Franklin Leads Virginia to Statement 71-58 Victory over Miami
All season long, Virginia has been waiting for a game where it all came together.
Facing one of the best teams in the ACC in the Miami Hurricanes, the Cavaliers delivered that performance.
Armaan Franklin scored 22 points and UVA led by as many as 21 in a 71-58 victory over Miami on Saturday night at John Paul Jones Arena.
By the end of the game, it was perhaps the best all-around performance of the season for the Cavaliers. For the first few minutes, however, it certainly did not seem that way.
Virginia turned the ball over four times in the first five minutes of the game and Miami took an early 10-7 lead. The Hurricanes might have opened up an even larger lead had they not been held back by their own shooting troubles. Miami missed its first ten three-pointers, some of which were fairly clean looks from some of its most talented scorers.
Then, the game turned into the Armaan Franklin show.
The Indiana transfer has had to adjust his game this season as he has watched his three-point percentage fall from 42.4% last season to 26.3% this season. The threes simply are not falling for Franklin, who has adapted and developed his mid-range game very well as the season has progressed.
On Saturday night against Miami, Franklin was making his mid-range shots as usual, but his three-pointers were falling too and the junior guard had one of his best games in a UVA uniform. He went on a personal 7-0 run, which included a driving layup, a catch-and-shoot corner three, and a mid-range jumper from the elbow to put the Cavaliers in front.
A few possessions later, Jayden Gardner was doubled in the post and he threw a cross-court pass to Franklin, who sank another three-pointer. Franklin had 15 points in the first half on six made shots, none more important than the last one of the half.
Miami had begun to get into a rhythm offensively, finally getting a pair of three-pointers to fall from Charlie Moore and Kameron McGusty, and the Canes were back within four points. Virginia worked the high-low to perfection for a Shedrick dunk off the feed from Gardner. Then, UVA got a stop and Reece Beekman pushed the ball up the floor quickly as time was winding down in the first half. Beekman shoveled the ball to Franklin, who drained the transition three-pointer just before the buzzer sounded to give UVA a 35-26 lead at the half.
Franklin finished with an impressive statline of 22 points, four assists, three rebounds, and four steals. Virginia shot the ball extremely well as a team from start to finish. The Cavaliers were 8/15 (53.3%) from three-point range and 30/50 (60%) from the floor. UVA’s offense was efficient and selfless, as the Hoos had 23 assists on 30 made field goals.
Miami, on the other hand, was unable to crack the Virginia defense with set offensive plays and had to instead rely on isolation one-on-ones. Kameron McGusty led the Hurricanes with 21 points on 9/13 shooting and three three-pointers. Charlie Moore added 17 points on 8/13 shooting.
Miami drew as close as seven points in the second half on a turnaround jumper by McGusty, but the Virginia offense continued to operate at a high level. In the second half, it was Jayden Gardner who got hot for the Cavaliers. Gardner scored 10 of 12 points in the second half, making five of his six shot attempts after halftime. The East Carolina transfer finished with 12 points, seven rebounds, and four assists.
Every time Miami attempted to make a run, Virginia was right there to score a basket on the other end to stop the momentum from shifting. There were hardly any scoring droughts for the Cavaliers, who fed off of the energy of the sizable crowd of over 14,000 people to push the Canes back on their heels. Miami head coach Jim Larrañaga used all of his timeouts before the last five minutes of the game.
Virginia built up a lead as large as 21 points and made the big plays at crucial moments to maintain a double-digit lead down the stretch.
The UVA defense made some stops and came away with 11 steals as a team to take some extra possessions. McGusty and Moore were able to score for themselves, but the Hoos shut down the rest of the team. Miami’s second-leading scorer, Isaiah Wong, was held to just six points on 3/9 shooting while being primarily guarded by Reece Beekman.
Beekman finished with a near double-double with 9 points and 10 assists to go along with two rebounds and two steals. Kihei Clark had 11 points, including three three-pointers, as well as three assists and three steals.
This was exactly the type of performance the Cavaliers needed to win back-to-back games for the first time since the first week of January and pick up a big-time victory over one of the better teams in the conference.
Up next, Virginia faces an even more challenging test as UVA plays at No. 9 Duke in less than 48 hours on Monday at 7pm. It will be the toughest battle of the season to date, but the Hoos just showed that they are more than capable of hanging with the best teams in the ACC if they play like they did on Saturday night.
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