but if he doesn't get a hand in there . . . [Dunn] probably would have gotten in easily."

Al Groh, who succeeded Welsh in 2001, was an assistant coach with the New England Patriots in 1995, but he amended his work schedule that week so he would have time that Thursday night to flip on ESPN and watch his son, Mike, and the Cavaliers.

"I got home 30 seconds before the kickoff, and paced around the floor of the television [room] for most of the next three hours," Al Groh recalled. "Pretty exciting."

Most of Groh's players have seen the game only on ESPN Classic. But they wouldn't mind repeating the achievement.

"It was a great game," said junior wide receiver Ottowa Anderson, who was 12 in 1995. "I'd love for the crowd to experience that again Saturday."
 

Magi? Wise men of ACC bring another gift from East
By Lenox Rawlings
JOURNAL COLUMNIST

Santa Claus has nine reindeer. Last Christmas, the ACC had nine schools. The ACC expanded to 12, and now they both cover about the same ground.

Santa Claus smiles, fat and happy.

The ACC smiles, hoping that it will become fatter and happier one day.

How does it know? It doesn't, really, but Commissioner John Swofford virtually promised a windfall of money and power. ACC athletics directors, presidents and chancellors - people who breathe to raise money and exercise power - eventually bought the pig. They bought it whole hog, as they used to say on Tobacco Road back when Tobacco Road constituted the heart of a smoking basketball conference rather than 33 percent of a sports corporation.

During the political dance, Duke and North Carolina squealed a bit, bamboozled because their claims of inherent infallibility fell on deaf little pink ears. Virginia's political establishment aligned with the two dissidents and wedged Virginia Tech into the pen, creating a dramatic soap opera with Miami's camera-hungry president taking center stage.

On a Monday afternoon in June, Donna Shalala said yes, an answer that might frighten some suitors but soothed the ACC beggars like 45-weight sunscreen on South Beach.

Miami's acceptance mitigated the damage caused by a surreal international teleconference a few nights earlier. In that high-octane meeting of presidential minds, Swofford and supportive athletics directors lost control of their nominal bosses.

ACC sports insiders proposed adding football power Miami, basketball power Syracuse and media-market power Boston College. The chief executives gave them Virginia Tech and Miami, which embarrassed the two rejects, ripped another hole in the ACC's tattered national reputation and forged an 11-team league that Swofford's financial consultants had never plugged into the computer models. Oops.

The net sum of all this brainstorming: a plan gone hotwire and a budget gone haywire. In several bizarre strokes, the ACC buried its past, botched its present and complicated its future. The 11-team arrangement altered perceptions of a conference boastful about its logical methods and exposed the flaws of disorganized power grabs.

The 11-team arrangement cut two more slices of pie without producing the football championship game, which ACC officials predict will yield $7 million to $10 million. The 11-team arrangement ruined basketball schedules, increased travel costs and looked foolish. Oops.

Out of chaos comes ... rationalization, followed by desperation.

Throughout the summer, Swofford and his agenda-toting athletics directors assured uncommitted bystanders that everything would work out. The message: 'Just trust us. We have models for everything. We might even play 20 games in basketball.'

Change for change's sake

The principals convened behind closed doors, where they bumped into certain human truths. Such as: Every millionaire basketball coach wants everything his way, a scenario prohibiting 20-game schedules that might cut into the diet of Fairfields and Prairie Views.

When the ACC opened the doors, the schedule had been reduced to 16 games. Duke wouldn't play every other school twice, so the regular-season winner might achieve that stature through a softer schedule. In that case, many people would refuse to confer legitimacy on the first-place team.

Duke and Carolina, teams that certain loyalists love to hate, will not visit every gym every season. For 50 years, the essence of the ACC flowed from the certainties of those winter nights, from the lock-solid guarantee that all rivals would show up before spring broke and the tournament began.

Football's grand scheme produced two divisions, with games assured against division members and one primary partner from the other half. That way, Florida State and Miami could still play without staying in the same division.

The fallacies of the new system stuck out like sore ankles. The sickest example: N.C. State would not play Duke the next two seasons although the schools are about 25 miles apart, share the same airport and for 80 straight autumns met every year except one (1944).

In a sense, the ACC reached a breaking point familiar to boomtowns. Cities annex territories with an eye on future tax revenues and government grants. Time passes, growth occurs and suddenly the cities face astronomical infrastructure bills. If enough people move in, the cities need more schools. The cycle spins into overdrive.

The ACC expanded to 11 and found the infrastructure costs surpassing the revenues. Swofford and his supportive athletics directors nudged their nominal bosses toward the trough once more, pushing for a 12th team to round out expansion. The CEOs complied, inviting Boston College again, before the Big East exit fee jumped a few more million and the options narrowed.

This invitation surprised no one, except for misinformed folks around Charlotte who somehow got the goofy idea that Notre Dame would throw away its traditions as quickly and gleefully as the ACC. Everywhere else, people shrugged. In Boston, the reaction illustrated the relative insignificance of BC and college sports generally. Newspapers barely grazed the topic, obsessed with the Red Sox-Yankees war.

The marriage will set up the football championship whenever BC extricates itself from Big East claws, sometime between now and 2006. The ACC probably will plug BC into the division with Wake Forest, FSU, N.C. State, Clemson and Maryland.

Fred Barakat, the associate commissioner in charge of basketball scheduling, suspects that the ACC will retain the same 16-game formula with two primary partners. For Duke, the partners are Maryland and Carolina. For Wake Forest, the partners are N.C. State and Georgia Tech. Carolina and State also are partners.

The complication: finding partners for BC and adjusting for the changes.

'The model's the same, unless we go to divisions,' Barakat said. 'Originally, we didn't go to divisions, but everything's subject to change.'

ACC officials thrive on change. Swofford conveyed that message throughout, insisting that nothing stays the same, that the ACC needed to take over new markets and grow or suffer the perils of stagnation.

He got his wish. The ACC now has a larger footprint, and you know what they say about bigger feet.

Bigger feet have bigger calluses.
 

Cavs sneak a peek at Clemson
By Steve Ellis
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER

Florida State offensive coordinator Jeff Bowden plans to talk to big brother Tommy this week. The Clemson head coach can pass on one tip: Be careful in signaling plays.

The (Columbia, S.C.) State reported that Clemson coaches discovered Virginia players stealing signs as they were being signaled from the sideline to quarterback Charlie Whitehurst as the Tigers ran a no-huddle offense. Virginia players would steal the plays and then call them out to teammates before the football was snapped.

"We started addressing it Sunday, because it gets to be a problem, especially in the middle of the year," Tommy said.

Clemson will use two persons to signal plays in during future games, including one with a "dummy" play.

FSU, which also signals plays from the sideline, will play Virginia on Saturday.

On fire

Georgia Tech's offense has been putting on quite an Octoberfest. The Yellow Jackets went into October averaging 12 points a game. Georgia Tech has scored 53 points while gaining 813 yards over two games.

The Yellow Jackets had a 150-yard rusher (P.J. Daniels) and a 150-yard receiver (Jonathan Smith) in the same game for the first time in the program's 111-year history. It happened against Wake Forest Saturday.

Not forgotten

Virginia quarterback Matt Schaub said he won't use the program's 33-28 victory over FSU in 1995 as motivation Saturday. But that doesn't mean Virginia coaches won't bring up FSU's first loss in the ACC.

Quarterbacks/receivers coach Mike Groh passed for 302 yards and two touchdowns in that game. Graduate assistant Anthony Poindexter had 10 tackles, including the play that kept Warrick Dunn out of the end zone on the game's last play.

"I think most of the players know what both of them did," said head coach Al Groh. "But it's certainly nice to have some living legends, if I may, around to remind them."

Another actor

Bobby Neely is best known among FSU fans for his role in a favorite Halloween story. Neely was making his first start at tight end for Virginia on a cold, foggy Halloween night in Charlottesville in 1992. Standing across from him was mammoth FSU defensive end Sterling Palmer, who was wearing one of those Darth Vader fasemasks. Steam was coming out from under it as Palmer breathed. Neely, as he admitted later, was looking for any sign that there was human life standing across from him. Moments before Virginia's first snap, Palmer looked directly at Neely and said, "Trick or Treat, ------ ------."

The words he used were not for family consumption. FSU coach Bobby Bowden was later asked what they might have been. Without hesitation, he said that knowing the character of his players, Palmer no doubt said, "Trick or Treat, pretty please."

Neely was playing a role in another story Thursday night. Neely was cast in Tuesday night's "Judging Amy." He played the character of athlete Jason Jarvy. Neely began his acting career after two seasons in the NFL.
 

Healed Schaub directs Cavaliers
By Steve Ellis
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER

Florida State's defense has little time to mope or point fingers in the aftermath of the Miami game. Virginia quarterback Matt Schaub awaits.

"I told our guys I'm so thankful we're not facing a weak team next," defensive-ends coach Jody Allen said. "These guys are good, and this quarterback is the real deal. He's 6-foot-5 and hits everything he throws at. If you leave him a crack, he'll get it there."

Schaub injured his shoulder in Virginia's season opener and missed the next two games. He completed 71.3 percent of his passes in the past three games with 881 yards and six touchdowns. He helped Virginia overcome a 10-0 halftime deficit Saturday before the Cavaliers' defense sputtered to allow Clemson a 27-24 overtime win.

"I thought I've done a pretty good job coming back," said Schaub, who completed 19 of 25 passes for 247 yards with three touchdowns against FSU last season.

"I missed a few throws last week that I otherwise would have probably gotten. ... Just timing."

Schaub was 33 of 48 for 271 yards and two touchdowns against Clemson. He also tossed two interceptions.
"Matt was a little high with the ball all day like a (pitcher) is a little high with his fastball," Virginia coach Al Groh said.

Schaub works behind a line that lacks the overall tonnage that FSU has seen from other opponents. But Allen said Virginia's athleticism and quick feet up front will pose problems.

"They have long arms. We'll have to be a little more physical," Allen said. "We can't just go right by them. We have to try to get some four-man rush on (Schaub)."

FSU didn't sack Miami's Brock Berlin but needs to put pressure on Schaub. Virginia may have to rely even more on Schaub's arm against FSU. Wali Lundy, the league's leading rusher, isn't expected to be available after he sprained his right ankle against Clemson. Virginia could have tailback Marquis Weeks (5-foot-11, 210 pounds) available. Arthroscopic surgery has kept him out of the past two games. Meeks, whose career highlights include 129 yards rushing against North Carolina State last year, has rejoined the team in practice. Alvin Pearman, who is averaging 52.5 yards per game, will start if Lundy can't go.

Miami played without its top running back and still managed to rush for 131 yards. But Schaub remains impressed with FSU's defense.

"You definitely see their swagger ... they are definitely making a lot of plays," Schaub said.

Both teams enter Saturday game's with title hunts on players' minds. FSU is off to a 4-0 start in the ACC and remains in the chase for a national title. Virginia is 3-1 in the league.

"We're not out of the hunt at all by any means," Schaub said. "We did a lot of good things to come back in that football game (Saturday). We're not down at all. We're confident what we can do."

Noteworthy

• Virginia may have Rich Bedesem in the lineup after the inside linebacker missed the past two games with a knee injury. Freshman Kai Parham, who had 14 tackles Saturday, has been starting in Bedesem's absence.

• FSU offensive coordinator Jeff Bowden won't show his hand, but Virginia players expect Chris Rix to go for big strikes on Saturday.

"They are going to throw deep on us a lot," Virginia cornerback Almondo Curry said. "...Try to knock us out of their rhythm. They don't want us to play the short field. They want to take their long shots. The cornerbacks, we definitely have to get jams on receivers. We can't let them just get up the field immediately.

"We have to get pressure on Rix and can't let him get out of the pocket, because he's an excellent runner."

• The Cavaliers were already aware Tuesday that FSU will start a true freshman at center in John Frady, and that inexperienced tackle Ron Lunford also will start.

"That's going to play a major role in our defensive scheme because we've got a couple of talented defensive linemen up front and hopefully they'll be able to take advantage of a guy like that," Curry said.

• FSU starting noseguard Jeff Womble (tricep) did not practice Tuesday and is listed as doubtful for the Virginia game.
 

Gillen's plan for U.Va.: turning back the clock
Cavaliers coach will use a smaller lineup as they try to run foes off the court
BY JEFF WHITE
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Oct 15, 2003

CHARLOTTESVILLE - On the recruiting trail this year, Pete Gillen's pitch to prospects has included this promise: His basketball team is returning to the uptempo style of play that yielded impressive results early in his tenure at the University of Virginia.

"He did mention that to me," said Adrian Joseph, a 6-7 forward whose athleticism has been compared to that of former U.Va. swingman Adam Hall.

"He wants to run the floor, have four wings and one post guy and keep running," said Joseph, who recently committed to Virginia for 2004-05.

Gillen's sixth team at Virginia begins practice Saturday. The Cavaliers open the season Nov. 23 against Mount St. Mary's, and fans at University Hall that night can expect to see a blue-and-orange-clad team that pushes the ball upcourt more than did its immediate predecessor.

"We'll be quicker this year," Gillen said, "and next year we'll be back to where we need to be. We're looking for more quickness."

In 1999-2000 and again in 2000-01, Gillen started 6-8, 255-pound Travis Watson at center and 6-7 Chris Williams at power forward. Each was undersized for his position, but both generally were quicker and more athletic than the players who had to cover them.

U.Va. pressed and ran with abandon in 1999-2000, averaging 81.5 points, finishing 9-7 in the ACC (19-12 overall) and advancing to the NIT. A season later, the Cavaliers again went 9-7 in conference play. They averaged 85 points and finished 20-9 after losing in the first round of the NCAA tournament.

Gillen's program clearly was on the rise, but everywhere he turned, it seemed, he got the same advice: Virginia needed more size so it wouldn't get pushed around inside.

"We were always criticized for not being big enough," Gillen said, "but we were 9-7 two years in a row playing one post player and four perimeter players."

In 2001-02, U.Va.'s starting lineup usually included two post players: Watson and 6-8, 240-pound J.C. Mathis. Williams moved to small forward, which seemed to be his natural position but where he wasn't as effective. The Cavaliers went 7-9 in the ACC, 17-12 overall and lost in the NIT's first round.

Their scoring average dropped to 79.6 points in 2001-02, and it plummeted again last season, to 73.9. Playing Watson primarily at power forward, Gillen alternated 6-9, 275-pound Elton Brown and 6-10, 250-pound Nick Vander Laan at the other post position. The Cavaliers were too slow to press effectively, which meant they no longer got many easy baskets in transition. They went 6-10 in the ACC, 16-16 overall and lost in the NIT's second round.

"It wasn't successful," Gillen said. "We're better off smaller."

And so the Cavaliers will once again employ a lineup that Gillen calls "four-quick" - a big man surrounded by four perimeter players. Much of the time, that post player figures to be Brown, a junior who's down to 250 pounds and seems poised for a breakout season. Look for 6-7, 205-pound sophomore Derrick Byars and 6-5, 235-pound junior Devin Smith to line up periodically at power forward, much as Williams did.

The shift in philosophy is one reason, Gillen believes, that the plodding Vander Laan transferred in August to an NAIA school in California for his final season.

"I think he was worried about playing time," Gillen said. "He mentioned to [senior guard Todd Billet] he'd heard about us going 'four-quick.'"

Virginia's roster includes five freshmen: guards T.J. Bannister, Gary Forbes and J.R. Reynolds, small forward Jason Cain and power forward Donte Minter. All but Minter are natural fits for Gillen's trademark run-and-press system.

The newcomers join at least five holdovers from 2002-03: Brown, Byars, Smith and guards Billet and Majestic Mapp. The status of a sixth veteran, 6-8, 235-pound junior Jason Clark, is unclear. Gillen and Athletic Director Craig Littlepage have declined to say if Clark, the team's most athletic big man, is academically eligible to play this season.