Is Virginia's defense tough enough? Tony Bennett has some doubts originally appeared on NBC Sports Washington
One of the first things that come to mind when someone says Virginia basketball is their dominant defense. For the past decade, Tony Bennett has turned the Cavaliers program into one of the best defensive scoring teams in the entire country.
That's why when Bennett publicly questions the toughness and grittiness of his team, it's a pretty big deal.
We're making it easier for you to find stories that matter with our new newsletter — The 4Front. Sign up here and get news that is important for you to your inbox.
Virginia is in the midst of a three-game losing streak to Florida State and once NCAA tournament afterthoughts in Duke and NC State. The latter two being losses that the Cavaliers simply shouldn't have, especially in a year like this one.
Against the Wolfpack -- in a 68-60 loss -- Virginia let the opposition score in the paint basically at-will. Thirty of their 68 points came in the paint.
And when the offense struggles to score, yes that narrative is here again, Bennett does not believe his team's defensive effort has what it takes to win them a game.
"How does this team play when the shots are not going in?" Bennett said in a postgame zoom media availability. "We haven't become gritty enough or tough enough to lean on our defense to hold us in there. We did it a couple times this year, but not consistently enough."
You wouldn't believe it based on the numbers the Cavaliers are posting this season. Their scoring defense (60.2 points allowed per game) is still the seventh-best in the NCAA. Virginia is also preventing teams from shooting above 42% from the field and 34% from deep. KenPom's adjusted metrics has the Cavs with the 30th best defensive unit in the country.
Sometimes those metrics don't show key moments in games. When Virginia's offense runs at an efficient pace rather than a rapid one, it leaves the door open for opponents to stay close. The problems on defense happen inconsistently, but more frequently as of late during the end of games.
"You can acknowledge you've got limitations but you've got to lay it on the line when it comes to winning time or get a stop time," Bennett said. "That's where you need everything and that's when we just all of a sudden, a lapse here or there or we forgot something, 'whoops,' and then those things, those are those little decisions that you can't absorb."
So how exactly do they get there? For one, each member of the program that spoke after the NC State loss talked about physical and mental toughness. The team has shown they can do it during the season. With March around the corner, they need it night-in and night-out.
“Not only physically, but I think mentally we got we have to sharpen up and get more tough," junior forward Sam Hauser said. "I think we've had some of the same type of lapses happen throughout the year in our losses, and they seem to keep coming up and repeating themselves. I think we do have to get physically tougher, but I think a lot of it starts with the mental side and we just got to keep working at it."
“The physical kind of follows the mental with that," senior Jay Huff said who was a part of the dominant Virginia defensive teams. "Toughness isn't just typical, lifting something really big or something like that. It is all mental and it's just getting stops down the stretch. I think that we can get there and we need to have a little bit more of that as we go this season."
There are two games remaining on the schedule for the Cavaliers to get out of their losing rut and find their defensive identity. They'll likely be favored in both contests, but they were also favored in their last two losses too.
Now is not the time for a team to be trending down. But for Bennett, his teams are all about deciding the game on the defensive side of the court. Three months into the season he still needs more.
"One thing you must do is look in the mirror and say, 'am I being as physically tough and mentally sound and tough as I absolutely can be to give ourselves the best chance to be as good as we can be.' Whatever that is," Bennett said. "I did it early in the year, I drew a line and I said this is what you think your maximum effort is, and you're trying to get to but there's a line above it and you got to somehow get to that because you're leaving too much on the floor"
