Before I do the media rundown of Pitt’s 23 point win over UNC-Ashville, I’ll take a moment to explain why I wasn’t too worried about Pitt’s start yesterday.
First, Pitt had been off for over a week. You have to expect some rust — and sure enough it was there. Second, you just cannot keep trying to read too much into every moment of a game. It becomes easy in hindsight after a team loses. Oh, there were the signs. It becomes the cliche — weak spot X finally caught up to team Y. But in a one-and-done format it comes down to the teams, their skill and talent, match-ups and luck.
Look at Louisville. Coming into the Tournament, they were the runner-up in the Big East Tournament. They had won seven of their last nine. Beaten teams like Pitt, UConn and Notre Dame. They looked like the second hottest team in the Big East. They came out and laid an egg against Morehead St. Maybe they would have come back to win if Knowles hadn’t gotten hurt in the second half, but would you, did you in your bracket expect that?
Remember Pitt last year? Absolutely dismantled Oakland in the opening game and then lost to Xavier. Or how about a few years back, when Pitt won the Big East Tournament? They throttled some poor team and then played horribly against Michigan State to bow out early. The year Pitt went a Scottie effin’ Reynolds lay-up short of the Final Four, Pitt putzed around for most of the game against ETSU.
It’s easy to read too much into this. And yes, Pitt is fully capable of being knocked off by Butler. Just ask Kansas about Northern Iowa last year. A loss would be because Butler played a great game, and one or several of Pitt’s flaws — frontcourt FT shooting, offensive droughts, losing focus on the rebounding/McGhee getting in foul trouble, to name a few — that we’ve seen this year were exploited or cost Pitt.
Not because Pitt came out slow in this game or any other game this past season. Not because went 3-3 in the prior six games, losing those games by a total of 6 points and OT against teams that went to the NCAA Tourney.
Okay, on to the media rundown.
For those of you really bothered by the game, Ashton Gibbs wasn’t happy with his defense.
Gibbs jumped at Matt Dickey as he was attempting a 3-pointer and fouled the Bulldogs’ leading scorer. The shot went in, and Dickey completed a rare four-point play to give his team some momentum. They scored 14 of the final 21 points of the half to make it 30-25 at halftime.
Dickey, being guarded by Gibbs, scored four more points in the early moments of the second half to twice cut the lead to a precarious three points.
“I’m not too happy about the way I played defense,” Gibbs said. “That’s one thing I’m going to step up the next game. I don’t care about the offense. I didn’t play defense like I should have. I’m going to play harder on defense the next game.”
Gibbs seems to have gotten a bit testy in the last week. Everything is ticking him off. Like Dickey saying this after the game.
Dickey, who was held to only 4 points in Asheville’s December match-up with Ohio State, offered praise for both schools. But when pressed to compare them, he gave the edge to the Tournament’s top-seeded team.
“Both teams have great guards, they’re both big inside,” Dickey said. “Not to take anything away from Pitt, but I’d say Ohio State is better. If that match-up comes later in the Tournament, it will be fun to watch because those teams are both really good.”
Gibbs, though he appeared agitated, took Dickey’s assessment in stride. “We’ve been living with doubters the whole season, and that’s what motivates us,” Gibbs said. “We’re going to take that [quote] and use it for the rest of the season.”
Hey, when you are a top-5 ranked team, carrying a #1 seed target on your back, you have to find ways to generate the disrespect card to provide extra motivation. Otherwise, you just move on to the next game.
Ron Cook covers the Nasir Robinson dive to take out Dick Groat.
So the dream of every #16 seed ended for UNC-Ashville. Pitt was just too big, strong and good.
Gibbs has been shooting very well lately, and I think everyone knows that his scoring — especially from outside — is vital to Pitt’s chances.
For Pitt, it’s about moving on to face Butler. McGhee as the only Indiana native on the team has played some of the Butler players before college.
McGhee and Howard were post players and battled as part of the high school Class of 2007. McGhee attended Anderson Highland; Howard starred for Connersville.
McGhee has never beaten Howard.
“It’s an 0-fer on one side,” McGhee said. “Four in high school, probably about three in AAU.”
When Howard scored the game-winner in Butler’s 60-58 victory over No. 9 seed Old Dominion on Thursday, it meant McGhee will get another shot at his nemesis.
Howard could be in for a surprise. The chiseled 6-foot-11, 250-pound McGhee bears no resemblance to the player he used to bully in high school.
“He might look at me a little different,” McGhee said. “He might feel me pushing back on him a little bit more.”
Coach Jamie Dixon coached Shelvin Mack on the U-19 team a couple years back and Gibbs says he’s stayed close with him. Honestly, any talk of Pitt looking past Butler or taking them less seriously because they play in the Horizon League is ridiculous on its face. Everyone knows what they did last year. They are a very, very good team. Coach Dixon has been saying it.
The Big East has a reputation for rough play, but Pittsburgh coach Jamie Dixon suggested Butler would be the most physical opponent his team has faced.
“We’ve got to be prepared for a physical defense from them,” said Dixon, whose top-seeded Panthers beat UNC Asheville 74-51. “But those are the things that I’ve seen in the past and saw in recent times.”
And John Gasaway of Basketball Prospectus makes me extra nervous by writing up how/why Butler could win (Insider subs.).
It won’t be easy, of course, as Jamie Dixon’s team wasn’t seeded on the top line by accident. This year the Panthers were clearly the best team in the Big East. In a conference that put 11 teams in the NCAA tournament, that’s saying something. And, anyway, it’s extremely rare for a No. 1 seed to lose in the round of 32. It happened to Kansas last year, of course, but prior to the Jayhawks’ loss to Northern Iowa you have to go back to 2004 to find the last time the top seed in a region failed to advance to the Sweet 16.
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Remember how last year in the tournament offensive rebounding was kind of the “It” stat? It seemed like just about every team that made a deep run was really good at gathering in its own misses. Every team except Butler, that is, which has made a habit out of beating opponents who are outstanding on the offensive glass. Murray State, Syracuse, Kansas State and Michigan State all had two things in common: 1) they were all very good offensive rebounding teams last year, and 2) they all lost to the Bulldogs. Then came Duke, still another team that excelled at cleaning the glass on its own end of the floor, and you may remember Stevens’ team gave the Blue Devils a pretty good game. Anyway, this trend has clearly carried over to 2011. Old Dominion was an unbelievable offensive rebounding team this year. In CAA action, the Monarchs pulled down an incredible 45 percent of their own misses. Next up, Pitt, the sixth consecutive NCAA tournament opponent that Butler has faced that loves to crash the offensive glass. Mind you, I’m not saying the Panthers won’t be able to get a few offensive boards — ODU got 13. I am saying that the Bulldogs know how to work around an opponent with this profile.
Nervous?
Seriously though, it’s a crap shoot, Pitt and Dixon keep at it, they are going to make it. I just hope it’s soon. And I wouldn’t trade the last 10 years for a final four berth.
Let’s be realistic — in Pitt’s case when we talk about “veterans”, we’re generally talking about players with 2-3 years max of experience as starters.
Calipari took UMass to the F4 circa 1996 and Memphis just 3 years ago when they lost the title game to Kansas in OT.
The point is that supposedly he know how to win the NCAAs as does Pitino … yet, apparently, Jamie doesn’t have a clue according to many
And, by the way, I’m not jumping on Dixon for a lack of tournament success, because I don’t think he’s had the horses most years.
But I still think you need to frame the issue correctly. You can’t even talk about Dixon in those coaching circles until he wins some higher profile games.
And, one more time, for the record, I’m not hopping on Dixon for lack of tournament success. I’m personally fine with having Pitt field a Top 15 type team every year because I’m much more interested in rooting for a program that’s always competitive than I am worrying about a coaching search every 4-5 yrs while up and coming guys use Pitt as a stopover on their way to bigger things.
Ask Calhoun and Jimmy B how long it takes….
And I expect to be knocking on it more and more as he gets better players (no knock on the current team.. as I think they have an excellent chance this year)
So any attempt to preempt the inevitable criticism of Dixon IF this teams bows out early, is just not reality. Dixon owns the results this year (and previous years), good, bad or indifferent.
But, why don’t we wait and see what happens? Who knows Pitt might actually win three more games. I’m very hopeful that they will.
And I will also put the OBLIGATORY disclaimer on the above statement: I am very happy with the state of the Pitt hoops program. Dixon has done a great job of building the program. I am hoping he is the Pitt coach for 20 more years and wins multiple national championships.
Our season will end at any time if things aren’t clicking or the other guys are playing out of this world…that’s one and done for you. It doesn’t diminish the talent or accomplishments of this team. It’s been a fun year. As to the tournament…1 down and 5 to go. Bring it on.
As far as the next one, I’m not nervous, but I’m not overconfident either.
Defensively, Pitt will do what they normally do by taking away one or more of Butler’s strengths. I’m confident of that.
My worry is whether Pitt will score enough to win. If Butler goes man-to-man, our motion and rebounding will chew them up. So, I expect Stevens to play some sort of 2-3 matchup to keep Gibbs from getting open looks, stop Wanny from penetrating and outman Gary on the boards. That means Pitt’s success will depend on Nas making plays in the middle and Gilbert hitting his 3s. The latter is the key to me, because that will force the wings to respect him and open things up for everyone else. Pray that Gil hits his first shot, because it always seems that determines his level of confidence the rest of the way.
And in Gil’s defense, I think his role is to be that other perimeter threat opposite Gibbs. You can’t have everyone “taking it to the hoop.” That’s just inviting the opposition to pack it in against you, like they did against Pitt in the old days when one or no one could hit from the outside.
Remember last year with Jermaine – loved his heart, hated his shot – Dixon. He couldn’t buy a 3 and started trying to force it inside. It probably cost us the Xavier game and Gil getting hot from outside at the end made the game closer than it really was.
You need at least two guys who can knock it down from outside to open things up, and Gil can get hot, as ugly as that shooting motion is.
The formula to beat Pitt:
1) Rebound your ass off – try to equal out the possessions
2) Control Pace – Press them on made buckets. Make Pitt play defense for 30 seconds every possession.
3)Penetrate with dribble drive. Look to score or kick to three point shooter.
4) High ball screen, high ball screen, high ball screen – use it to get the defensive match ups you want.
So if you look at Butler, they can absolutely control the pace offense. They don’t press much.
They can screen roll with Howard. Mack can penetrate.
Rebounding will be the key, if Pitt can dominate the boards, as they should, they will win.
Bottom line: this isn’t a terrible match up for pitt, if they play 90% they win.
Also, the line at 8 is a positive sign, people who are paid a lot of money to know these things, think pitt will win comfortably. If the line had been 3 or 4 I would have been ready to jump off a bridge.
Expect Pitt to be up a bucket at halftime, win by 10. You heard it here first.
Hated to see Louisville and Villanova go down. Could not stay up for Georgetown. The oaf Barkley, was calling us the Big Least and said Marquette would lose. At least they made him look dumb. Why is he on anyway. Should stick to golf. However, two games against each other means that the most that can survive first weekend is five. Will have to listen to more anti Big East BS all week. Go Pitt, carry the flag.
Remember, Pitino not only won an NCAA Championship but took 3 different schools to the Final 4 .. yet lost to a 13th seed …. as almost did Calipari yesterday, who has taken 2 different schools to the F4 and was oone game away last year from taking a third school there.