Game Preview: Virginia faces Pitt in looking to avenge upset in first meeting - SCACCHoops.com

Game Preview: Virginia faces Pitt in looking to avenge upset in first meeting

by UniversityBall.org

Posted: 3/4/2017 7:30:42 AM


Remember the first game against Pitt? On that cold January night, we gave up what felt like a million threes (ed. note: 13) in losing what felt like a forgivable game to a Pitt team that some people (ed. note: this author among many others) thought could be pretty good. The Twitter consensus late that night was that the defensive side of the court — where we allowed 21 threes and 58 percent shooting in losing to FSU and Pitt — was to be the potential pain point moving forward.

Fast forward to March 3rd. Today. Pitt is 4–13 in the ACC and is not hitting 61% of their threes (they’re a respectable 8th in 3-point percentage at 37%). Virginia has the most efficient defense in ACC play (96.4 DRTG in league games) and the whole damn country (86.4 for the season). Conference opponents are shooting a league-low 32% from behind the arc. Tomorrow’s rematch with the Panthers will be played exactly two months after the first meeting, but it feels like two years.

Tomorrow marks Senior Day for London Perrantes. As is traditional, he’ll get a tribute piece from me after the season is over. For now, I’ll leave it that it feels appropriate that he gets the ceremony to himself. London has largely flown under the radar during his Virginia career, preferring the team concept to individual notice. It’ll feel good to see him soak in enough applause to account for the last four years.

Jontel Evans and Perrantes have started 221 of Tony Bennett’s 266 games as head coach. Evans was a fierce defender and gritty gamer whose embrace of Bennett’s five pillars laid the foundation for our current success. Perrantes stepped in and lifted this program up a step: his steady hand has overseen all of two ACC regular season titles, an ACC Tournament title, an Elite Eight, a Sweet Sixteen, and four NCAA Tournament appearances in total — an unprecedented run of success for Virginia in the modern era. His legacy will be wins — lots of them. The next point guard (Ty Jerome, I presume) has big shoes to fill.

Pitt has had a rough go of it. After losing by one to Notre Dame and beating us to begin ACC play, they lost eight straight, a brutal stretch that included one of the last good wins of the season for NC State and a still-unbelievable 55-point loss to Louisville. Once they woke up at 1–9, things perked up for a sec — they won three of four , including wins over FSU and Syracuse — but any dream of a late season resurgence fell away with losses to Georgia Tech, Wake, and UNC.

Pitt’s not deep. Outside of their five starters, only junior forward Ryan Luther gets steady run from the players that will be active tomorrow (one-time starting point guard Justice Kithcart was dismissed today). In the kind of intense, low possession game we want, I’m hoping our depth makes a difference.

Kevin Stallings claimed he was going to free Pitt’s guys from the constraints of Jamie Dixon’s offense, but these things take time. Instead of beautiful, free-flowing transition basketball, Pitt is playing slower (65.8 possessions per game compared to 66.1) than they did under Dixon and relying more on the contributions of two players.

The first of those go-to guys is the 6'9'’ Michael Young, who uses a ton (30%) of possessions and shoots (31.7%) on a ton of them. Young is having himself a year: he’s averaging 20.1 points per game, 6.9 rebounds, and 2.8 assists and doing it efficiently (112.6 ORTG) despite entering every game wearing a neon sign proclaiming him one of Pitt’s two real threats with the ball.

The other primary Panther is Jamel Artis, the 6'7'’ wing-turned-point guard. Artis has also filled box scores (18.9 ppg, 4.8 rpg, 3.4 apg) while shooting 40% from three. Artis had one of the stranger lines of the year (6–12 overall, 6–7 on threes, 6–12 from the line) in their win in Pittsburgh. The Artis-as-Point-Guard experiment hasn’t worked out perfectly (he’s turnover prone and really struggles to defend smaller players), but he’s having a nice year producing his own offense.

A typical Pitt possession sees one of those two take the ball off of a high ball screen and either create for themselves, the screener (Young in particular is an adept roll man), or a spot-up shooter. As we’ve seen in our nightmares, Pitt takes a lot of threes — 41% of their shots and 36% of their points in ACC games, league highs both. Artis (40%) and Cameron Johnson (42.4%) lead the way with six attempts each per game, but the nominal “bigs” in Young (36.7%) and Sheldon Jeter (38.8%) will take and make the shot and even gritty wing Chris Jones (9–33 for the season) takes enough to keep defenses honest.

You’d think the Panthers would be more efficient than they are. They’re 11th in the ACC in efficiency (1.04 ppp) and 14th in EFG% (49.7), and I think it’s because they haven’t made enough threes (37% in league games) to make up for their relatively poor (45.6%) shooting inside the arc. They lack height and athleticism — particularly inside — getting a lot of shots (12.5%) blocked and struggling to finish others when contested.

Pitt’s defense has been borderline disastrous (1.14 ppp, 39.1% on 3-pointers) in ACC play. They don’t block shots or force turnovers and allow opponents to snare about a third (32.4%) of their own misses. Small guards have been able to get wherever they want to.

Two major factors stand out when you look at Pitt’s four ACC wins: they’re 38 of 78 (48.7%) on three-pointers (compared to 37% for all games) and have a free throw rate of 49.2 (compared to 36.5 for all games). We’ll obviously need to contest well (and count on them not making ridiculous contested shots like Cameron Johnson did in the first meeting). If Kyle Guy and Ty Jerome are in the starting lineup again (and I hope they are), then they’ll be tasked with maintaining their upward trend in that area.

Artis and Young are both adept at winding into the lane. I’m not as worried about Artis (yes, I know what he did last game), because we have a surplus of wing defenders and I think he’ll probably give up close to as many as he gets if he’s matched up with London, Kyle, or Devon.

I’m not as confident about Young. He’s too smooth and too quick with the ball for Isaiah to be a perfect match and is too large for most of our wings. Devon Hall will see a lot of time, especially since Pitt’s modern positionless starting lineup isn’t always the best look for Jack Salt (he played two minutes in the first meeting).

I love that we’re giving the three more emphasis of late (21–40 over our last two games, or 37.7% of our shot attempts). I’d love it even more if we were complimenting the threes by finishing in the lane, getting to the line, or hitting those bread’n’ butter two-point jumpers with more regularity. We haven’t hit 40 percent of our twos since Duke or 50 percent since Louisville. For comparison’s sake, the team with the 175th-ranked offense in the country — the most average of the average — is hitting 49.1% of their twos for the season. I want us to continue to take the three (Kyle and London alone should combine for at least 12 attempts if they’re both playing major minutes), but basing our success on them feels precarious on this particular team.

Virginia Eights:
G: London Perrantes — 6'2'’ sr #32 

Six of his last 13 from behind the arc and 14 assists to just one turnover over our last two games, with the best part of those performances being his individual D on Justin Jackson. I don’t know if he’s all the way right yet, but he’s getting close.
G: Devon Hall — 6'5'’ jr. #0
Last three games: 44 points, 10 rebounds, eight assists, 6 of 11 on three-pointers, two wins. 
G: Kyle Guy — 6'3'’ fr #5
Pitt is tall — their smallest regular is 6'6'’ — and that height really bothered Kyle during the game in Pittsburgh. Don’t put too much stock into that, though, because UNC is pretty tall too and he just hit five threes against them. Guy is 10 of his last 14 over our last two games. Not too shabby. 
F: Isaiah Wilkins — 6'7'’ jr #21
Wilkins had a fantastic game (four points, nine boards, four blocks) against UNC, especially given their size advantage and his lingering illness. 
F: Jack Salt — 6'11'’ so #33
Salt’s multiple offensive rebounds (three) against UNC marked his first game with more than one in our last six. 
G: Darius Thompson — 6'4'’ jr #51
Thompson has assisted a teammate in every game where he’s played at least 10 minutes this season. On the other side of the coin, he’s made one of his last 16 three-point tries. 
G: Ty Jerome — 6'5'’ fr #11
Ty’s two-point percentage (65.5% for the season) shows he’s stronger than his frame indicates and smarter than his class.
F: Mamadi Diakite — 6'9'’ fr #25
Double figure minutes in every game going back to ‘Cuse. I still think we’d be better if he started. His jumper looks so good, and he’s due to make some.

Pitt:
G: Jamel Artis — 6'7'’ sr #1

Artis’s current mini-slump coincides with Pitt’s losing streak: he’s averaging 13.3 points per game, has 11 turnovers to 11 assists, and is 4–16 on three-pointers during the slide. 
G: Chris Jones — 6'6'’ sr #13
Jones has taken just one shot in two of Pitt’s last three games. He’s adept at getting to the line (58.6 FTA/100 FGA), but not making them (67.1%). 
F: Cameron Johnson — 6'8'’ so #23
Johnson is Pitt’s X-factor. His four 3s against us came as somewhat of a surprise, but he’s since put up two games each of five and six. 
F: Michael Young — 6'9'’ sr #2
Numbers have taken a small hit in conference play, but his body of work remains impressive. He was good (19 points, 8–18 shooting) against us the first time around, but I would take that line from him again if offered. 
F: Sheldon Jeter — 6'8'’ sr #21
Pitt’s lone dedicated rebounder (9.8% OREB, 19.8% DREB) has added stretchiness (26 made threes after 15 combined in his first two years at Pitt) back to his game. Beat FSU (29 points, 12–14 shooting) almost entirely by himself. 
F: Ryan Luther — 6'9'’ jr #4
Thanks to a foot injury, this will be just Luther’s second game since January 11th. He scored eight in the first meeting, cutting baseline for dunks behind our sleepy defense. 
G: Jonathan Milligan — 6'2'’ jr #55
Milligan appears determined to get his: he attempted 11 threes in 26 February minutes. Unfortunately, he made just two. 
F: Rozelle Nix — 6'11' jr #25
The sample size is tiny, but dropping a 300-pounder into the middle of the lane is producing rebounds (18.3% OREB/32.1% DREB). He put up seven points and five boards in 16 minutes in a worthy effort against Duke.

Verdict:
If we defend to the standard we’ve set this season, particularly lately, this one should be a win. The margin will be determined by what we do on offense.

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