Beekman to Bennett: ‘Don’t worry, Coach, I got this,’ in win over WVU

By Jerry Ratcliffe

It isn’t often that Tony Bennett can joke about a missed free throw, but Reece Beekman’s miss with a mere 2.3 seconds remaining in Wednesday night’s Fort Myers Tip-Off game with West Virginia was exactly what Bennett wanted to see.

Virginia broke a 54-all deadlock in the waning seconds when Beekman aggressively drove to the hoop and was fouled.

The senior point guard made the first for the one-point lead, but followed Bennett’s order on the second and missed. The UVA coach figured West Virginia wouldn’t be able to get off a decent shot with the 2.3 seconds remaining, but didn’t figure on his own player, Ryan Dunn, grabbing the rebound.

Dunn was fouled with 0.4 seconds showing, made the first free throw for the eventual 56-54 final score, but again, purposely missed the second as the game ended and the 24th-ranked Cavaliers improved to 5-1. WVU dropped to 2-3.

“At the end, it was a perfect miss,” Bennett grinned. “We even got the rebound. We did it on purpose. I said [to Beekman], ‘Just don’t airball it,’ and he said ‘I got you … I practice it.’”

For a blow-by-blow account of the game, box score and game notebook, see our game story here.

It was another close call for the Cavaliers, who squeezed by Florida on a neutral court earlier this season, but were hammered in the opening game of the Fort Myers event by Wisconsin on Monday. Both games were physical, and UVA was dominated on the boards in both games — 48-21 by Wisconsin and 41-28 by West Virginia.

Bennett, though, believed his team showed progress from Monday’s lopsided loss to the Badgers.

“For whatever reason against Wisconsin, we were a little indecisive, whether it was flying in there to trap the post and a little disjointed or disconnected,” Bennett said. “I thought all our guys did a good job of protecting the paint, really crowding, especially when (WVU big man Jesse) Edwards got a catch.”

Edwards had 17 points and 9 rebounds, playing the final 5:25 with four fouls. He drew eight fouls and fouled out UVA center Blake Buchanan.

As Bennett has often mentioned, most big games come down to a handful of plays, and this one was no different. Beekman did exactly what his coach expected, took over the game down the stretch and put the Cavaliers on his back.

“As the point guard and leader of the team, you’ve got to choose your time to be assertive and kind of take over, so you never want to force it,” Beekman said. “Those [last] four minutes we were getting a little stagnant on offense, so I just decided to go make plays.”

That’s exactly what Beekman did to cap off his 12-point (5 of 11 field goals), 4-rebound, 5-assist, 4-steal performance. In crunch time, Beekman was practically unstoppable as he scored 5 points in the final 2:45.

He sank a turnaround jumper just inside the free-throw line at that juncture for a 50-47 lead, then drove the paint and scored on Edwards for a 52-51 edge with 1:29 to play, and there was no doubt who would have the ball in his hands at the very end with the game tied.

Beekman drove to the basket and was fouled. He made the first shot before the Mountaineers called time out, as they tried to come up with a last-second strategy. At the same time came Bennett’s and Beekman’s exchange about missing the shot and the guard’s assurance he had everything covered.

As badly as UVA was beaten on the glass, the Cavaliers’ only two offensive rebounds in the game came at the very precise moments they needed them. When Beekman missed his second free throw, Dunn grabbed it. Dunn had missed a 3-point attempt with 9 seconds to go, but Virginia rebounded, leading to Beekman’s final drive in the paint.

“Reece has improved so much and some of the plays he made down the stretch off the dribble in the lane, that’s high-level stuff,” Bennett said. “So when you need that — the game comes down to making plays at certain times — and I thought he had a good pace.”

UVA had a 10-point lead (36-26) with 13:18 to play but WVU fought back and took the lead off three consecutive 3-pointers (42-40) with 8:41 remaining.

“We didn’t get too rattled when they tied the game after being down 10,” Beekman said. “We with stayed with our offense. I feel that’s going to help us down the season with those close battles. That’s our second one like that already in the first six games.”

The Cavaliers had their shooting touch abandon them in their trip to the Sunshine State, even though sharpshooter Isaac McKneely returned to the lineup after suffering an ankle injury and missing a game in between. Virginia was a mere 8 for 32 on its 3-point attempts in the two games, 25 percent.

Certainly those numbers are going to have to jump before UVA takes on a good Texas A&M team in Charlottesville next Wednesday in the inaugural ACC/SEC Shootout.

McKneely, oddly, was the only native of the state of West Virginia on the floor in the game against his home-state Mountaineers. He got into a dust-up with a couple of WVU players during an intense stretch as McKneely and West Virginia’s Quinn Slazinski were slapped with technical fouls.

McKneely said playing against WVU, a team he followed closely growing up, and winning was “surreal.”

That matchup brought up a lighter moment in the postgame between former UVA standout Jimmy Miller, now the school’s radio color analyst, and Bennett. Miller, who also hails from West Virginia, asked Bennett about how great it was for McKneely to beat his home-state team.

Bennett chuckled and asked Miller how it felt for him to do the same thing back in his playing days when he helped Virginia beat West Virginia. Miller laughed and said it felt “pretty darn good.”

Bennett chuckled again and said, “I’m glad [McKneely] got a win against his home state because I got my ass kicked by my home state,” referring to UVA’s loss to Wisconsin.