Virginia blocks Pitt from advancing to ACC Championship game

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With seconds remaining, the ball left James Robinson’s hands, and began its trajectory.

The sphere didn’t reach its destination, though, due to the fingertips of Justin Anderson who caused it to loop harmlessly short of the basket.

Pitt’s first time playing in the ACC tournament ended Saturday afternoon with a loss to the Virginia Cavaliers, 51-48.

Robinson felt he had an open look for the potential game-tier, but acknowledged that he had to shoot regardless, given how little time remained.

“Everybody in the gym knew I had to take it,” Robinson said. ”Justin tipped it a little.”

Five blocks by five different Cavaliers, including Anderson’s with three seconds to go, proved crucial in a game that everyone knew would come down to the final possession. Just as it had when both teams played a month ago in Pittsburgh,Virginia winning on a buzzer-beating three-pointer, 48-45.  

“You’re not going to break Pitt down quick, and hopefully you’re not going to break us down,” Virginia coach Tony Bennett said. “We were saying one more stop, everything you’ve got, leave it on the floor.”

“They were doing the same thing. When the defense has that mindset, it’s hard to score.”

The Panthers had difficulty in that area when it mattered most,  Trailing by three and four possessions for much of the second part of the second half, Pitt couldn’t score.

Lamar Patterson said he and his teammates knew what Virginia wanted to do with the pace of the game and defensively by packing the lane and slowing the Panthers down.  

The redshirt senior finished with 15 points, but went 2-for-8 from beyond the arc after shooting 50 percent from long-range in the two games prior.

Virginia’s defense aggressiveness as a unit was most evident in its aesthetically-pleasing blocks, but Pitt guard Cameron Wright said the approach got results in less tangible ways, too.

“Everytime we attempted to get a shot up their entire defense was there contesting,” Wright said.

One of the reasons Pitt couldn’t shrink the deficit late was the block by Anthony Gill on a Josh Newkirk layup attempt. Ge sent the shot bouncing powerfully off the hardwood leaving Pitt to try, and fail, again to draw the score level.

Virginia’s Joe Harris led his team with 12 points, but said that if the game came down to play at the other end of the floor the Cavaliers would once again keep Pitt from sinking the shot it needed.

“I was very confident in our ability to get a stop at the end,” Harris said.