Virginia Tech (3-2) suffered their worst loss in years with a stunning 74-64 upset defeat at the hands of Jacksonville (3-2) in Cassell Coliseum.
It was a tale of two halves as the Hokies took a 10-point lead into halftime, behind great play from their lead frontcourt duo of Tobi Lawal and Mylyjael Poteat, who combined for 23 points at halftime. They were feasting on virtually every defense thrown at them in the first half, whether it was a man-to-man, a 1-3-1 zone, or a 2-3 zone. The zones opened up the middle of the floor, which allowed easy mid range jumpers and drives for the two bigs.
Following these trends in the first half, Jacksonville head coach Jordan Mincy knew things had to change.
“I really challenged our frontcourt (at halftime),” Mincy said. “I felt like their frontcourt dominated in the first half. I asked them who’s tougher?”
The Dolphins bigs proved to be tougher in the second half, led by Zimi Nwokeji who had 19 points and nine rebounds off the bench, while knocking down four of his eight three-point attempts. Nwokeji along with forwards Stephon Payne lll and Kendall Munson also evened the rebounding battle, which ended in a 33-33 tie, despite a significant advantage towards the Hokies in the first half.
The other major adjustment Mincy and his squad made at halftime was switching to a full court press.
“We saw it in the Penn State film,” said Mincy about the Hokies' struggles against full court pressure. “Those first few possessions (of the second half) we were able to turn those guys over.”
Within just the first two minutes of the second half, Brandon Rechsteiner lost the ball trying to beat a double team, before Tobi Lawal gave it away with a sloppy inbounding violation.
“I’ve got to do a better job of getting them in the right spots,” Mike Young said of the turnovers against the pressure.
After a solid first half with just five turnovers, the Hokies coughed it up 11 times in the second half, as Rechsteiner and Lawal continued their sloppy play with five turnovers a piece.
However, the Hokies’ second half issues didn’t only come on the offensive end.
“We weren’t on the same page long enough,” said Virginia Tech forward Tobi Lawal on the Hokies' defensive lapses. “We’ve got to stick to the script.”
There were many occasions where the Hokies just seemed to lack the chemistry to know what their teammates were going to do, fouling up routine pick and roll coverage, not knowing whether to hedge, switch, or play drop coverage. Following the game, Lawal insisted that such defensive togetherness will only come with time and experience.
Unfortunately, the Hokies are very far away from where they need to be and they hardly have time to get there with Michigan, South Carolina or Xavier, Vanderbilt and Pittsburgh on their immediate horizon. However, the Hokies have no option but to move forward and figure out what they need to improve upon moving forward.
“The games in the past; we’ve already lost,” said Lawal. “We can’t fix it; We’ve got to fix it in the coming days.”
The Hokies return to the court at 6 p.m. on November 25th in a matchup against Michigan on a neutral floor in Fort Myers, Florida. Tech won’t return to Cassell Coliseum until an MJ Collins and Tyler Nickel led Vanderbilt team makes its way to Blacksburg as a part of the ACC/SEC Challenge at 9:15 p.m. on Wednesday, December 4th.
