Virginia looks to keep road momentum going as it readies for trip to Villanova

SOUTH BEND, Ind. — London Perrantes leaned against a wall inside Purcell Pavilion, the Virginia senior talking about seemingly everything but his game-high 22 points in Tuesday night’s win at Notre Dame.

His health had seen better days. His diet had never been so light. He spoke about the fever and the headache he had felt for much of the day. He was told this was his flu game — a nod to Michael Jordan — and he smiled with a “guess so.”

“All the way up to the game,” the guard said of his symptoms. “I probably had like half a meal all day, so just basically tried to give all I’ve got in this game.

“Got two days off and get ready for Villanova, so hopefully I can get back.”

Ah, that’s right. Villanova. The team that will still technically be ranked No. 1 in the AP poll when the Cavaliers pay a visit to Philadelphia on Sunday. The team that won last year’s national title. The team that the Hoos had beaten rather decisively earlier in that championship Wildcats season.

So you can forgive Perrantes if he was not too phased about the prospect of going into the Wells Fargo Center.

“Obviously we beat them during the beginning of the season, but the beginning of the season is a lot different than the end of the season,” he said. “I actually didn’t watch the game — the championship game or any of the other Final Four games. I just watched the last two plays, the Marcus Paige jump shot and obviously Kris Jenkins, so I don’t really know how good they all played. But yeah, it was obviously difficult to watch them play in the championship.”

Whether Virginia is looking to exact a measure of vengeance this weekend against a team it has already beaten is beside the point. It is not every day you get a nonconference test like this deep into January, let alone a road one after paying a visit to the No. 14 team in the country.

That Virginia escaped here with a 17-point win is impressive, yes. That the Hoos did it with their best player in the physical condition that he was in — ahead of their trip to Nova — emboldens them to think of this Irish test as more of a hurdle passed more than simply a quality road win.

“I mean, it’s huge,” Perrantes said when asked about the victory under the circumstances. “We’ll take anything we can. Obviously a road win in conference play is huge, especially with a team that’s been playing as well as they have, it’s also big. So just try to keep the momentum going.”

That momentum is easier to do on the road — where the Hoos have made their mark — when you play the kind of defense Virginia does. As freshman guard Ty Jerome said, not everybody is used to that kind of greeting with the ball in their hands. Virginia is 6-1 on the road this year. Since the ACC expanded to 15 teams in 2013-14, the Hoos have a 23-9 conference road record, best in the league.

Marquette’s upset of Villanova — news that slowly made its way to the Virginia locker room during postgame interviews Tuesday — will undoubtedly sharpen the champs’ edge. But through victory on the same night, Virginia became empowered itself, as the Hoos feel there is yet another gear to be tapped into, something they have no choice but to believe after winning the way they did despite having Perrantes at sub-optimal health.

“He’s unbelievable, how consistent he is,” Jerome said of Perrantes. “He’s our leader, and when a leader steps up and plays like that, you have to follow.