Skip to main content
Cavaliers Now

The Plus/Minus: Virginia Women's Basketball Falls to Oklahoma

Virginia rallied in the 3rd quarter against Oklahoma before falling late 82-67
Val Prochaska|
The Plus/Minus: Virginia Women's Basketball Falls to Oklahoma
The Plus/Minus: Virginia Women's Basketball Falls to Oklahoma

The Virginia women's basketball team suffered an 82-67 loss to No. 25 Oklahoma on Sunday afternoon at John Paul Jones Arena. Val has the Plus/Minus to break down what we learned from the Cavaliers in their first defeat of the season. 

Plus

A win is a win is a… Well, not in this case. Not all defeats are created equal and this loss surely constitutes a moral victory for Virginia. The Cavaliers shot 1/23 from deep. (And no, that is not a typo.) The Sooners scorched the nets from beyond the arc – 13/30, or 43% -- and yet the game was still there for the taking for Virginia early in the fourth quarter. This is exactly the matchup Virginia needed ahead of a trip to the Grand Caymans to play Tulane and LSU. There will no doubt be lots of teaching points available to Coach Agugua-Hamilton.

Plus

Paris Clark and Kaydan Lawson made their first appearances on the hardwood this season. Now it is only Mir McLean that we’re waiting for.

Minus

The team looked ragged from the get-go. The rotations that Coach Mox has developed went out the window with the additions of Clark and Lawson, both of whom can play the 2 and the 3. In other words, the same position that Jillian Brown has helmed, and thrived at, since the first game. Brown, Yonta Vaughn and Kymora Johnson all had their worst games of the season. Some of this is due, no doubt, to the quality of the opponent, but some was due to the all the new faces. Chemistry takes time.

Minus

Get out and run. If you want to summarize Coach Mox’s philosophy through one season and four games at Virginia, this would be it. And in Oklahoma, the Cavs found an opponent just as invested in running as they are. Well, the Sooners schooled the Cavs in how to push the ball in transition.

This was a lovely play by Olivia McGhee.

She made the bucket. Two points. But it was typical of Virginia's approach to running.  Every time a Virginia guard gets the ball in transition and she gets into the paint, she’s going to the rim. And it works some times and fans ooh and aah, but it is predictable basketball. And it’s not efficient. Going 1-on-3 is not a recipe for success.

Virginia shot 1/23 from deep. Which is truly awful. But not one of the attempts came after a drive and kick out. When your team is in the middle of a 1/23 night, you have to look for the easier 3s to take, either a corner three or a three off a dribble drive, which are the two easiest threes to make.

By comparison, this was Oklahoma out running. Raina Jones here does NOT have tunnel vision, she’s got runners in the wings and she doesn’t try to touch the paint. Camryn Taylor is left trying to lunge at a three 23’ feet from the basket.

Oklahoma did this to Virginia all game long. Virginia was stout on D. They forced 24 turnovers. But that yielded just seven points on the break as opposed to the 18 that Oklahoma scored.

Plus

Free throw shooting remains a positive. This was a back and forth game, especially in the first half. Players on both teams looked gassed late in the first half. Free throw shooting is all about form and form suffers as exhaustion increases. And yet the team went 14/17 from the line.

Plus

Olivia McGhee had her coming out party. She got hurt in the Blue-White Scrimmage and it might have slowed her down a bit. Fellow freshman Kymora Johnson has gotten the early notoriety, but McGhee was the star of the game today. She had 14 points and 5 rebounds and the game’s most singular play.

Plus

Despite not having a player over 6’2” last year, the Cavaliers were a rugged rebounding team, especially on the offensive boards. Oklahoma is the No. 25 team in the country and they’ve got plenty of size and Virginia convincingly out-rebounded them on the offensive glass, 18 to 9. And subsequently they had a 15-8 advantage in second chance points.

Plus

Virginia has another strong second half. UVa was down by 17 at the half, had cut that to nine at the end of three, and was within five points early in the fourth quarter. Had the team merely been poor from deep, as opposed to putrid, and shot even just 26% from the arc, this would have been a much different game. Coulda. Shoulda. Woulda. As I said, this was a moral victory. And every season has room for a couple of those.

Matt's Take

Matt's got reaction from Coach Mox and a detailed game report.

Plus

Virginia 30 – 27 over Duke in football. As my buddy Hal, Official Friend of CavaliersNow© texted me, “It’s always good to beat Duke.” Yes indeed.

Plus

Orange on the hardwood. The women wore orange and introduced a new uniform. I cannot fathom how Carla Williams allows Tony Bennett to wear only blue and white uniforms. We are not Penn State. Virginia’s colors are orange and blue, and for the hoops programs, apparently only Coach Mox knows that.

Next Up: Virginia’s next two games are part of the Cayman Islands Classic. Looming on Saturday is reigning national champion LSU. There’s some turmoil in Kim Mulkey’s program as Angel Reese, last year’s Final Four Player of the Year, is not playing (and no one is speaking) and Hailey van Lith, primo transfer from Louisville, is not playing up to her standards. The game is looking more winnable than, say, it did two weeks ago.

But first, Virginia plays Tulane on Friday in what looks like a classic trap game. To see either game, you’ll have to sign up for FloHoops. Tip-off for Tulane is 11am.

Subscribe to the Cavaliers Now Newsletter to receive UVA sports news in your inbox first thing on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

To stay up to date on all Virginia Cavaliers sports news, follow CavaliersNow on social media:

Facebook: @CavaliersNow
Twitter: @CavaliersNowFN

See more Virginia women's basketball news and content: Virginia Women's Basketball on Sports Illustrated

See more Virginia sports news and content: Virginia Cavaliers on Sports Illustrated

Add us as a preferred source on Google

Loading recommendations... Please wait while we load personalized content recommendations

Published
Val Prochaska
VAL PROCHASKA

Val graduated from the University of Virginia in the last millennium, back when writing one's senior thesis by hand was still a thing. He is a lifelong fan of the ACC, having chosen the Tobacco Road conference ahead of the Big East. Again, when that was still a thing. Val has covered Virginia men's basketball for nine years, first with HoosPlace and then with StreakingTheLawn, before joining us here at Virginia Cavaliers on SI in August of 2023, continuing to cover UVA men's basketball and also writing about women's soccer and women's basketball.

Share on XFollow Jerzy_Walker