the foul calls were ticky tack. but its going to happen from time to time. we need to learn to roll with those punches. for example, blair picking up the reaching foul at the three point line…inexcusable….and him almost picking up the foul on the hedge…..granted that hedge has really been effective…but when he’s in foul trouble i dont think its a good idea

…also the weakness of gary mghee, he is so inept and if we could just have someone come in for blair that could at least play respectably and hold his own it would be nice…

..oh well…only two losses…a win at home at ND then an easier part of the schedule coming up…we can pick up some momentum for when it really counts

not really disappointed with the loss–closing down the Palestra, Blair in foul trouble–but I wonder if we shouldn’t spend the rest of the season working on zone defense if we run into this type of officiating in the NCAA tournament? Takes away from our Offensive rebounding strength, but keeps our stars(Blair) in the game. We have no answer if Blair is in foul trouble–and should expect other teams to try to foul him out as their offensive strategy. Our poor foul shooting is going to hurt us in close games. We are just giving points away at the line.

We did not have it tonight and Nova made the big shots when they counted. Ugly game. Congrats Nova.
I usually don’t whine about officiating — perhaps because we play so many home games — but the officiating was very inconsistent tonight. The Pitt guards were getting mugged as they brought the ball up the court and moving the ball around the perimeter, yet there were no calls. At the other end they were calling it tight. Yes, Blair committed some silly fouls hedging on the perimeter and we didn’t move our feet very well on occasion, but there were a lot of head-scratchers mixed in there.
Refs need to be consistent at both ends of the floor. A 23-14 differential in fouls is not consistent, particularly when both teams are playing so physical. This game would have been a blowout if Villanova made their free throws during the first 35 minutes of play. That alone indicates that something was wrong as this wasn’t a blowout type of game.
You obviously won’t hear Dixon or the Pitt players griping about this, so I’ll do it for them. And just to be clear, I don’t think the foul issues were the reason we lost. But it most certainly had a huge impact on the outcome of the game. And that’s a shame.
Finally, we need to do a better job against these pressing teams. I think we broke the press well enough. However, we really struggled getting our offensive sets going once we broke the press. That needs to change.

As a humorous aside, this picture tells the story of the night:

link to a.espncdn.com

I don’t think a foul was called on that play 😉

Went to the game tonight…dissapointing how horribly Pitt shot in the second half. Pitt seemed to be out-hustled throughout the second half, Nova got second chances when they shouldn’t have. Pitt hardly got any second chances. Blair’s 4th foul was a terrible decision on his part and was a foul. Reaching on a guard is just not a good idea. If this team is going to win on the road, he must be smarter. We looked chaotic on the O…But, I agree the reffing was pretty horrid. Even the Nova fans next to me kept telling me…we got one there. Or, that looked clean, when Pitt was called for a foul. Tough loss, but not horrible….it was a great atmosphere for a game and Nova fans were crazy…loud as ever and a tough place to play. I was glad to here let’s go pitt chants break out at times. Fans really travel well. Nova, seems to always take pitt out of what they do. i went to the game last year at nova and Pitt was sloppy as well. Its one of the few games in both years that Pitt has got out scrapped. I think they will get it together and move on stronger.

Speaking of consistency, Young has GOT to be more consistent. Missed open 3s and still refuses to ever pull up on a drive if the D closes it down. Either the ball gets stripped or he gets a charge. Pull up and shoot a motherf@#$ing 7-10 footer, Sam!!!

The refs were horrible, but missed open looks cost Pitt this game. And I agree with giving a zone look here and there. ‘Nova’s too good of a 3-ball team to do it for long stretches, but here and there to change up the look, take some of the pressure of Blair when he’s picked up some fouls, it could be valuable.

When McGee did get in, I didn’t think he looked that bad. Moved his feet on D and I don’t think really gave up any hoops, at least no easy ones. G. Brown has been invisible these last few games. He also needs to step up.

Disappointing loss, overall. Agree they will bounce back on Saturday.

I thought Sam had his worst game of the year, if not the past 2 years. His motivation seemed lacking – at one point, a Nova guy was diving for the ball while Sam walked toward it…..

that being said, here’s where the game turned in my opinion. Pitt’s up 19-9, Biggs is sitting cause he got 2 fouls in like the first 2 minutes. At the 15 minute mark, up 19-9, we sub out Fields, Dixon, and Blair and have on the floor: Young, who is not motivated tonight and is shotting poorly and making poor decisions; Gibbs, Brown, Wanamaker, and Robinson. 4 non-starters. Nova starts the pressure and, snap your fingers, it’s a 1 or 2 point game. Nova was in it the rest of the way. Bad decision mass subbing like that by the coach, I think.

Pitt has got to start figuring out a way to win these types of games. Our inability to consistently perform well against different styles of teams always kills us. OK, our big men get in trouble – that is not good – but we are the #3 team in the country, we should figure out a way to score more than 26 points in the second half.

Blair has to be smarter, especially when you get the sense that the game is going to be called pretty close.

Have to make a statement against ND and it is not going to be easy. Harangody is a quality big man who will test Blair and McAlarney can make a shot anywhere on the court.

The team should be locked in a gym and not able to leave until each player shoots 10,000 foul shots.

agree with Kev and I was thinking the same thing at 19-9 — he should have at least left Fields in the game for offensive continuity, because even with Blair out, there was an opportunity to get up big early and change the flow of the game. When he put in the 4 subs, everybody knew it would be close at halftime.

The only fouls that mattered were Blair’s…..and they were all very deserved, so I don’t buy any of the whining about the officiating. His 1st was a tackle, 2nd one a clear bump on the hedge, 3rd one he hit Cunningham’s elbow on a shot when he had no reason to reach, and 4th one he tried to pick somebody 30 ft from the hoop. All deserved and all pointless.

I thought Pitt lost the game because they got nothing out of Nova’s press. When a team gets in your face like that, you need to make them pay some of the time with easy buckets. Pitt never got anything easy against the press and settled for halfcourt possessions every time, not to mention the turnovers.

As tough as Fields is, there are nights when his inability to get in the lane and dish or score hurts the Panthers. His lack of speed means he has to settle for fadeaway jumpers much of the time, and he makes plenty of those and that’s great…………but it doesn’t get anybody else easy buckets and draw fouls from a smaller team like Nova.

In past years I wouldn’t have campaigned for Pitt to speed the tempo up against even a halfcourt press because we didn’t have the horses to play up and down. But now we do and I think we could run a team like Nova out of the gym if we had fought back and attacked that press.

I don’t get the foul shooting thing. How is it possible that the names change every year but our inability to shoot free throws as a TEAM remains consistent? You have to put that one on the coaches. There is a specific technique that involves keeping the shooting elbow inside and following straight through to the rim. Everybody on this team has their own (terrible) style and it drives me freakin’ crazy. We will get to the final four this year, and this will hurt us once there….

Cant agree more about shooting technique, but this is what we recruited. Alot of strengths, but shooting form is not one. Pitt players make tremendous improvements during their time, but not too much in shooting %. Not all horrible, but with their forms, they are not going to be consistent. The only other gripe I have about Coach Dixon is his philosophy on how to break full court pressure. Has been a weakness for years and I believe it to be in the way they approach it, not the individual players skills. Too much passing to areas on the court where you should not pass against pressure (corners and sideline right over half court) and too much standing still trying to pass your way through it. Get some movment and eventually someone is going to have to attack it a little with some dribble penetration and make some plays out of it. Getting it over half court and finally setting up your offense with 15 seconds on shot clock should not be your goal with facing teams that pressure.

The encouraging thing is that I believe this was the worst game Pitt has played all year, and they were still in it…on the road…against a top 20 team. Thinking about the game, there is not a single player that was on the floor that I would say played a good game. Not great, but nobody was even very good. So that is encouraging to play that bad and still be in it. That being said the effort was discouraging. I know Sam exploded at WVU, but did anyone notice how much he was pouting before the end of the game. Each bad call, or shot that doesn’t fall he starts hanging his head and gets lazy. We heard a lot about him being a leader this year prior to the season, but, he really could use an attitude makeover at times. I understand he is probably the most talented player, and has carried them at times, so is hard 2 question. But, watching him walk around with his head down is frustrating. As a senior, he needs to pick up the attitude.
Lastly,
The foul shooting is not a coaching thing….it isn’t technique in most cases. It’s mental, and its contagious…its been passed down through Pitt over the past few years. Great foul shooters, have great confident minds. These guys, esp. fields are capable of making them, they just lose it mentally at times and it costs.

I agree with Hugh that this wasn’t Fields’ finest game. I think he fell in love with the fade-away after making a few early baskets and dribbled himself into trouble too often. He also made some questionable passes that ended up as turnovers.
I would argue Hugh’s point about not bringing the officiating into question. Only the two hedges were clear fouls on Blair *in this game.* I say *in this game* because there were a multitude of more blatant fouls that were not called. I was just watching the “highlights” on ESPN and saw the blocking call on Brown where he set up under the basket and the Villanova guard took three steps, jumped into him, scored and got the call when Brown took a dive. That’s an absolute no-call from any objective point of view. Also, the missed goaltending call on Cunningham in the first half was a disgrace. Again, it’s not the fact that Pitt was called for fouls. It’s the fact that the game was called a different way at each end of the floor. That’s very hard for players to adjust to, and in all honesty, something they shouldn’t have to do. This is the best conference in the land. We should have the best officials. We don’t.
On a positive note, Wannamker played an outstanding game tonight in front of the home folks. Very aggressive off the bounce, selective with his shot, great vision in the passing game and solid defense. He has my vote for most improved player this year.

Well, I guess with it being the last college b-ball game at the Spectrum, ‘nova was fired up or something, who knows.

I do have ESPNU, and I just kind of felt like I was watching the Louisville game again. On the road against an excited crowd, they pressured us, Blair got in foul trouble, we fell behind and couldn’t hit any big shots, we lost.

Yup, same story as last Saturday against the ‘ville.

How do you win with Blair on the bench, Young goes 6-14, Biggs scores 0, normal Pitt foul shooting and weak defense in the second half?

Wanamaker played well.

Villanova got hot, made their foul shots (in the second half) and protected their house in an emotional game. Great crowd. Hats off to them.

The thing that I find worrisome moving forward is that Young seems to go cold and make bad decisions when Blair is in foul trouble. Obviously, this has something to do with the the other teams D but it is a concern for March Madness.

Pitt needs to win a couple close ones at the buzzer to show that they can. Levance seemed to uncharacteristically lose his composure at the end of this one. He needs to be the General to win this kind of game. He has done it before and will do it again.

It is the Big East.

can’t win them all. Not our best effort, and blair needs to quit it with the reach-in fouls….can’t be mad at losing on the road in-conference to a top 25 team…..we’ll be fine……

Here’s another thing I don’t like. I just read the PG story, and, even though there are limited quotes from anyone, nobody really seemed “mad” that they lost. Maybe it’s just the way I’m reading it, but they seem rather ho-hum about the whole thing. I hope Dixon reams them a new a**hole today at practice.

Taught free throw shooting for years….can see the flaws in the techniques of 6 Pitt players.
Here’s the deal…the “streetballers” refuse to change their style..and the coaches cannot make them. Again, it’s like practicing a bad golf swing over and over….you can shoot 10,000 free throws but if your form is bad, you will still fail when the pressure is on and your legs are gone.

Formula for beating Pitt has been set. Drive the basket on Pitt early and often putting the big men in foul trouble. Press all game and in the second half Pitt will fold up late due to so much expended energy and our guards not being quick enough to respond.

Still ….we have only lost two games. A great learning oppotunity exists from the Nova game.

I do feel pretty good about the match-up with ND. Dixon will pressure McAlarney and I’m sure Jamie will have the sense to put Biggs on Harangody.

Teams have been shutting down McAlarney and Harangody has been taking 20+ shots a game and I don’t see why Pitt can’t force that pattern to continue. Let Harangody have his shots……just don’t put him on the line and don’t help so much that Ayers (who’s been shooting terribly) and Zeller get wide-open looks.

If Dixon takes McAlarney, that means Fields and the other guards have to keep Tory Jackson out of the lane. He’s not a shooter, but he’s a strong penetrator so you play off him and watch him struggle.

Need a win Sat to get the momentum going again…..

Dan, “streetballers” refuse to change their style? seriously…Pitt seems to do one of the best jobs of any team in reeling players in to play a certain style. They convince kids to play their buts of on defense, and work within an offense for shots. You mean to tell me that they can convince so called “streetballers” to do all that but not to change free throw form if they wanted to. It’s not the form thats flawed. There are plenty of great shooters/foul shooters with imperfect form. it is getting enough reps, which I am sure they do. And it is mental when they get on the line…maybe you can coach that aspect better, but I really don’t think “style” is the issue…some of the guys form is fine, they just mentally crash late in the game on the line. Let me ask you this, do you think Ashton Gibbs is a good three point shooter? Yes, obviously the kid hits almost everything…does he have good form? no it looks unorthodox, everything comes out completely flat, but they go in…he’s a shooter with a shooter’s mind who has worked hard enough to be good and has the mentality of a shooter.

Was at the game, it felt like a million degrees temp wise. Really Pitt has two ways of winning, take high percentage shots so you don’t need anyone to rebound, or take whatever shots you want and have someone rebound. Neither happened at all. We can blame the refs as much as we want, but we have to find away to win those type of games. Even though with all their pressing and double teams it looked like we were getting fouled, it wasn’t called. In March we might get some real tight calling refs and we will have to thrive or go home.

There was just some real bad decision making by the team. Levance really needs to stop trying to force a drive to the basket. He is supposed to be the General, Generals get others into action. Also Sam is looking real sloppy. He just drives expecting to make his way to the basket and picks up charges or he has been missing wide open looks. Both are unacceptable for someone who wants to go in the first round in the draft. The only real consilation is that it wasn’t at home, and it was to a ranked team, but Nova is not really that good of a team and there really is no exuse to lose to them. It almost felt like the Lville game all over again.

Blair needs to play smart and avoid some of the unecessary fouls. While I agree his third foul was b.s., he did swat his arm downward even though no contact was made. If he keep his hands straight up no foul is called.

I knew Pitt was in trouble when I saw the first possession of the second half. The Nova PG pushed fields to the ground with a forearm, and no fould was called. Then Pitt gets whistled with five fouls in 3 minutes.

Is it just me, or is Fields lacking some passion lately. He doesn’t seem to be showing any emotion on the court as of late, and appears to be just going through the motions at times….

I think that Nova won becuase they played a better game…When we see Burr in stripes, we can be sure one of our big 3 will be in early foul trouble. The players know that he will ring them up for the slighest infraction. There are a few players in Pitts rotation who have gone beyond confident to hot dogging (one handed passing, rebounding, and catching) which is leading to several lost possessions per game. I’ve grown used to Pitt players not excelling at the FT line, but could the coaches please get some of the players to at least use good form and stop rushing there shots from the FT line. For the last time, just as Dixon has become more selective in his 3 point shot attempts, Young has got to be more selective about driving the ball into the lane in traffic…it seems as though 75% of the time, something bad happens. Dixon is really impressive on both ends of the floor, I don’t think Gil Brown unseats him this year in the starting line up.

I was at the game and sat courtside by the basket where the goaltending “did” occur. A couple of comments on the game. 1. Villlanova played a good game and defended very well all night 2. Blair played 23 minutes and Biggs played 15. Because of the foul trouble we had combinations on the floor for long minutes that don’t play together that much, and it showed. 3. Sam was attempting to drive to the basket and not settle for the three, but every time he touched the ball he had two and often 3 players converge on him. He needs to recognize this sooner and kick it out instead of continuing to try and make his own shot. 4. With Blair and Biggs out VIllanova was able to key in even more on Young. That is why he was frustrated all night. I agree with the post that he needs to pull up for the short jumper. there are distances between the three point line and the basket and he is a good shooter. Wannamaker had a very good night, so i disagree with the post that said everyone played poorly. Pitt was still in it at the end, but couldn’t hit any open threes and VU shot lights out form the foul line at the end of the game. Bottom line is that if Blair/Biggs don’t get in foul trouble, either one in my opinion, we win the game. we can’t rely on Sam to pick up all the slack when Biggs and Blair are in foul trouble. Opponents will always key on Sam and make others beat them. Last night the “others” didn’t show up in the last 10 minutes.

Finally, during the national anthem Blair had both hands raised with fingers pointing out #1. Severla teamates actually tried to pull his arms down. I think that helped stoke the fires on the VU side. His first foul was right in front of me and I believe he was agressively “marking his territory” to make a statement to VU. It wasn’t necessary and was careless. In other games he might not have gotten a fould, but right after showboating he drew too much attention to himself.

Let’s bounce back and beat ND

Hail to Pitt

Blair puts his arms up during the national anthem of every game so i think that point is irrelevant.

Bad loss for Pitt. Nova is not a very good team and Pitt shot themselves in the foot by settling for so many threes. Especially since they weren’t dropping late in the game. Additionally, Pitt needs to attack after they break a press and not just get back into the the halfcourt.

The tipping point last night was Blair’s stupid 4th foul. We had a chance up until that point.

But make no mistake about Nova being a good team. They are very well-coached and pose some tough matchups, especially with Blair on the bench. It’s the kind of loss that I almost expected to happen, and is bound to happen in the big east. Pitt didn’t play well, but they we’re playing well enough to be in the game with 8 minutes left with DeJuan on the floor. He just needs to learn from this, be smart and learn that a stupid foul can cost us the game, and come out with some fire on Saturday. I expect the zoo to be in full effect.

I was at the game sweltering in the heat. Its been a while since I was in The Spectrum, but now I remember why they’re tearing it down.

The Panthers started out stong, and then absolutely fell asleep. The only bright spot I saw was Wanamaker. The officiating was terrible, and inconsistent at both ends. For the country’s number 3 team to be unable to make foul shots is totally unacceptable. Villanova is a good, competent and well coached team, but they don’t match up talent-wise with Pitt. We simply did not take the game seriously and folded when pressured. Villanova’s press totally prevented Pitt from getting into any kind of offensive flow. Pitt needs a real outside shooting threat. Although I love Blair, he looked like he was out of gas, even though he spent a lot of time on the bench fo stupid fouls. Generally both defenses were relentless, but Pitt does need to learn a zone of some kind when they lose their big men. We need to learn how to break a press and score, not just get the ball over the time line. We missed too many cherries under the boards, and too many layups. Number 3 teams don’t miss those shots. We looked nonchalant and almos disinterested. There was no sign of leadership. Wednesday night’s Panthers were nt the same team that I saw crush Syracuse a week ago. Maybe we need to bring the band and cheerleaders to these games that are relatively close to Pittsburgh. I don’t know what Pitt’s travel arrangements are when they come to Philly, but if they’re on a bus and arriving game day i can tell you from my personal experience that the 6 hour trip from to Philly is exhausting. As a Pitt alum residing in Philly, I’ve seen the last 6 or 7 games between Pitt and Villanova here in Philly. I can’t remember Pitt ever laying well here against Villanova.

Hail to Pitt!!

I was at the game sweltering in the heat. Its been a while since I was in The Spectrum, but now I remember why they’re tearing it down.

The Panthers started out stong, and then absolutely fell asleep. The only bright spot I saw was Wanamaker. The officiating was terrible, and inconsistent at both ends. For the country’s number 3 team to be unable to make foul shots is totally unacceptable. Villanova is a good, competent and well coached team, but they don’t match up talent-wise with Pitt. We simply did not take the game seriously and folded when pressured. Villanova’s press totally prevented Pitt from getting into any kind of offensive flow. Pitt needs a real outside shooting threat. Although I love Blair, he looked like he was out of gas, even though he spent a lot of time on the bench for stupid fouls. Generally both defenses were relentless, but Pitt does need to learn a zone of some kind when they lose their big men. We need to learn how to break a press and score, not just get the ball over the time line. We missed too many cherries under the boards, and too many layups. Number 3 teams don’t miss those shots. We looked nonchalant and almost disinterested. There was no sign of leadership. Wednesday night’s Panthers were not the same team that I saw crush Syracuse a week ago. Maybe we need to bring the band and cheerleaders to these games that are relatively close to Pittsburgh. There were certainly plenty of Pitt fans in the house. I don’t know what Pitt’s travel arrangements are when they come to Philly, but if they’re on a bus and arriving game day I can tell you from my personal experience that the 6 hour trip to Philly is exhausting. As a Pitt alum residing in Philly, I’ve seen the last 6 or 7 games between Pitt and Villanova here in Philly. I can’t remember Pitt ever playing well here against Villanova.

Hail to Pitt!!

I have to agree with Blair looking out of gas as Rich said. I’m not sure why considering he wasn’t on the court all that long. But his last foul looked like he was dead…he didn’t move his feet at all and reached..