No. 13 UVA turns attention to Georgia Tech; Tony likes ditching the suits

By Jerry Ratcliffe

With Wednesday night’s home game against NC State now postponed due to Covid-19 problems within the Wolfpack basketball program, Virginia coach Tony Bennett must turn his thoughts toward Saturday night when Georgia Tech comes to Charlottesville.

The Cavaliers, who jumped from No. 18 to No. 13 in the AP Top 25 poll this week, are coming off an utter annihilation of No. 12 Clemson last weekend and are now 5-0 in the ACC and 9-2 overall. It’s difficult to maintain momentum when it seems every other game includes a postponement.

“We’ve got to take the hand that’s dealt,” Bennett said Monday.

The hand is just working on his own program for another few days before facing the Yellow Jackets, who really know the definition of interruption.

Georgia Tech ends a 17-day pause since its last game if the Jackets can play their scheduled home game Wednesday night against Clemson, which dropped to No. 20 nationally after their blowout loss to Bennett’s Wahoos. Even if Tech plays the game versus Clemson, the Jackets will be shorthanded after having four consecutive games postponed, the first three with his own team and the other due to NC State’s virus issues.

However, Tech coach Josh Pastner said he expects his full roster to be available for Saturday’s game at Virginia. He realizes that won’t be an easy task for his team, noting that what makes the Cavaliers elite is their offensive prowess. The defense, he said, is always going to be there.

This is the highest-scoring team during the Bennett era and that showed Saturday when the Cavaliers pounded Clemson _ which entered the game as the No. 1 ranked team in the country in defensive efficiency _ 85-50 at Clemson, and posted a season-high 60.7 percent shooting, including 15 3-pointers, including nine straight in the second half.

Bennett, who said that he actually enjoys film study of not only his team but opponents, was somewhat blown away when he reviewed the offensive portion of Virginia’s win over the Tigers. He hadn’t realized that his team had made nine consecutive 3-pointers in the second half.

The UVA coach revealed that when he does film study he always looks at the Cavaliers’ defensive performance first, and will watch the defensive angle a few times before turning to look exclusively at the offense. When he’s viewing the videos, he looks for little things that perhaps he can use to strengthen the team in certain areas, or maybe adding a wrinkle or two

“You’re looking for a 1 percent or 2 percent increase,” in efficiency, Bennett said.

He also shared his thoughts on coaches being allowed to wear coaching gear, polo shirt and slacks, to games rather than suits and ties.

Whoever started that trend anyway? Maybe Bobby Knight, Bob Huggins and Lou Carnesecca were on to something?

Bennett did not wear a tie when he was head coach at Washington State but was advised by former UVA athletic director Craig Littlepage to wear one when Bennett became the Cavaliers coach. Since Littlepage retired, his replacement, Carla Williams, hasn’t objected to Bennett ditching the tie.

“No way coaches should ever go back to wearing suits,” Bennett chuckled. “There would not be pushback from the majority of coaches.”

He’s right, you know. Most coaches would rather dress the way they do for practice, particularly Notre Dame coach Mike Brey, who perhaps stretched the boundaries when he coached a game in shorts this season

Bennett said he and his staff have talked about the practice garb vs game garb a few times and they were all in favor of just wearing polos and slacks.

“We’re not a GQ staff,” Bennett guffawed.

Virginia’s female base might argue that point about Bennett’s image, but the coach is more concerned with comfort.