While Pitt won’t release it’s non-con b-ball schedule until all the contracts are signed and the dates are assured, other schools keep doing so. Dayton released its non-con schedule and confirms they play at the Pete on Saturday, December 23.
Pitt’s decision to play a much more challenging non-con continues to be noticed and praised — even as the past cupcake schedules are reviled.
The non-league schedules assembled by many BCS programs tend to include more creampuffs than carnivores.
Among the more egregious offenders in this department over the past several seasons has been Pittsburgh. Since ascending to national prominence under Ben Howland during the early 2000s, the Panthers have played a vast majority of their non-conference contests within the friendly confines of the Petersen Events Center, where they have enjoyed a considerable home-court advantage against largely inferior competition. (Before a memorable upset at the hands of Bucknell in Jan. 2005, the Panthers had won 48 consecutive OOC games on their home court.)
Last year’s team was no exception. The Panthers didn’t lose a game until Jan. 21, starting the season with 15 consecutive wins. But an out-of-conference strength of schedule that ranked No. 227 out of 334 elicited questions from a number of pundits — and not until the Panthers started recording scalps against Big East competition were the naysayers silenced.
If early reports are any indicaton, this kind of scheduling could be history in Pittsburgh. Though the non-league slate has yet to be finalized, it appears Jamie Dixon will test his club with one of the tougher OOC schedules in Division I.
The Panthers have a signed an agreement to play a home-and-home with Washington. The Huskies will travel to the Steel City on Feb. 17 and Dixon’s side will return the trip during the 2007-08 season.
Pitt will not confirm its non-conference opponents until all of the individual contracts are signed, but the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has reported a number of the other opponents the Panthers appear to have secured. The list includes perennial dancer Wisconsin and back-to-back NIT champion South Carolina, along with NCAA hopefuls Dayton, Florida State and Massachusetts.
Is it the same kind of uncompromising baptism-by-fire undergone by schools like Gonzaga or Temple? Maybe not. But it’s a welcome change in philosophy for a program whose confection-laced schedules had become the target of perennial criticism.
It will probably take Pitt a few years before they live down the sheer badness of their recent non-cons.
