Champions Rewind: 2019 Virginia Cavaliers

In our Champions Rewind series, we’ll look at the seasons of past National Champions and break down their offensive and defensive systems.

This week, we’ll look at the 2018-19 Virginia Cavaliers, one of the greatest redemption stories in all of sports history.

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Season Recap

In 2018, Virginia suffered the first loss to a 16-seed in March Madness history. Despite being a 1-seed and only losing twice during the regular season, Virginia lost by 20 to UMBC.

Virginia lost two senior starters, Devon Hall and Isaiah Wilkins, but returned a large majority of their production for the 2018-19 season. They also brought in freshman Kihei Clark, ranked 378th in the country, who started over half the games for Virginia that year.

Starters

Kihei Clark – 5’9 – Freshman – Point Guard

Kyle Guy – 6’2 – Junior – Shooting Guard

De’Andre Hunter – 6’7 – Sophomore – Power Forward

Bench

Virginia Stats – sports-reference.com

Despite the early upset in the tournament the prior season, Virginia was ranked 5th in the preseason AP Poll, their worst ranking of the season.

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Virginia had no issues early, winning their first four buy games with ease.

They went to the Battle 4 Atlantis tournament, where they took on Dayton in the first round. Virginia never led by double digits, but they still managed a 66-59 win. De’Andre Hunter had 23 points, 6 rebounds, and an assist. Ty Jerome and Kyle Guy added in 15 and 14 points, respectively.

Virginia took on Wisconsin in the second round, in a game dominated by defense and slow pace. Each team had only 58 possessions, and neither cracked 55 points. Virginia used a 10-0 run towards the end of the first half to take a 15-point lead into the half, but Wisconsin was able to cut the lead to five in the second half. It ultimately wasn’t enough, though, as Virginia won 53-46. Hunter had 20 points and 9 rebounds in this one.

Virginia faced Maryland in the championship game. The Cavaliers used a 13-2 run early in the game to take a 9-point lead into half. They…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/champions-rewind-2019-virginia-cavaliers-012755993.html

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Publish date : 2026-08-21 01:27:00

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