Dennis did a nice recap from the Pittburgh papers on the game. In Chicago, it was all about DePaul coming out flat and slow.

As the night opened, it was apparent, even to DePaul, that the Blue Demons were a step slow, a pace behind.

It could be understood, given the draining two days the team endured leading up to Wednesday night’s game with No. 7 Pittsburgh. Emotional center Lorenzo Thompson’s 43-year-old father died of a heart attack Monday, and that somber mood followed DePaul to Allstate Arena.

The Demons were certain, though, as the night went on, as the nationally televised game against a ranked opponent progressed, the tempo would change, the spring in their step would return.

“Our guys are so good, so I’m thinking eventually we’re going to get into our style of play,” Blue Demons guard Draelon Burns said.

It never happened, and in the end, DePaul limped away with its first loss at home this season, a frustrating 59-49 Big East Conference defeat against the Panthers.

“All the mental mistakes we made, as lazy as we were on offense, we were still right there,” point guard Sammy Mejia said. “It only takes a couple shots to get the momentum. We tried, but we just weren’t the team we needed to be offensively. That’s the worst part, knowing that if we play the way we normally play, we’d have a chance to win. That’s what’s heartbreaking about this.”

Which, of course, is what a good team can do to DePaul. Not let them get into  their comfort. They play a tough defense, but on offense want to score quickly off of transition. They are not effective when they have to play a half-court set.

Part of that was that Pitt made them work much harder than they are used to on defense. With Pitt’s passing and ball movement, the Blue Demons were forced to work much harder and longer on defense than they liked.

“They just are not going to let you run,” coach Jerry Wainwright said. “You have to have people below to help on (Aaron) Gray.”

Hoping to contain the 7-foot Gray, DePaul started both Green and forward Marcus Heard rather than its normal guard-heavy group.

“They started a little bigger,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said. “We didn’t expect that. … But we can pick things up and make adjustments.”

Gray emerged from a recent scoring slump to finish with 18 points, but DePaul curtailed the Panthers’ other threats. Problem was, the Demons couldn’t carry over their half-court defense to the other end.

DePaul forced 7 first-half turnovers but scored only 8 field goals, notching their second-lowest points total (18) for a half this season.

“We fought and hung in there on the defensive end,” Wainwright said. “But what happens sometimes is we have a tendency to rest on offense.

“Everybody on the team knows I’m really possessed with our defense. What you have to get the kids to understand … is somebody’s offense is their best defense.”

What Pitt didn’t expect — and I mentioned it in game –  not double-teaming Gray.

‘They started big, and we didn’t expect that,” Pittsburgh coach Jamie Dixon said. ”We thought they would double-team a little more [on Gray], and they didn’t initially. But we really defended all the way through, and that was the emphasis for this game. … We did the things we wanted to do offensively and defensively.”

While being frustrated with the way DePaul played, Pitt was held up as an example.

Minutes later, sitting on the platform Mejia just exited, Panthers coach Jamie Dixon offered words of a different tone and they screamed out all the difference in the game just ended.

“It was,” he said speaking of his team, “a very efficient and solid, smart game all the way through. We just came out and did what we wanted to do from the jump offensively and defensively. It was a testament to our guys and our focus.”

Does that define how you go about your business, I asked him later in a hallway.

“Yes, yes,” he said. “And I guess never being satisfied might be thrown in there too. We were smart today, but I think we can get smarter.”

How do you get a team to play with that sense of urgency, I asked.

“It’s practice,” Dixon said. “You don’t do it in a day. You don’t do it for a play. It has to be a constant battle and when [a player’s] not ready to perform, ready to practice, you can’t allow it. A sense of urgency is not a one-day thing.”

We’ll see a lot more of that sense of urgency — there or not — this weekend against Georgetown.