Sene returns; Cavs beat Oral Roberts

CHARLOTTESVILLE — If you’re a Wahoo fan, you’ve gotta love the fact that Assane Sene is back in the lineup.

The Virginia sophomore scored a career-high eight points, grabbed seven rebounds and blocked a shot in his first game of the season on Saturday afternoon at John Paul Jones Arena — and seemed completely unsatisfied.

“This is nothing,” said Sene, following Virginia’s 76-55 win over Oral Roberts in the Cancun Challenge. “I know I can do better.”

That has to be music to the ears of the Wahoo Nation, not to mention first-year Virginia coach Tony Bennett.

Sene, fresh off a three-game suspension, is clearly one of Virginia’s most important players. Against Oral Roberts, Sene showed what a valuable commodity a 7-footer with long arms can be.

Sene scored five of his points and swatted a shot by the Golden Eagles’ Michael Craion to key an 11-4 second-half spurt that essentially put the game out of reach.

“Assane, with his activity —whether it’s a blocked shot or a rebound — is a very good help-defender,” said Bennett, whose team won its second straight. “Obviously he (adds) some size and depth on the front line.”

On Tuesday, the Cancun Challenge moves to Mexico. Virginia (3-1) plays Stanford, while Oral Roberts (2-2) takes on Sam Houston State.

“It’s baby steps, as they say,” said Bennett, when asked about his team’s progress. “I thought we reeled it back in and, defensively, didn’t let it get out of hand in the second half.

“There were less breakdowns as it wore on. My big challenge to them is, ‘Just don’t go back to ground zero.’”

Virginia was led by Mike Scott’s 15 points and 10 rebounds. Sylven Landesberg added 14 points and seven rebounds, while Sammy Zeglinski and Mustapha Farrakhan each scored 13.

UVa started the game a little slow. In the first half, the Cavaliers were blitzed by 3-pointers. Golden Eagles guard Kyron Stokes nailed his first four attempts to propel his team to a 19-14 lead.

But Virginia, behind Farrakhan — he scored all 13 of his points in the first half — pulled back into the game and eventually led by as many as 10. The Cavaliers took a 41-35 lead into the break.

In the second half, Virginia’s defense hunkered down. Farrakhan, according to Bennett, did an excellent job of putting the clamps on Golden Eagles forward Dominique Morrison, who had scored 31 points against Stanford on Wednesday. Morrison finished with just seven points on 3 of 15 shooting.

“Mu took that challenge and tried to make him earn as much as possible,” Bennett said. “I thought Mu’s quickness — and he was just constantly there — wore on him.

“I thought Mu did a nice job.”

For the game, Virginia held the Golden Eagles to 32-percent shooting.

“They make it awfully difficult for you to get easy points,” said Oral Roberts coach Scott Sutton. “I thought we missed some easy shots early in the second half that could have gotten us some momentum and kept us in the game.”

With Sene back, Virginia controlled the boards, out-rebounding the Golden Eagles by nine. Junior forward Mike Scott looked as comfortable on the blocks as he has all season.

Landesberg was happy to have Sene out on the court again.

“He brings so much energy and is so active on both ends of the court,” Landesberg said. “He’s just a lot of fun to play with out there.

“It’s not good to let your man go past you, but you know if he does, you know you got a big 7-footer down there waiting and it’s going to be tough for him to make a shot.”

Sene should have finished the game with two blocks. Late in the game, he swatted the shot of a driving Ken Holdman, but was inexplicably called for his fifth foul.

“That was really a bad call, I think,” Sene said, (but) I’m just going to keep working. This is just the beginning. I know I, and I know we, can do better than that.

“I’m just going to keep working hard.”

Sene said it was tough having to sit out the team’s first three games for “conduct detrimental to the team.”

“That was just a learning time,” he said. “We all make mistakes — just don’t do it again and learn from it.

“It was hard to sit on the bench and watch my teammates play, but I was also learning from that. A lot of times players can learn from the bench. That’s what I was doing.”

Sene said the biggest thing he tries to bring the team is “energy.”

“I always use the word ‘hyped,’” he said. “I love that word. We’ve got to always be like that. When we do that, we can beat any team.”

w Reid is a staff writer for the Charlottesville Daily Progress.

ORAL ROBERTS (2-2)

Morrison 3-15 0-0 7, Craion 2-8 2-2 6, Ford 6-9 4-8 16, Pearson 1-4 0-0 3, Stokes 4-8 1-2 13, Rogers 0-2 0-0 0, Holdman 0-2 1-2 1, Niles 1-4 1-2 4, Bell-Holter 1-4 3-4 5, Nasarre 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 18-56 12-20 55.

VIRGINIA (3-1)

Scott 6-12 3-4 15, Meyinsse 1-3 0-1 2, Farrakhan 4-8 3-4 13, Zeglinski 4-7 2-2 13, Landesberg 4-10 6-6 14, Evans 0-0 0-0 0, Baker 1-5 2-2 4, Sene 3-5 2-4 8, Sherrill 1-1 0-0 3, Jones 0-3 2-4 2, Spurlock 1-1 0-0 2, Tat 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 25-55 20-27 76.

Halftime—Virginia 41-35. 3-Point Goals—Oral Roberts 7-17 (Stokes 4-5, Pearson 1-1, Niles 1-3, Morrison 1-5, Bell-Holter 0-1, Rogers 0-1, Craion 0-1), Virginia 6-15 (Zeglinski 3-6, Farrakhan 2-3, Sherrill 1-1, Jones 0-1, Baker 0-2, Landesberg 0-2). Fouled Out—Sene. Rebounds—Oral Roberts 35 (Craion 11), Virginia 44 (Scott 10). Assists—Oral Roberts 7 (Ford, Pearson, Stokes 2), Virginia 12 (Farrakhan 4). Total Fouls—Oral Roberts 20, Virginia 17. A—8,829.