Is Virginia’s defense good enough to overcome their less-than-elite offense?

There have been moments this season in which Virginia evinces a level of dominance that no other team seems capable of attaining. Consider the Cavaliers’ most recent win against Pittsburgh, a game in which coach Tony Bennett’s squad held the ACC opponent to 0.67 points per possession and just seven points in the first half. Or the road win versus Duke, a defensive masterpiece that conceded 30 points to Marvin Bagley while allowing the other Blue Devils to score just 0.69 PPP. Or the non-conference contest in which UVA dropped 1.13 PPP against Rhode Island, a team with an equally as stingy defense and aspirations to run deep into March.

There is a reason that Bart Torvik’s TourneyCast projects Virginia as the Division I squad with the best odds of winning the 2018 NCAA title (24.1 percent). Bennett has married arguably the best defense of the KenPom era (83.7 opponent points per possession) with a more than capable offense (1.16 PPP, ranking 37th in DI), leading the Cavaliers to a 26-2 record and the top seed in the ACC tournament. And yet, there are subtle signs warning that, once March Madness begins, this Cavs squad could unravel; specifically, should we be concerned about how perfectly Virginia needs to execute in order to score?

According to Seth Davis of the Athletic’s Fieldhouse, one opposing coach doubted the effectiveness of UVA’s offense, saying, “The biggest question is what happens when they get behind. Do they have enough firepower to out-talent the other team?… Their inside players can’t beat you. They are very reliant on the 3-ball.”

This isn’t just an adroit observation on the eve of postseason play — there is some historical merit to wondering whether UVA has the offensive chops to contend. Since the 2011 tournament, when the field expanded to 68 teams, only seven squads cracked the Final Four with an offensive efficiency ranking outside of KenPom’s top thirty. Two of those examples came in 2011, when both Butler (34th) and VCU (60th) made the final weekend, and the most recent — Syracuse (2016; 65th) and South Carolina (2017; 149th) — came courtesy of topsy-turvy regions. There’s a reason why only 25 percent of Final Four squads have a less-than-robust offense — there comes a time in every game when all that really matters is the ability to score more buckets than the other team, and that moment is most evident in March.

We’re not saying UVA is offensively inept: Virginia has been extremely effective from the perimeter — as the anonymous head coach pointed out to Davis — converting 39 percent of its 3-point field goals, but it’s worth noting that as one delves a bit further into the data, there are times when those shots simply fail to connect: in its two losses, Virginia converted just 32 percent from deep.

And when that happens, it helps to have some semblance of interior scoring, which has been a bugbear for Bennett’s squad this season. The team makes 50.5 percent of its 2s—at first glance, that rate seems respectable, until one considers that there are 157 DI teams with a higher 2-point field goal percentage, and that scoring within the arc is a hallmark of contending in the NCAA tournament. Eleven of the 28 Final Four squads since 2011 shot a worse rate during the regular season than the Cavaliers — and the majority of those percentages belong to teams that danced prior to the implementation of a 30-second shot clock.

Bennett’s 2018 squad heavily relies on jump shooting — a quarter of its offensive possessions result in a jumper (of which UVA scores 1.002 points per shot, per Synergy)—but should an opponent clamp down on the perimeter, UVA hasn’t shown the capability to score either at the rim or within the arc in the halfcourt, connecting on 49 percent of its attempts (per Hoop-Math.com). Part of this malaise is due to the Cavs’ roster construction; Bennett’s most utilized lineups are tailor-made to execute his vaunted packline defense — according to Hooplens.com, UVA’s top lineup, which pairs Kyle Guy, Ty Jerome, and Devon Hall with Isaiah Wilkins and Jack Salt, has held its past five opponents to 0.76 PPP. But that same lineup can’t compete quite as well on the other side of the ball, notching just 1.05 PPP within the same time frame. And it gets uglier against just Tier A opponents — .93 PPP.

Also troubling is the team’s inability to score late in the shot clock. Bennett’s squads are known for executing a play call to its nth possibility before capitalizing, so it isn’t surprising that UVA’s average possession length is about 20 seconds and 45 percent of its attempts originate with that amount of time on shot clock. But the squad is shooting an effective field goal percentage of just 49.8 percent in those final moments, which seems low for a team whose nature is to grind out possessions. Compared to a squad like Villanova, which isn’t as deliberate as the Cavaliers but is still comfortable running various play call permutations, the differences in eFG percentages are worrisome (55.5 percent versus 49.8 percent).

To not score consistently as the shot clock dwindles is one thing, but when a team’s modus operandi is to in fact score consistently at the end of the shot clock — and struggles to do so — then there is a cause for concern.

Of course, there is a silver lining: the one Cavalier that has been effective within the arc is De’Andre Hunter, who has made 54 percent of his 2s in ACC play. The 6-foot-7 freshman wasn’t utilized as often earlier this season, but the UVA coach appears to have realized his frosh’s scoring punch, as Hunter’s minutes have steadily increased through conference play. The forward is now one of the team’s first reserves off the bench. When coupled with Wilkins in the frontcourt, UVA’s efficiency margin has skyrocketed the last five ACC contests (+.60); that particular lineup formation converts 64.1 percent of its 2s (per Hooplens.com).

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There are few teams that can withstand UVA’s relentless and withering defensive pressure, so these offensive concerns could be moot. But, of those seven Final Four squads that ranked outside KenPom’s top thirty for offensive efficiency, just one won a national title — 2014 Connecticut, in one of the ugliest title games in recent memory. Can Virginia score enough and let its defense carry Bennett and Co to his first ever Final Four? It’s certainly plausible, but this ACC squad isn’t the invincible top seed it might appear to be.