CHARLOTTESVILLE -- As he evaluated the skills of three freshman candidates to join Sean Singletary in Virginia's backcourt, men's basketball coach Dave Leitao always had a fall-back plan.

Leitao had been watching transfer Calvin Baker for a year in practice and knew that Baker offered what the three freshman didn't -- experience.

Baker led William and Mary in scoring and assists two years ago as a freshman, and he logged 14 minutes Sunday afternoon in Virginia's season-opening 90-72 victory over Vermont.

Freshman Jeff Jones started at the backcourt spot vacated by four-year starter J.R. Reynolds, but Baker was the first guard off the bench.

Baker finished with 11 points and took defensive turns on Mike Trimboli, the Catamounts' point guard and top returning scorer.

"If [Baker] was on a regular course, he would be a college junior," Leitao said, "and, regardless of what level he was playing at, he would be very comfortable on the court."

Baker was enrolled at Virginia during the 2006-07 season and was allowed to practice with the team.

"He's had a year of being successful, individually, on a team," Leitao said. "He's had a year of understanding what's required of everybody in this program. He's gotten beat up for one straight year by both J.R. and Sean, so he's better for those experiences.

"He has a chance, at least coming out of the gate, to be a pretty solid contributor. While those three [freshmen] go through their normal paces, we can be stable enough with a guy like him."

That's all Baker wanted -- a chance.

"I've heard since I made the decision to come here that it was a risky choice," said Baker, a 6-foot-2, 186-pounder from Woodside High School in Newport News. "It was a risk I was prepared to take."

The hardest part of sitting out the 2006-07 season was not being able to accompany the team to games.

"There was plenty of anticipation coming into our first scrimmage, not to mention the games," Baker said. "I'd been playing against nobody but our own players for a year and a half."

Baker acknowledges that defense was one of his weaknesses at William and Mary, where he averaged 11.6 points in 2005-06, and he knew he had to get better if he wanted to play.

"Coach Leitao [is] a defensive coach; that's all he preaches," Baker said. "If you want to play on his team, that's a big part of it. He always told me, 'You never know when your name's going to be called.' He puts a lot of trust in me that I won't break down at the defensive end."

The Cavaliers had problems with 6-5 Marqus Blakley, who scored a game-high 24 points, mostly around the basket. However, Trimboli was limited to 16 points on 7-of-17 shooting from the field.

Vermont shot 41.5 percent from the field, compared to 54.7 percent by the Cavaliers, who got 19 points apiece from Singletary and Adrian Joseph. Joseph was 5-for-8 on 3-pointers and Virginia was 9-for-19 behind the arc as a team.

Virginia used 14 players, not including senior center Tunji Soroye, who underwent arthroscopic knee surgery last week, and his fellow Nigerian Solomon Tat, who underwent surgery earlier this fall for a sports hernia.

Playing time was limited for three other players who have missed considerable practice time because of injury: sophomore Will Harris (ankle), freshman Mike Scott (ankle) and freshman Mustapha Farrakhan (hand).

It was Virginia's 10th straight victory in a season opener, while Vermont fell to 0-2 after dropping a 60-53 decision Friday night at George Mason. The Catamounts finished 25-8 last year, winning 20 of 21 games after a 5-5 start.

"I've had a lot of conversations with people about the word that will come up all year long ... parity," Leitao said. "You've look at Kentucky and they get beat. You look at Georgia Tech and they get beat. Southern Cal gets beat. All in the first weekend. Obviously, 1-0 is a better way to get started than 0-1."

Vermont MP FG FT R A F PT

Blakely 36 9-15 6-9 10 3 3 24

McIntosh 23 2-6 2-2 3 1 4 7

Shields 17 3-6 0-0 0 0 0 6

Trimboli 37 7-17 0-0 2 3 3 16

Cieplicki 29 5-12 2-2 1 2 5 13

Accaoui 13 0-3 2-2 0 1 1 2

Vier 11 0-3 0-0 0 1 2 0

Powlovich 20 0-0 2-2 3 0 3 2

Field 8 1-2 0-0 1 0 0 2

Dean 1 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0

Robbins 1 0-1 0-0 0 0 0 0

Kissel 4 0-0 0-0 0 0 2 0

Team 5

Totals 200 27-65 14-17 25 11 23 72

Virginia MP FG FT R A F PT

Diane 29 4-7 1-3 8 1 2 10

Joseph 31 7-11 0-0 6 3 2 19

Pettinella 9 2-3 0-2 5 2 3 4

Jones 23 3-4 2-3 6 1 0 8

Singletary 31 4-9 10-12 5 6 2 19

Farrakhan 4 0-2 0-0 0 0 1 0

Baker 14 4-6 2-4 1 0 2 11

Makalauskas 19 2-2 4-6 4 0 2 8

Tucker 17 1-4 2-2 2 0 1 5

Zeglinski 7 0-1 0-0 1 1 1 0

Burns 2 0-0 0-0 2 0 1 0

Scott 2 0-1 2-2 0 0 0 2

Harris 2 0-1 0-0 0 0 0 0

Meyinsse 10 2-2 0-0 2 0 2 4

Team 3

Totals 190 27-51 23-34 46 14 17 90

Vermont 32 40 -- 72

Virginia 46 44 -- 90

3-point goals: Vermont 4-17 (McIntosh 1-2, Trimboli 2-7, Cieplicki 1-4, Accaoui 0-2, Vier 0-2), UVa 9-19 (Diane 1-3, Joseph 5-8, Singletary 1-2, Baker 1-1, Tucker 1-4, Zeglinski 0-1). Turnovers: Vermont 10 (Trimboli 4), UVa 18 (Singletary 6). Blocked shots: Vermont 3 (Blakely 2), UVa 4 (Tucker 2). Steals: Vermont 9 (Blakely 4), UVa 5 (Singletary 4).

Officials: Clinton, Driscoll, Styons.

Attendance: 11,893.