Lets not be the signature win that Providence can claim puts them back in the bubble discussion. Take care of business tonight.
UPDATE: Pitt is crapping the bed. Down 44-26 at the half.
Pitt came out slow, sluggish and sloppy. Then it looked like Pitt was putting it together, getting it to 29-25 with 6+ minutes until the half. Then Providence went on a 17-1 run to the half.
Look, Pitt is playing horrible. No question. 10 turnovers. Only 3 assists (Fields has 0). A few shots haven’t fallen.
On the flip side, credit should be given to the Friars. They have moved the ball really, really well. 13 assists to 3 turnovers. We knew they could score and they are.
Pitt also getting beaten on the boards — 19-14. Pitt only has 1 point on second chances. Providence has 8. Those are effort things, and Pitt isn’t giving the effort while Providence is.
FINAL UPDATE: Well that sucked. A 81-73 loss.
It was frustrating as there were points where it looked like Pitt was snapping out of it. About to really turn it on as the game started getting close. And then…
Well, we can expect plenty of stories on how Pitt lost because Blair was in foul trouble. It must be so since he fouled out of the game. No. Not this time. Blair spent most of the first half, playing half-assed. It was as if he expected Providence to give him the room.
Not that he was the only one. Pitt played a stand-around game. Poor ball movement to go with the sloppy ball-handling.
With the exception of Ashton Gibbs, guard play was a complete wreck. Providence was playing a 2-3 zone, which means the guards have to shoot and make plays. Wanamaker looked like he had never seen a zone. Fields and Dixon just seemed disinterested. And Gilbert Brown reverted back to enigma status. I was most frustrated by that aspect.
The officiating sucked. No question, but Pitt did plenty to themselves to lose.
Credit, though, also has to be given to Providence for playing a great game. They made their shots. They were much more active. They did their thing. Pitt didn’t.
Some random observations:
* Pac 10 is just plain lousy. Howland lost Love, Westbrook and Mbah a Moute and replaced them with freshmen who haven’t excelled, Wash St lost most of their team and Arizona State…….yes, you heard me right (Go Herbie!), might be the best the conference can offer. Ouch.
* Big 12 is way down. Beside OU, it’s a tough year out there. Look at what KU lost; they’ve got young talent but it’s way too soon for those kids and Missouri is just taking advantage of lousy competition. Texas, missing a PG, is also down this year.
* Big 10 stinks. Michigan St has nice athletes, plays D and rebounds…..but they can’t put the ball in the hoop regularly enough to scare anybody. Rest of the conf isn’t worth mentioning.
* Outside the major conferences, Memphis is usually a major threat, but they lost three NBA players (Rose, Dorsey, CDR) and those three guys could pick up a couple of bench players and dust this year’s starters.
* The BE and the ACC are good (not great, just good), as usual. Maybe 10 of the top 15 clubs come from these two conferences. Status quo: UNC has the most talent and is better than Duke, WF and Clemson while UConn, Pitt, and Louisville are fighting it out in the BE. Same as it ever was.
* It’s hard to even write about the SEC. This year’s UT team is way down, Fla is bad, Meeks is fun to watch but Kentucky is average. LSU is taking advantage of playing nobody every night.
* As you mentioned, there doesn’t seem to be a threat in the ranks of the mid majors. The media’s been looking for a squad to tout and usually the MVC or the Horizon has something, but all the Butlers, Creightons and Tulsas don’t look as good as they have in past years. Also, Gonzaga isn’t nearly as good as they should be.
All of which combines to tell me that college hoop is way down and Jamie Dixon has picked the right year to field his best squad. Better to be lucky sometimes, right?
Read my post. I stated that they were “reasonable” calls, perhaps inconsistent with other calls in the game but not phantom calls. Anytime a player doesn’t move his feet and reaches out while the opossing player is blwoing by him to the basket he is proabaly going to get called. It happens all the time. It isn’t a hard foul, but it is easy to call and is out in the open. If you are going to let him go by you, why reach out??
And now we come to the Big East Tourney. I would love for us to win it, but we might be better off if we get knocked out early so we can rest for March which is what really matters.
This is why college football can’t change its current format. Every game means something. The game against PC tonight means little in the grand scheme of things and the Big East Tourney doesn’t mean much either. It’s all about what happens at the end…. so before anyone wants to throw a 20 plus win team under the bus for having one lousy performance, it isn’t that big of a deal now. If it was next month at this time, it is the end of the world.
Let’s not make mountains out of mole hills.
Hail to Pitt
Notre Dame stinks this year because Harangody puts up 30 shots a game, everybody’s figured out how to guard McAlarney, Tory Jackson’s game has gone backward and they miss that Kurz kid, who was nice to have around the boards.
And I didn’t even bring up G-town, which is the best example of a team way downhill from last year. They’re bad. I actually feel sorry for Monroe because Sapp, Summers and Wright can’t shoot fish in a barrel.
You’re missing my point on Marquette. Buzz would take some size right now if he could get it. Doesn’t mean he has to change style of play, just means he’d like to have some options.
My point was that the BE and the ACC are steady and everybody else is down. It’s hard to argue with that given the state of play and the hemorrhaging of good players outside those two conferences.
A great year for Dixon to put his best squad on the floor. There’s always going to be BE and ACC comp in the tournament, but this year the other competition doesn’t look nearly as formidable.
One thing I don’t understand is why is college basketball down this year? Because OJ Mayo and Micheal Beasly aren’t playing. News flash they didn’t to squat in the NCAA tournament or for their teams. UNC’s team is entirely back. UCONN has tremendous NBA talent as does Louisville. What is the rationale for saying college basketball is down? You have 4 teams with 3 losses or less. Same thing last year. It just doesn’t make a heck of a lot of sense. The mid-majors are down, but the rest of college basketball is about the same.