Charlottesville, VA -- Gary Forbes had 21 points, including 17 second-half points, as Virginia used a 20-6 run late in the game to pull ahead of the Hokies for a 65-60 win. Virginia Tech was led by Zabian Dowdell with 20 points and Coleman Collins with 19. The loss is Virginia Tech's third straight and fourth in their last five games, dropping the Hokies to 12-10 (5-6 ACC). Virginia has won three straight and improves to 13-9, 4-7 in the conference.

Virginia Tech led 41-35 with over 12 minutes remaining, but Virginia went on a decisive 20-6 run over an 8:23 span to go up 55-47, and the Hokies never seriously threatened after that. After a poor-shooting first half, the Cavaliers shot 14-28 (50%) in the second half, getting open looks in transition and in the half-court set, as VT once again struggled to come up with a defensive stop in the second half, much as they did against Maryland.

Virginia has won three games in a row since having switched to a more slow-tempo style, and the Hokies fell victim to it. All season long, Virginia Tech has used turnover margin to their advantage, but in this game, while the Hokies took good care of the ball, turning it over just 10 times, they only forced 9 UVa turnovers.

The Hokies were also plagued by foul problems, with Dowdell fouling out and Jamon Gordon and Carlos Dixon finishing with 4 fouls apiece. The foul situation, plus Virginia spreading the floor and slowing things down, meant the Hokies couldn't use their trademark scrappy half-court defense to good advantage. The Hokies also struggled to finish around the basket, failing to capitalize on 13 offensive rebounds while missing a number of dunks and follow-ups. The Hokies shot just 35.7% for the game, going 20-56, which included 11-27 in the second half, when the Cavaliers were hot.

Dixon played just six first-half minutes due to three fouls and was ineffective offensively, failing to score a field goal (0-3) and finishing with just four points. Dowdell was 4-7 from three-point range, but the rest of the Hokies went 0-5. Fortunately for the Hokies, Virginia was cold from the outside, going 5-23 (21.7%).

Neither team shot well in the first half, which ended in a 26-26 tie. VT hit just 9-29 (31%), and Virginia missed a number of open opportunities in going 11-33 (33%). The Hokies broke open a 7-7 game with a 12-4 run to take a 19-11 lead on a jumper by Collins with 8:12 left in the half.

Virginia gradually battled back with a 13-4 run, keyed by two 3-pointers from Devin Smith (16 points), to take a brief 24-23 lead. Deron Washington scored VT's last three points of the half to pull Tech back to a tie at intermission.

In that first half, Dowdell (11 points in the half) and Collins (10 points) had all but five of Tech's points. Dixon was scoreless in just six minutes, picking up three fouls in the process. Marquie Cooke, Jeff King, Robert Krabbendam, and Wynton Witherspoon all saw action in the first half for the Hokies.

After Elton Brown hit a shot to open the second half, the Hokies went on an 8-0 run to push their lead out to 34-28 with 17:04 left. The Hokies held on to that lead, getting a 41-35 advantage on a three-pointer by Dowdell with 12:45 left, before things started to fall apart. The Cavaliers roared back, going on a 20-6 run, getting 13 points in that time from Forbes, who had a dunk, a tip-in, and several layups, in both the half court and transition. A dunk by Devin Smith gave the Cavaliers a 55-47 advantage with 4:23 remaining.

Dowdell responded with a three-pointer, but the Cavaliers stretched their lead out to 59-52 on two free throws by Smith with 2:17 remaining. Four points from Jamon Gordon and 1-2 on free throws by UVa's Brown made the score 60-56, and Virginia started a key possession with 1:14 remaining.

The Cavaliers ran the shot clock down, and Smith took a three-point shot with 44 seconds left to go, missing it. The Cavaliers got the offensive rebound though, forcing the Hokies to foul. Tech tagged Sean Singletary, who made both free throws and pushed the lead back to 62-56 with 40 seconds left.

The Hokies couldn't get it any closer than four points after that, as UVa made 3-4 free throws in the last 30 seconds to stay ahead of VT.

The Hokies gave up 13 offensive rebounds to Virginia on the day, including one second-half possession in which the Cavaliers had three straight offensive boards before finally scoring. But overall, the battle of the boards was fairly even, with UVa winning 40-38.

This game finished a stretch of five road games out of seven for the Hokies, who went 3-4 in those seven games and now return home for a 9 pm contest with Duke on Thursday, Feb. 17th. The game will be televised on ESPN2.

VIRGINIA TECH (60)

                          fg    ft    rb             
                   min   m-a   m-a   o-t   a  pf   tp
D Washington        29   3-9   3-6   2-7   1   2    9
C Dixon             25   0-3   4-4   0-5   4   4    4
C Collins           33  8-15   3-4   5-7   1   2   19
Z Dowdell           37  6-13   4-5   0-2   0   5   20
J Gordon            31   2-8   2-2   2-3   3   4    6
W Witherspoon        3   0-0   0-0   0-0   0   0    0
R Krabbendam         4   0-1   0-0   0-1   1   1    0
M Cooke             26   0-5   0-0   2-6   0   1    0
J King               2   0-0   0-0   0-0   0   0    0
C Tucker            10   1-2   0-0   0-2   1   1    2
  
_____________________________________________________
TOTALS             200 20-56 16-21 11-33  11  20   60
_____________________________________________________

Percentages: FG-.357, FT-.762. 3-Point Goals:
4-12, .333 (C Dixon 0-2, Z Dowdell 4-7, J 
Gordon 0-1, M Cooke 0-1, C Tucker 0-1). Team 
Rebounds: 5. Blocked Shots: 3 (C Dixon, Z 
Dowdell, D Washington). Turnovers: 10 (J 
Gordon 3, Z Dowdell 2, M Cooke 2, C Dixon, D 
Washington, C Collins). Steals: 7 (J Gordon 
4, C Tucker, D Washington, M Cooke).


VIRGINIA (65)

                          fg    ft    rb             
                   min   m-a   m-a   o-t   a  pf   tp
D Smith             36  6-15   2-3   2-7   2   3   16
E Brown             28   4-6   2-6   2-7   0   2   10
J Reynolds          32   1-9   0-0   0-1   1   3    2
T Bannister         21   0-5   2-2   0-2   3   3    2
S Singletary        40   3-8   2-2   1-7   7   3   10
G Forbes            28  9-14   2-3   4-5   1   3   21
J Cain              14   2-4   0-0   1-7   1   2    4
D Minter             1   0-0   0-0   0-0   0   0    0
  
_____________________________________________________
TOTALS             200 25-61 10-16 10-36  15  19   65
_____________________________________________________

Percentages: FG-.410, FT-.625. 3-Point Goals:
5-23, .217 (D Smith 2-10, J Reynolds 0-5, S 
Singletary 2-4, G Forbes 1-3, J Cain 0-1). 
Team Rebounds: 4. Blocked Shots: 6 (D Smith 
2, G Forbes 2, E Brown, J Cain). Turnovers: 9
(D Smith 2, J Cain 2, E Brown, T Bannister, S
Singletary, J Reynolds, G Forbes). Steals: 4 
(S Singletary 3, J Reynolds).


-----------------------------------
VIRGINIA TECH        26  34   -  60
VIRGINIA             26  39   -  65
----------------------------------- 

Technical fouls: None. A: 8,223. Officials: Mike 
Wood, Mike Eades, Ray Natili

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