Editor's Note: Over the course of this multi-part series, we're going to take a deep dive into UVa's recent results in the NCAA Tournament and break down the data to see what myths can be busted and what long-term lessons can be taken away.

We begin with a look at the recent wins and losses as well as how regular-season success compares to the tournament results.

Virginia is 13-7 in the NCAA Tournament in the Tony Bennett era. In their eight appearances, the Cavaliers have made it to the Sweet Sixteen three times, the Elite Eight twice, with one Final Four and of course the National Championship. Those numbers are comparable or better than most programs that make the NCAA Tournament annually, a group of teams that make up the sport’s very elite.

But there's also this: In UVa’s eight NCAA trips, the Wahoos have lost in the First Round three times, twice as the higher seed losing to a double-digit seed. And of course, once in historic fashion, becoming the first No. 1-seed to lose to a 16 in a game that wasn’t even close.

UVa’s loss to Ohio last weekend was the latest addition to this list, meaning Virginia has also failed to reach the tournament’s second weekend in five of the eight trips with two of those early exits coming as a 1- or 2-seed.

In Bennett’s 15 years as a head coach, he has made the NCAA Tournament 10 times, including a pair of trips while coaching at Washington State. In those games he is 16-9, giving him a 64 percent win percentage.

As a program, Virginia has been to 24 NCAA Tournaments in more than 100 years of basketball. The program record in the NCAAs is 35-22, so before Bennett arrived, the Wahoos were 22-15 in the NCAA’s, for a 59 percent win percentage.

In many ways, this is difficult to quantify. How does one begin to determine whether teams play "harder" in March than they do in the regular season? And assuming they do, because every NCAA Tournament game is do or die, how big is the “effort” gap between a March Madness contest and a game against NC State on a Wednesday night in mid-February?

Also, it’s not like Virginia’s players aren’t also aware of the stakes, so if other teams are playing harder and valuing each possession, the Hoos should be doing the same. It’s also worth noting that all tournament games are at neutral sites, but Virginia has won a lion’s share of neutral games during the regular season and has had a strong road record as well.

There is one quantifiable difference, however. Every team in the NCAA Tournament has some combination of the following: talent, effort, good coaching, or a winning culture. Even the No. 16 seeds had to win their conference tournaments to get to the NCAAs. So every team Virginia faces in the Big Dance believes it can win, is used to winning, or—in the case of the bubble teams—is talented enough to knock off a top seed.

Obviously the ACC is annually a deep and talented league, with some of the nation’s top teams. In the Bennett era, Virginia has played better teams in the ACC regular season run that it has in the NCAAs (UVa has never played a 1- or 2-seeded team in the NCAA Tournament under Bennett). But on average, the teams UVa has faced in the Big Dance have been better than its average regular-season competition.

In 2019, the Cavaliers average KenPom ranking of their regular-season opponents was 103. Once the non-conference competition was removed, their average conference foe had a KenPom ranking of 56. And in UVa’s six-game title run? Their opponent had an average ranking of 41. Once the Gardner Webb (No. 163) is removed, UVa’s opponents were all ranked 32nd or higher, with an average ranking of 17.

In 2020, UVa went on an eight-game winning streak to end the regular season before things were called off. Many fans and media felt the Wahoos had turned a corner, and without a doubt they deserve credit for pulling out a bunch of wins in a row. But in that stretch, UVa only beat two top 50 KenPom teams, both at home, and all but one of those wins were one-possession games. So as UVa ran into better teams on average in the postseason, its run of close wins was likely to come to an end.

The rules of basketball are the same in the regular season as they are in the postseason. And in the regular season, UVa has been flat out dominant in recent years: The Hoos are 219-50 in the regular season since 2014, with five ACC regular season championships and a gaudy home record. There’s no doubt that NCAA Tournament games pack more pressure and, as the data shows, are usually against better teams than UVa sees on the average regular-season night, despite playing in an elite conference.

Once again we have to thank KenPom for access to a boatload of advanced stats for all of UVa’s tournament successes and failings in recent years.

The most notable stat to explain UVa’s wins and losses is points per possession. The Hoos are consistently at the bottom nationally in pace, so there are fewer possessions in their contests than in other games, though the difference isn’t always massive.

In the program’s 13 NCAA Tournament wins under Bennett, the Cavaliers have scored 1.18 points per possession and 73.9 points per game. Their opponents have scored just 0.99 points per possession and 62.5 points per game. In their losses, however, it has been a different story. UVa has scored just 53 points per game in its seven NCAA Tournament losses under Bennett, while allowing 65.9 points per game. UVa has scored just 0.88 points per possession in those losses and if you’re a novice when it comes to advanced stats, 0.88 PPP is what the experts would call “bad.” UVa’s defense hasn’t been as sharp in the losses, either, allowing 1.09 points per possession. In their tournament wins, the Hoos have scored less than a point per possession just once, their 53-49 win over Oregon in 2019. They have allowed more than one point per possession in all of their losses and scored more than one PPP in just one loss, the nail biter against Michigan State In 2014.

One common thread in UVa’s setbacks is big deficits. Virginia has trailed by at least 10 points in five of the seven losses. The only games the Cavaliers lost where they didn’t trail big were the comeback wins for Syracuse in 2016 and Ohio this year. Both of those teams achieved their biggest leads of the contest once their comebacks were complete and they had the game in hand. And while it may feel that UVa has blown a lot of leads in March, the Wahoos only led by double digits in one of their NCAA losses, again, Syracuse, when they led by 16 early in the second half. They did lead by more than one possession in all but one of their losses (a 2-0 advantage against Michigan State in 2015), but the Cavaliers weren’t able to stretch out those leads and put the opponent away. UVa also lost some leads in the title run but never trailed by more than 10 in wins over Oregon, Auburn, Purdue, or Texas Tech.

So how have the Hoos done in close games? Most of the wins in the NCAAs have come by significant margins, with the exception being their run to the title two years ago. UVa’s average NCAA win has come by 11.4 points, and until the title run, the only single-digit win previously, beating No. 12-seed UNC Wilmington 76-71, came after trailing by 15 in the first half. In Virginia’s losses, there have been a few blowouts (the two Florida games and UMBC) and a slew of close ones. UVa’s losses to Michigan State (twice), Syracuse, and Ohio—four games total—have come by just 18 points. And all of those games could have gone either way in the final minutes.

And then 2019 happened. In the six-game run to the title, the Cavaliers beat Oregon by four, Purdue by five in OT, Auburn by one, and Texas Tech by eight in OT. Three of those games were decided in the final seconds of regulation and the Hoos trailed in all of them.

Did those wins happen because UVa’s luck turned around, or was it something else? More on that later in this series.

Was UVa doomed by poor shooting in its losses and propelled by hot shooting in the wins? Mostly, yes. In seven tournament losses under Bennett, the Wahoos shot a combined 32 of 142 from deep, or 22.5 percent. UVa broke 30 percent from 3 in just two of those losses, going 6-of-18 against Michigan State in the 2014 Sweet Sixteen and 8-for-21 against Syracuse in 2016. There have been some atrocious performances there as well, like going 2-for-17 from 3 against Michigan State in 2015 and a 1-for-15 night from deep against Florida in 2017. As expected UVa was better from deep in its wins, going 94 of 248 from long range combined, or 37.9 percent. UVa shot better than 40 percent from deep in five of those wins, including an 11-for-24 effort in the title game against Texas Tech. The Cavaliers had a few rough outings in their wins, making less than 30 percent of their 3s in three games that they won (Butler in 2016, Oklahoma and Oregon in 2019), but they excelled in other areas in those victories.

UVa got to the line more in games it won, on average, and converted. In their 13 wins, the Wahoos have averaged 17 free-throw attempts, and scored just under 13 points per game at the line. UVa got to the line just 13 times per game in the losses, scoring 9.3 points per game on free throws. That may not seem like a huge difference, but considering the fact that UVa lost so many close games in the tournament, that small difference can end up being critical.

When UVa has made 15+ free throws in NCAA Tournament games, the Cavaliers have gone 7-1.

Tomorrow: So, what's the "magic number" for the Hoos?

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