Indies top order crumbled around him, Kraigg Brath

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. -- Austin Nichols is one of several new players that figures prominently in the rotation for No. 8 Virginia, and while he arrived as a transfer from Memphis with a reputation as a gifted offensive player, hes adapted quickly to Tony Bennetts defensive philosophy.I think we can be a pretty good team, Nichols said after leading Virginia with 11 points in a 72-32 rout of St. Francis Brooklyn on Tuesday night. Weve just to continue focusing on defense.The Cavaliers (2-0) looked in midseason form at the other end of the floor, holding the Terriers of the Northeast Conference scoreless for a stretch of more than 10 minutes in the first half. Virginia scored 20 consecutive points in that stretch to open a 35-11 lead.The Cavaliers dont have a go-to scoring option so far, and even if one surfaces, Bennett said their focus will always be the same.I think this team understands that were going to have to be so good defensively, he said. Thats going to be our ticket.The Terriers (0-2) ended the drought on two free throws by Yunus Hopkinson with 7.8 seconds left in the half.These games do one of two things for you. They either make you stronger or break you, Terriers coach Glenn Braica said.Glenn Sanabria led St. Francis with 10 points and Gunnar Olafsson had seven.Nichols, who missed Virginias two preseason scrimmages and season-opener at UNC Greensboro while serving a suspension for violating a team rule, scored on an array and shots around the basket. Jarred Reuter added nine points and London Perrantes, Marial Shayok and Mamadi Diakite each had eight for Virginia. All 11 scholarship players for the Cavaliers scored and grabbed at least one rebound.The Terriers finished 11 for 48 from the field, 22.9 percent.BIG PICTURESt. Francis: The Terriers attempted 16 3-pointers in the first half and made just one, which is not the recipe for a team from the Northeast Conference to challenge a ranked or Power Five-level school. Having already lost at North Carolina State, they continue an early season gauntlet at Providence next Monday.Virginia: The early-season indoctrination of youth into coach Tony Bennetts lineup continued as freshmen Kyle Guy (21 minutes) and Ty Jerome (10) each got significant playing time and Diakite, a redshirt freshman, played 14.THE DOWN LOWNichols has plenty of company up front in 6-11 Jack Salt, 6-9 Diakite and 6-7 Reuter, and all made contributions.Jack started and had six points and two rebounds, Reuter and Diakite each grabbed four rebounds and Diakite had a block.Me and Manadi are more like finesse players, Nichols said, and the Bruise Brothers, Jarred and Jack, theyre the bangers inside.BULLSEYEVirginia walk-on Justice Bartley was one of three walk-ons who entered the game for Virginia with about 2 minutes to play, and Bennett was thrilled to see the sophomore score his first collegiate basket on a layup with 30 seconds remaining.HE SAID ITI think its $60,000, or $80,000. -- St. Francis Brooklyn coach Glenn Braica when asked what his team gets from facing Virginia.UP NEXTSt. Francis travels north to play at Providence next Monday night.Virginia continues a three-game home-stand with a visit from Yale on Sunday. Austin Bryant Lions Jersey . A lawyer for MLB, Matthew Menchel, confirmed Wednesday the league dropped its case against Biogenesis of America, its owner Anthony Bosch and several other individuals. The lawsuit had accused Biogenesis and Bosch of conspiring with players to violate their contracts by providing them with banned performance-enhancing substances. Calvin Johnson Jersey .Y. -- The Buffalo Sabres have placed centre Cody Hodgson on injured reserve and recalled two players from their AHL affiliate in Rochester. http://www.authenticnfllionslockroom.com/Youth-Jahlani-Tavai-Elite-Jersey/ . Emery skated the length of the ice and fought an unwilling Holtby during the third period of the Flyers 7-0 loss Friday night in Philadelphia. He was given 29 penalty minutes, including a game misconduct. But Emery did not face even a disciplinary hearing with NHL senior vice president of player safety Brendan Shanahan because rules 46. T.J. Hockenson Youth Jersey . The defence is doing its part, too. Drew Brees threw a pair of touchdown passes in the first half and the guys on the other side made sure that was enough, sending the Saints to a 17-13 victory over the Atlanta Falcons on Thursday night. Jarrad Davis Jersey . Collaros, 25, was solid last season, posting a 5-2 record as the starter while incumbent Ricky Ray was injured. Collaros also started Torontos 23-20 regular-season finale loss to Montreal — Ray didnt dress because the Argos had already clinched first in the East Division — but was one of three quarterbacks to play that day. On Friday evening, Mohammed Shami took his first Test wicket in a year, six months, and 13 days. If any wicket is worth that long a wait, one necessitated by injury, surgery, and 40 days on crutches, this was probably it.The seam was bolt upright as the ball left Shamis hand, with no hint of wobble, and the impact of seam on turf caused the ball to move away from Rajendra Chandrika. It pitched just short of a good length, not too far from off stump, climbed a few inches more than Chandrika possibly expected, and drew an instinctive jab. Outside edge taken, chance accepted, and West Indies, replying to Indias 566 for 8 declared, were 29 for 1.It was a beautiful delivery, from a bowler fully capable of bowling them, but perhaps few had really expected him to produce that particular kind of delivery.Before this Test, 48.94% of Shamis Test wickets were either bowled or leg before, and only 31.91% caught behind or in the slip cordon. Those numbers reflected the skills he was primarily known for: pace, a fullish, attacking length, and an ability to reverse the ball. He possessed a sharp bouncer too, but did not necessarily generate steep bounce from a good length or just short of it.He often got wickets for the opposite reason, with balls that skidded on, losing very little pace off the pitch, reaching the batsman quicker than expected, perhaps even a shade lower than expected, and punishing them for camping in the crease.Marlon Samuels knew all about this. Shami, on Test debut, had dismissed him twice with deliveries skidding through from that perfect length, the shortest possible length he could land on while still hitting the stumps. Samuels was caught on the crease both times, bowled for 65 in the first innings and lbw for 4 in the second.On Saturday, two-and-a-half years later, Samuels faced Shami again. He seemed to be reminding himself of those dismissals, and seemed to be a man fighting his muscle memory, a man of sluggish footwork telling himself to press forward. The result of that internal struggle was a sort of crouching shuffle across the crease, and Shami wrong-footed him twice with bouncers. Samuels got under both of them, hunching awkwardly low.Shamis 16th ball to Samuels landed on the fullish side of a good length, in the corridor. Samuels shuffled across once more, leaning forward, and aimed for a push into the covers. All he managed was a thin edge. It settled snugly in Wriddhiman Sahas gloves, and Shami had become the joint-quickest Indian fast bowler to 50 Test wickets.Once again there was movement, and once again a bit of extra bounce. The ball had brushed the edge of Samuels bat close to its shoulder. In between the Chandrika and Samuels dismissals, Shami had dismissed Darren Bravo with a not dissimilar delivery, though shorter. Three balls after sending back Samuels, he got Jermaine Blackwood to fend another awkwardly lifting ball to gully.Four wickets, all of them the result of extra bounce. This was new, and unexpected. It caused you to watch every step of his action just that little closer. Once you did that, there was one obvious change from the Shami of old. In his first couple of years of international cricket, Shami had an idiosyncratiic run to the crease, a gallop of unusually long strides.dddddddddddd A number of experts had suggested this could cause a loss of stability when he reached the crease, and had ascribed this as a reason for his tendency to bowl loose balls. Around the time of the 2015 World Cup, Shami had said he was making an effort to shorten his running strides, and had credited Shoaib Akhtar with giving him the suggestion.Now, making his Test comeback at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium, Shami was sprinting in with noticeably shorter strides. The question still remained: did this have any connection with the bounce he was generating?Pondering it, Ian Bishop, the former West Indies fast bowler, suggested the bounce might have had less to do with shorter running strides than with a possible knock-on effect: a shorter delivery stride. This, he said, would give the bowler a higher point of release, and, as a consequence, the possibility of extra bounce. He took the example of Shannon Gabriel, who had troubled India with steep lift during their first innings.Before he suffered the ankle injury that cut short his 2015-16 Australia tour, Gabriels delivery stride, Bishop said, had grown progressively longer without him quite realising it, causing him to lose height at the crease.In the months following his recovery, Gabriel had worked hard to correct this. It wasnt easy to tell if Shami had also, by design or as a byproduct of his reduced running stride, shortened his delivery stride, but Bishop felt he was achieving good height at release. What also pleased him was Shamis alignment at the crease, his feet lined up to point him precisely where he wanted to bowl.It told in his line. On a pitch where bounce often seemed to be the fast bowlers only friend, Ishant Sharma may have been expected to provide the main threat, but while he did achieve steep lift, his line wasnt as close to off stump as Shamis. He did not make the batsmen play as often, and did not, as a result, force as many errors.As the rest of West Indies top order crumbled around him, Kraigg Brathwaite waged lonely resistance, his method simple and effective. Blessed with excellent judgment of line, he ignored as many deliveries as he could outside off stump, and waited patiently for straighter balls he could work into the leg side. Forty-eight of his 74 runs came in that direction. The cover drive barely made an appearance. Most of his off-side runs came square or behind square, when the bowlers dropped short.In all, Brathwaite left 53 balls. But he didnt leave with equal ease against all of Indias bowlers. He left 31 of the 67 balls he faced from Ishant, 13 out of 45 from Umesh Yadav, and only 6 out of 31 from Shami. He passed Shamis fourth-stump examination, but four of his team-mates didnt.This, in short, was high-class Test bowling: pace, movement, and that new-found bounce, all allied to an excellent length and a line that forced the batsmen to play, or think about playing. A better batting side may have made fewer mistakes, but Shami was still asking the right questions, over and over. ' ' '