PHILADELPHIA (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) – Their professional basketball seasons in Europe normally included over 30 games. So, as Virginia’s Thijs DeRidder and Johann Grunloh gear up to play their 36th contest for the Cavaliers in Sunday night’s NCAA Tournament second-round game against Tennessee, it’s not the number of outings that is taking its toll.

It’s the timing.

European seasons typically stretch out over nine or 10 months.

The American college season is scrunched into five.

“You can feel it,” Grunloh told Cville Right Now. “When I go to (UVA trainer Ethan Saliba) more tape has to be added to the body. You have a blister there. Tape there. A wrist here. It feels like I have to take like 20 minutes for tape each practice. You can definitely feel it. That the season, there are so many games back-to-back.”

Grunloh played last season for SC Rasta Vechta in the German Bundesliga. DeRidder spent the past two years with Bilbao Basket in the Spanish Liga ABC. 

“It’s kind of new for me because in Europe, the season is from September til June, if you play playoffs all the way,” DeRidder told Cville Right Now. “Here it is more narrow, like squeezed into each other.”

What’s helped keep not only UVA’s European imports but its entire roster fresh for this NCAA Tournament has been impressive depth. 

First-year coach Ryan Odom employs a nine-man rotation, not uncommon in college basketball. What is unusual is that all nine players who regularly see the court average over 16 minutes per game. 

Tennessee, for example, only has six regulars seeing that many minutes. The Wright State team Virginia fought past in the first round had seven.

Chance Mallory, Ugo Onyenso, Devin Tillis and Jacari White give UVA multiple productive options off its bench. White scored 26 points to lead the Cavaliers to their 82-73 win over the Raiders in the first round Friday.

“For the end of the year, this is the best I’ve felt honestly in my career,” said senior point guard Dallin Hall, whose 28.4 minutes per game lead the team. “We feel good. We have depth and that’s been our strength all year.”

Hall credited the work of Saliba and strength coach Mike Curtis, the practice planning of the coaching staff, and the deep bench for that.

UVA will lean on its depth Sunday night when they face a big and physical opponent in the Volunteers. 

Saturday after practice at Xfinity Mobile Arena, the Cavaliers said Tennessee has a similar physical presence to Duke and Miami, teams Virginia faced during the ACC season. 

“I think the first time we played Miami, the first time we played Duke, the physicality shocked us a little bit,” guard Malik Thomas told Cville Right Now. “The second go-around of playing both those teams, I think we did a better job of adjusting to the physicality. But we’re not going to have a second chance to play Tennessee. This is win or go home. We have to be adjusted to their physicality at tip off and be the aggressors.”

The Volunteers rank second in the nation in rebounding margin, winning the battle on the boards by 12 a game.Virginia is 14th at seven. 

Where Tennessee has truly distinguished itself is on the offensive glass, where its 16.1 offensive rebounds per game also rank second in the country and can lead to a wave of second-chance points.

That figures to lead to a compelling clash at the rim, where UVA leads the country with 6.4 blocked shots per game. 

“We have to be who we are,” Tennessee coach Rick Barnes said. “They’re going to be who they are, and you hope there’s no let down in that. You hope your habits eventually take over, and our habits are who we are and we hope that if we have done the right things, they’re going to shine when we need them to shine.”

Shine Sunday and you move on to the Sweet 16.