Tech's unselfishness shines in ACC Tournament banner-night win over Tribe

By Sam Alves

Staff Writer

November 13, 2022

BLACKSBURG — Three games into the season, Virginia Tech finally unveiled its ACC Tournament championship banner from the 2021-2022 season. Fittingly, tournament MVP Hunter Cattoor burst out of a slow start to this season with a 22-point outing that paced the Hokies to a 22-point first-half lead.

While the Hokies didn’t match their 66% mark on first-half field goals after halftime, they didn’t have to to take a comfortable 94-77 win over in-state foe William & Mary (1-2) on Sunday night in Cassell Coliseum.

Tech shot out to a 14-0 lead before the Tribe hit their first shot more than five and a half minutes into the game. By then, William & Mary head coach Dane Fischer had called a timeout to try and stymie Tech’s outburst; meanwhile, Hokies head coach Mike Young was nearly halfway onto the court pumping his first and pumping up Cattoor and point guard Sean Pedulla.

From the head coach on down, Tech’s unselfishness was on full display, a key to Tech’s 69% (11-for-16) clip from deep in the first half, when the Hokies essentially put the game on ice.

“I think it’s just we all enjoy each other and enjoy each other’s success,” Pedulla, who also tallied 22 points, said to reporters after the game. “We all want to see each other play well. So if I have an extra pass for Darius [Maddox], I want to see him make that shot.

“Sometimes that’s even more rewarding than making a shot yourself. I think we all have those same characteristics. I think that’s what makes a great team.”

Before the half, Tech assisted on 13 of 21 (62%) made field goals and only turned the ball over three times — all by Justyn Mutts.

“We love when we see that [unselfishness],” Cattoor, who only scored six points in each of Tech’s first two games this year, said. “The fans love when they see that stuff. It’s the way the game is supposed to be played. Me, personally, I think everyone should touch the ball, screen and move around. When you do that, everyone gets fired up.”

On the other side, graduate transfer Anders Nelson did more than his share pacing the Tribe. After four years at St. Thomas University in St. Paul, Minnesota — three of which came with the school playing D-III competition before making the jump to D-I in 2021 — Nelson was the man who kept Tech’s walk ons from entering before the final few minutes of the second half.

Nelson scored 13 of the Tribe’s first 16 points, 16 in the first half (the next highest Tribe scorer had just four) and led all scorers by game’s end with 25.

“[Nelson] looked like Ricky Rubio out there tonight,” Young said “You see that sometimes. Kid had a good ballgame. We missed him on a couple of things. Hats off to him.”

After getting on his team’s defensive effort in Monday’s blowout win over Delaware State, Young was more understanding of his team’s defensive letdown in the second half this time around.

“You go out to such a substantial lead, it’s hard to continue to keep their attention defensively,” Young said. “To Dane’s credit, those kids continued to fight and believe and hang in there.”

From Young’s point of view, the Hokies have struggled to maintain intensity in the second half of games in the first week of the season since they haven’t closed out individual possessions.

“We’re not guarding a complete clock,” Young explained. “We’re guarding 25 seconds of that thing and we just kind of relax and the ball is driven.”

“I think it’s just the common theme of getting complacent in the second half,” Pedulla said. “I think against [Delaware State], it was turnovers. Whenever we get that lead, we kind of get complacent.”

With the Hokies headed to the Charleston Classic, staying hot rather than just starting that way will be necessary as the level of competition will only increase from here on out.

But the unselfishness that’s already evident under and tangible proof of Young’s concept has the group moving in the right direction.

“They don’t give those away,” Young said of the ACC Tournament championship banner. “We’re proud of it. So proud of it we’re going to try to do another one here soon, so let’s get busy and get better, especially on the defensive end. We’ve got the makings of a good ball club. We’re a long way from that right now.”