So… It looks like that whole clever plan to bring in the best remaining recruits to the WPIAL to Pitt on a weekend when they don’t actually have to see Pitt play football is paying off.

Just heard it from the man himself: Dorian Johnson has committed to #Pitt

— Chris Peak (@PantherLair) November 19, 2012

This was first leaked on twitter by several other 2013 commits to Pitt.

This was huge, surprising and welcome.

(more…)

I am starting to think that expansiopocolypse won’t end until we have a “conference” of 64 teams, divided into 5 divisions and each division bifurcated into two sections.

The latest shots fired come from the Big 10, in what can only be considered to be their biggest “all about the money” move in this never-ending program shifting.

The University of Maryland is in serious negotiations to join the Big Ten Conference, sources told ESPN on Saturday.

If Maryland goes from the ACC to the Big Ten, Rutgers of the Big East is expected to follow suit. The addition of Maryland and Rutgers would give the Big Ten 14 members as the league gears toward negotiations on a new media rights deal when its first-tier rights expire in 2017.

No date has been set for a potential announcement, though it could come as soon as Monday. The Maryland board of regents will meet at 9 a.m. Monday morning to decide on the move, a source with direct knowledge told ESPN.com Sunday morning.

But there is not a consensus among athletic department officials. The source said the school is leaning toward the move but there is still time for the school to decide to stay in the ACC.

Except the biggest homers for Maryland and Rutgers — no one is pretending that this possibility is about anything other than money. Specifically, the Big Ten Network (BTN).

(more…)

I could only “watch” in the live gamecast. No noise. Nothing. Silent agony. I writhed and contorted in the chair as the score seemed more dire and time got shorter. Not even bothering with Twitter or anything outside of that single screen. Matching the silence from the “game,” I said nothing. No shouting at a miss that could have happened a minute, two minutes, seconds before. Just tense silence.

The sips of my double IPA becoming drinks, becoming gulps. No joy taken from the resiny nose and the flavor. It could have been anything, as long as it helped to dull the emotions. I’d pay for this later. The impotent frustration of not even being able to see what was going wrong.

Scanning and rescanning the box score. Looking to see if there was anything that gave a glimmer of hope. Extremely poor shooting from the outside. Oakland shooting well — or at least getting good looks it would seem. Were the Golden Grizzlies having a hot shooting night? Was the defense playing poorly? Was Oakland packing it in against Pitt, daring them to shoot jumpers? Was Pitt simply settling?

Trying to figure out if this was a let-down game after rolling Lehigh, or a look-past game as the team thought about the Wednesday game with Michigan and the trip to Madison Square Garden. Did it matter? It wasn’t looking like a win would happen. An inexplicable home loss to a good mid-major, but in the end still a team from the Summit League. A game that seemed like a mere formality to another good start. Set to become a debacle.

(more…)