When David is facing off against Goliath, Davids usually fare better when the Goliaths are distracted and have lost focus. It worked out well for San Francisco on Friday, but on this day, Goliath was snarling and crushed St Francis.
St Francis     51
Virginia     76
Positive:
Reece Beekman. First off, there was this to end the first half:
Fastest guard of the Bennett era?
Beekman got the start, pushing Clark to the bench, and he responded with a smooth performance. That was the only bucket he scored, but Beekman notched 4 assists and 3 steals to go with (are you paying attention, Kihei?) zero turnovers. He looks like he belongs.
Negative
Injuries. Injuries always suck. In this case, the turmoil belonged to the Red Flash as starting point guard Ramiir Dixon-Conover had to sit out with a rolled ankle. Just as I want the Cavaliers fully suited up for every game, I want the other guys completely healthy. Especially the Davids.
Positive
Size. Our bigs, Jay Huff and Kadin Shedrick, simply overwhelmed the Red Flash. They had some good size for a mid-major, able to bring a 7-footer off the bench. But Huff went for 6 – 7 en route to 13 points while Shedrick had 12 points on 5 – 6 shooting. Virginia out-rebounded St Francis 38 – 25.
Negative
Three point shooting. Despite the supposed array of weapons Bennett has at his disposal, other than Tomas Woldetensae going 2 – 4 from deep, the rest of the team could only muster up a lethargic 3 – 18 outing.
Negative
Sam Hauser’s defense. Hauser is not fleet of foot and he’s clearly not sure about his defensive rotations which has lead to some gaping holes in the Pack Line over the past two games. There are other culprits. Today’s starting lineup of Hauser, Huff, Woldetensae, Beekman and Justin McKoy basically featured three rookies. Hauser was the lead player on the scout team during his redshirt year, but going forward Bennett may need to rethink how he uses redshirts in preparation for playing the pack line. Because it if were anyone else playing D the way Hauser has, he certainly wouldn’t be starting.
Positive
Tomas Woldetensae. Tomas was the most active player on the court. He was the only player with any success from deep: he hunted his shot and buried his two threes on consecutive possession. He is doing the best job (by far) of getting into the lane, collapsing the defense, and finding the open man. Against San Francisco, he created open threes. Versus St Francis he created good interior space and had four assists overall. Defensively, his hands are just as good as Ty Jerome’s.
See More:  HooAmp details Kadin Shedrick’s pre-season.
Negative
Coronavirus. Well, obviously. But for the narrow purposes of NCAA hoops, the virus will wreak havoc all season long. Just the latest casualty: Virginia’s game vs William and Mary has already been cancelled.
Positive
Offensive flexibility. As Seattle Hoo predicted, Bennett returned to a Sides offense, eschewing the 5-out of the past two games. The sets were ragged, to be sure, and we still failed to run the pick-n-pop with Huff, but the sets afforded lots of good, open looks.
Positive (I think)
A message. As in Bennett sent a resounding message to Clark. Dropped from the starting lineup – for the first time in 42 games – Clark logged just 15 minutes, the fewest minutes he has ever played for Virginia. Clark had made one adjustment to his hair, sporting a euro headband, but for the third straight game, Clark was relatively anonymous. I’m sure it wasn’t lost on either Bennett or Clark that Kihei had 3 turnovers while Beekman had none (in 22 minutes.) The big question will be how Clark responds over the next two games.
Positive
Anticipation. Sam Hauser is simply going to shred the Syracuse zone on January 25th. The way to destroy a zone is set a player smack dab in the middle of the zone. It helps if said player has vision, the ability to play two handed, a reliable mid-range jump shot, some size, and the ability to pass out of the high post. Sam has all in abundance.