Justin Anderson scored a career-high 18 points and fellow freshman Taylor Barnette added a career-high 13 as Virginia extended its home winning streak to 19 games Sunday with a 68-50 victory over St. John’s in the second round of the NIT. Read more

GREENSBORO, N.C. — The North Carolina State team that seriously damaged Virginia’s NCAA Tournament hopes is just one of several ACC squads that have talented transfers sitting out this season.

The Wolfpack is picking up Ralston Turner, a 6-foot-6 wing player who started 59 games in two seasons at Lousiana State and averaged 12.4 points as a sophomore in 2011-2012.

Turner, familiar with State coach Mark Gottfried from Gottfried’s days as the head coach at Alabama, hit 99 3-point field goals in two seasons at LSU and is seen as a likely successor to Scott Wood, who hit seven 3-pointers Friday in a 75-56 victory over Virginia.

Turner will be one of three 2013-2014 ACC newcomers who spent the 2011-2012 season in the Southeastern Conference, along with Virginia’s Anthony Gill (South Carolina) and Duke’s Rodney Hood (Mississippi State).

Maryland, in its last season in the ACC, will be adding Evan Smotrycz, a 6-9 transfer from Michigan, where he averaged 7.7 points as a sophomore in 2011-2012. So, as a senior in 2014-2015, Smotrycz will be playing in the same league in which he began his career as Maryland moves to the Big Ten..

A similar circumstance will occur when 6-7 Alex Dragicevich begins play for Boston College. Dragicevich sat out this season after transferring from Notre Dame, where he scored 6.6 points per game in 2011-2012.

Next year, he’ll be facing his old team with Notre Dame’s entry into the ACC.

Virginia Tech will add a transfer, too, in Adam Smith, who averaged 13.7 points as a freshman at UNC-Wilmington in 2011-2012.

In addition to the transfers and recruits, whose names are available on a host of websites, Virginia is among the schools that have had players sitting out this season as redshirts.

The Cavaliers’ Malcolm Brogdon, the prize of UVa’s 2011 signing class, has resumed practicing after complications from foot surgery kept him from beginning the season. He will be a sophomore next season.

Clemson will gain the services of two players who already are on campus, top 2012 signee Jaron Blossomgame, a 6-7 forward, and 6-2 guard Devin Coleman, who played in 23 games in 2011-2012.

Garrius Adams, a 6-6 guard from Apex, N.C., who started 37 games in his first three seasons, sat out this season at Miami and theoretically could return as a fifth-year senior in 2013-2014.

ALSO AFFECTING the 2013-2014 ACC basketball release will be this spring’s NBA Draft and which ACC underclassmen will make themselves eligible.

Maryland’s 7-foot-1 sophomore, Alex Len, is listed as a top-10 pick and maybe even top five. Other first-round possibilities include North Carolina sophomore James-Michael McAdoo, Duke freshman guard Rasheed Sulaimon and North Carolina State juniors C.J. Leslie and Lorenzo Brown.

Every time I see Len, I’m less impressed, particularly when he had three of his shots blocked at Virginia last weekend, and McAdoo isn’t close to ready. Leslie and Brown may be the most NBA ready based on what I’ve seen.

Miami sophomore point guard Shane Larkin, who was terrific Friday against Boston College, has said he is remaining in college. So is Virginia’s Joe Harris, according to what he was telling fans Wednesday in Greensboro.

Virginia announced Monday that it will be playing four games against Brigham Young, its opponent in the 2013 football opener.

The Cavaliers, already scheduled to visit Brigham Young in 2014, will be playing the Coguars in Charlottesville in 2019 and Provo, Utah, in 2020.

Events of the past week have only served to reinforce an opinion I’ve held for many years.

While games against opponents like North Carolina and Duke bring out the fans and increase media attention, just as important for the Virginias of the men’s basketball world are match-ups with the likes of Wake Forest, Clemson and Georgia Tech, particularly on the road.

UVa (20-10, 10-7 ACC) put its NCAA Tournament hopes in jeopardy this week when it dropped road games to Boston College 53-52 and Florida State 53-51. The Cavaliers earlier had beaten both of those teams in Charlottesville, by 14 and 20 points, respectively.

At the beginning of the week, there was a four-way tie for eighth place in the ACC between Clemson, Boston College, Georgia Tech and Wake Forest. Know what else those teams had in common? All of them owned home-floor victories over Virginia.

What has to be so maddening for UVa fans is that virtually all of the losses have gone down to the wire. In its last three road games, Virginia has gone into the last 10 seconds of the game either tied or with the lead and the Cavaliers have come out 0-3.

Moreover, none of the games has gone to overtime. Miami hit the go-ahead basket with 5.9 seconds left in a 54-50 victory in Coral Gables, Fla., Boston College went ahead on a 3-pointer with 8.4 seconds left and Florida State scored with 4.4 seconds left.

On top of that, Virginia didn’t get off a shot at the end of any of those three games. Paul Jesperson threw away an inbounds pass at Miami, Jontel Evans dribbled out of bounds at Boston College and Joe Harris lost control of the ball while headed upcourt Thursday.

FOR THE SECOND GAME in a row, UVa coach Tony Bennett conceded Thursday night that maybe he could have called a late-game timeout.

Actually, he did call a timeout following a Michael Snaer free throw with 4.4 seconds left Thursday, but where the Cavaliers really needed a timeout was on the next-to-last possession.

UVa, leading 51-50, had rebounded a Michael Snaer miss with 59 seconds but all it had to show for the ensuing possession was an off-balance lay-up attempt by Akil Mitchell, forced to improvise when the original play fell apart.

Senior point guard Jontel Evans had the ball out front, as he usually does, with the plan to get the ball to leading scorer Joe Harris. It was pretty easy to figure out that the Cavaliers wanted to get the ball to Harris, or at least the Seminoles figured it out.

Bennett had enough timeouts remaining that, when the original play broke down, he could have called a timeout with 35-40 seconds remaining and set up another play.

There was a similar situation on a late possession in the Boston College game, when Evans was obliged to throw up a desperation shot at the end of the shot clock, only to dive to the floor, grab the ball and call a timeout before the Eagles could tie him up.

ALL SEASON LONG, at least that part of the season since Evans’ permanent return from foot surgery, he has been the go-to guy at the end of the shot clock.

When 10 seconds remain, the Cavaliers spread the floor and Evans drives into the lane, either drawing a defender and passing to a teammate, passing to the wing for a 3-pointer or taking the shot himself.

Sometimes the shots have fallen but the slightest bit of attention from a taller post player reduces the chance for success. Nobody plays harder than Evans and nobody cares more, but when he’s the No. 1 option at the end of the shot clock, that’s risky.

Opponents show such disregard for Evans’ offense in the halfcourt that he can be standing 1-2 steps inside the 3-point line and his defender will have his heels to the lane. There were numerous occasions Thursday night when the Seminoles seemed to be playing 5-on-4.

VIRGINIA DOESN’T HAVE many options at point guard and Evans’ defense and ball-handling make him practically indispensable. But having the offense go through him in these late-game situations doesn’t seem like the best strategy.

Going into Sunday’s regular-season finale against visiting Maryland, the Cavaliers are 1-6 in games that have been decided by four points or fewer and are 2-8 in games decided by six points or fewer.

Given those numbers, it’s a wonder UVa is in the NCAA conversation at all.

Correction (March 3): A previous version of this blog referred to a different tournament in the first paragraph.

Craig Littlepage didn’t disagree with me Wednesday when I floated “22″ as the magic number for Virginia’s men’s basketball team to receive an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.

Littlepage, the UVa athletic director, is something of an authority on the subject, having served as chairman of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Committee in 2006. What he did remind me Wednesday is that Virginia’s accomplishments aren’t the sole issue here.

“A factor for any perceived ‘bubble’ team is what happens in the one-bid leagues or the two-bid leagues,” Littlepage said. “An upset winner, all of a sudden, from the West Coast Conference — or you could name another non-BCS Conference — does that take up an additional at-large spot?”

One of the questions surrounding Virginia and its NCAA Tournament credentials is the three games it lost before Christmas to teams from the Colonial Athletic Association — George Mason, Delaware and Old Dominion. Senior point guard Jontel Evans, a veteran of 70 career starts going into this season, missed all three of those games while rehabbing a surgically repaired foot.

“We’ve had some good wins against teams that are probably going to be in at-large consideration — [North] Carolina and N.C. State I particular — but the reality is, we had a number of games early in the season where we weren’t 100 percent in terms of Jontel’s situation and later with Darion [Atkins] and Mike Tobey,” Littlepage said. “Those are outcomes that are taken into consideration and there’s no way to quantify what that means for each of 10 different committee people, but certainly that’s something that’s taken into consideration. I think we’ve done enough to be in that grouping of schools that’s going to be discussed.”

Read more »

According to the FootballSchedules.com, Virginia is the Ducks’ Sept. 7, 2013 opponent.

We will have more on this later today. Right now, here’s the beginning of a release sent out today by Virginia:

Virginia football head coach Mike London announced today four members of the Cavalier coaching staff have been relieved of their duties. Those coaches are associate head coach/defensive coordinator Jim Reid, defensive line coach/recruiting coordinator Jeff Hanson, running backs coach Mike Faragalli and tight ends coach Shawn Moore.

In addition to those moves, London announced safeties coach Anthony Poindexter will no longer be the Cavaliers’ special teams coordinator but he will remain on staff.

Michael Rocco, who has started 21 games over the previous two football seasons from the University of Virginia, has received his release from the football program and plans to transfer to another Division I FBS program, according to a source with knowledge of the situation.

Rocco and his family met with UVa coach Mike London on Friday to discuss his decision. The source said the meeting was amicable.

Rocco, who has one year of eligibility remaining, plans to move on to another FBS football program and redshirt next season. He will then be available to play in the 2014 season.

For the latest on this, follow Doug on Twitter @DoughtySports

 UPDATE (9 p.m. Friday, Nov. 30) : Since this blog was updated, Indiana State coach Trent Miles has been hired to replace Bill Curry as Georgia State’s football coach.

Upon hearing this week that Virginia offensive coordinator Bill Lazor had interviewed for a head-coaching job this week, my first guess was that he was talking to an FCS (previously Division I-AA) program.

He was. And, he wasn’t. Read more »

Cavaliers and Cougars Will Meet in 2013 and 2014

Charlottesville, Va. – Virginia and BYU will meet in football for a two-game series in 2013 and 2014, the schools jointly announced today. The teams are scheduled to meet Saturday, Aug. 31, 2013, in Charlottesville and Saturday, Sept. 20, 2014, in Provo, Utah.

Virginia Executive Associate Director of Athletics Jon Oliver said the series came about following the announcement this year by the Atlantic Coast Conference that its member schools would go from a nine-game league slate to eight games starting in 2013.

“We feel fortunate that we were able to schedule a series with BYU, a school with a strong football tradition, on such short notice,” Oliver said. “Historically the games have been very competitive and we look forward to opening the season against them in 2013 in Scott Stadium.”

The 2013 season opener will be the fourth meeting in the series between the teams. Virginia defeated BYU 22-16 during the 1987 All-American Bowl in Birmingham, Ala. The Cavaliers defeated the Cougars 45-40 in Provo, Utah, in 1999 and the following season BYU downed UVa 38-35 in overtime in Charlottesville, marking the first overtime game in Virginia’s history.

Virginia’s other non-conference opponents in 2013 include Penn State on the road and VMI andBall State at Scott Stadium. The dates for those three games and the ACC opponents for the Cavaliers’ 2013 schedule will be announced at a later date.