University of Virginia Library

Cavaliers Invade
Maryland Saturday

Sports Analysis

By Hugh Antrim
Cavalier Daily Staff Writer

Photo By Bob Cohen

Second-Year Man Frank Dewitt Goes High For Basket Against Duke Monday Night

Virginia Cagers Will Be Looking To Extend ACC Three Game Winning Streak Against Maryland

Now that some of the excitement
has died down after Monday
night's shocker, in which the
Cavaliers whipped Duke 61-57,
basketball enthusiasts face the enviable
task of sitting back and
enjoying an honest-to-goodness upset.
You see, Virginia did more than
come close this time.

With a current 3-10 ACC record
the Cavaliers travel to Maryland
Saturday with a chance to further
enhance their seeding for the
conference tournament, to be held
the first weekend of March in
Charlotte. If Coach Gibson's cagers
can bump Lefty's Tures again,
Virginia will tie Maryland for sixth
place in the ACC. As of now the
Cavaliers will challenge N.C. State
or North Carolina in the first round
of that tournament.

But let's go back to Monday
night in University Hall. It was
thought that without either Chip
Case (ineligible) or Kevin Kennelly
(injured elbow) Cavalier hopes were
less than slim. Mr. Gibson was
forced to start four second-year
men, plus Bill Gerry, a third-year
mn. Few thought that this five
could dispense with a Duke team
that had recently upended nationally
ranked Davidson. And it was all
right that Virginia stuck with Duke
in the first half - that had
happened before; the Cavaliers had
always seemed to falter somewhere
down the stretch. But the display
Messrs. Rash, Miller, McCandlish,
DeWitt and Gerry put on in the
second half smashed lingering
doubts that Duke would somehow
put an end to Virginia's upset
fantasy.

The Cavaliers played near perfect
basketball in the final 15
minutes. Mr. Gibson never substituted,
and no one tired - they just
came on stronger. Virginia had only
five turnovers the entire game, and
three of those were on offensive
player-control fouls.

Yet one could claim the margin
of victory lay with the fact that
Duke was "down" and just had an
off night, except that it just wasn't
so. This reporter is convinced that
Virginia outplayed Duke, a prospect
that befuddles him. Duke
outshot the Cavaliers from the floor
with a highly respectable 46.4 per
cent accuracy. The Blue Devils even
wound up with more individual
rebounds, 28-26.

Left Drieseil's Terps will be
lying in wait in Cole Field House
Saturday night with vengeance on
the mind. Virginia has now taken
Maryland four times in a row.
Tickets to the game are apparently
only being sold through Maryland's
Cole Field House, and those rolling
to College Park should contact Terp
headquarters to insure themselves a
place to sit; Lefty likes to fill the
place with turtle fans.