It’s time for Virginia to break this spell on the road

By Jerry Ratcliffe

Within the friendly confines of John Paul Jones Arena, Virginia’s basketball team is invincible.

At home, the Cavaliers are a young Mike Tyson at the top of his game. Powerful, in control, intimidating, sometimes dominating. And if the 3-pointer is falling early, a first-round knockout.

On the road, not so much. On the road, the Cavaliers are the Washington Generals, the perennial losing opponent of the Harlem Globetrotters.

Tony Bennett hopes that will change tonight in Atlanta, when UVA (12-5, 3-3, tied for sixth in the ACC) takes on Georgia Tech (9-8, 2-4) at 6 on the ACC Network.

Virginia is Oh-and-Four on the road, and those losses haven’t been pretty. For the last eight years, Virginia could have played the Yellow Jackets on the Moon or in a grocery store parking lot and the results would have been the same, as the Cavaliers take a 10-game winning streak over Georgia Tech into tonight’s contest. In fact, UVA has won 18 of the last 20 times vs. the Ramblin’ Wreck.

Prior to Wednesday night’s win over a dangerous Virginia Tech team, and even in that game, the contrast between the Cavaliers at home vs. outside the city limits were startling.

At home: Virginia averaged 72.7 points per game and opponents averaged 49.

Away: UVA averages 53.8 points per game, opponents 73.8.

At home: The Cavaliers make 55.3 percent of their field-goal attempts, opponents shoot 34.8.

On the road: UVA makes 37.1 percent of their shots, opponents 49.2.

Home 3-pointers: Virginia hits 40 percent of its 3’s, while opponents make only 24 percent.

Away 3-pointers: UVA makes only 26 percent of its triples as opposed to opponents shooting 42 percent.

According to research that statistical analyst Danny Neckel shared on social media, Virginia, 10-0 at home, ranks first in efficiency in the ACC and No. 7 nationally. On the road, where the Cavaliers are winless in four games, UVA is dead last in the ACC in efficiency and No. 331 in the country.

After the Cavaliers polished off the Hokies in Charlottesville a few nights ago, the home-away thing reared its head when Bennett was asked, “Can you guys take this [success] on the road?”

Bennett, who isn’t a future Hall of Famer for nothing, delivered this line: “Tune in Saturday … we’ll see.”

The man ain’t stupid. He can’t guarantee that his team won’t come apart at the seams in foreign territory yet again, although Georgia Tech certainly isn’t of the ilk of say, Memphis, NC State or Wake Forest.

The Jackets have had their own problems, losing four in a row before pulling off a double-overtime, thriller-diller, 93-90 win over Clemson on Wednesday night. Such a win, by any means, gave new Tech coach Damon Stoudamire hope that his team is developing.

His team can score, particularly from beyond the arc, where the Jackets have made at least 10 3-pointers in four-consecutive games, making 42 percent of their attempts during that span.

Still, in these days of newly-built rosters, many of the Techsters have not faced deliberate Virginia, and as any coach will tell you, seeing it in person is nothing like watching it on film. You have to see it to appreciate it, just like opponents had to feel a Tyson haymaker to realize the power behind it.

Stoudamire, who had a two-year stint as an assistant with the Celtics in between head-coaching jobs at Georgia Tech and Pacific, admitted this week that being his first time around in the ACC, he is in uncharted waters. Back in the WCC, he knew how to gameplan, how to beat certain coaches.

Figuring out Bennett’s style is complicated.

“Virginia is a very feisty team,” Stoudamire said. “Watching them, especially the last game against Virginia Tech, Tony must have got after them pretty good in those practice sessions because they were back doing the things they do … being in gaps, creating turnovers, really being physical.”

Didn’t hurt that Dante Harris returned after 10 games due to a bad ankle injury, or that Jordan Minor delivered what everyone had been waiting on since his transfer, a solid game in the paint. Virginia had been missing Harris’ quickness, defense, decision-making, and Minor’s physicality for quite some time.

Now, it’s time to take this show on the road, break the jinx, reestablish dominance over the Jackets and stop stinking things up away from home.

It’s time to be Tyson.