Before the game against the Richmond Spiders, a Freshman Pitt player who hadn’t gotten a lot of playing time talked about making that game his “coming-out party.” Keith Benjamin was only off by 5 1/2 weeks. Benjamin got in there when Graves was being consistently beaten on the perimeter by Gerry McNamara; and Ramon found out the hard way about the advantages of age and guile as he picked up 3 fouls in only 9 minutes in the first half trying to help stop McNamara. But I’m getting ahead of things.
To help keep things straight. Box score. Pitt press release and Play-by-play.
There was no pre-game. At least not for me. I barely made it home for the game from dinner that ran long. Get the TV fired up, notepad and a New Castle as I hear Dan Shulman say that there are some 25 NBA scouts in attendance. If that isn’t incentive for Taft to show what he’s got, then he is an even bigger cipher.
Syracuse wins the tip, and as they set up I see that Kendall got the start at Forward. Warrick gets the ball and hits a beautiful fade jumper over Troutman. Pretty.
Pitt doesn’t set up their offense well and Troutman turns the ball over. Pitt gets the ball right back when Josh Pace gets trapped down too far and travels. Once more, Pitt looks ill-prepared on offense. They can’t get the ball inside, and are unable to find a clear perimeter shot. Krauser actually passed up an almost clean look. Graves ended up with the ball as the clock was winding down and tried to toss one up on the run. Syracuse gets the ball and pushes quickly up court. McNamara tries a 3 — and Kendall fouls him. Ugh. McNamara drains all 3 and it is 5-0 Syracuse.
Krauser brings the ball up and launches a bad 3. He gets his own rebound but then throws the ball away. You can’t pass the ball that hard when your moving inside and only 5 feet from your teammate.
Syracuse misses a couple chances, and when it looks like they’ll get a 3rd, Kendall strips Warrick. Warrick was so surprised he fouled Kendall. Graves is pulled for Ramon at 17:20.
Kendall gets rewarded at the other end with an open look and sinks a 3. 5-3.
Warrick hits his second jumper. 7-3.
Krauser tries another quick 3 that misses the mark and Syracuse grabs the board and is running. Warrick slams it home. 9-3. Warrick is now 3-3 shooting. Pitt has to use a time out.
Out of the timeout, Pitt actually gets the ball to Troutman, but he misses inside. Kendall can’t get the tip. Warrick gets the rebound, but at the other end finally misses a jumper.
Ramon tries his first 3 of the game, but misses. Kendall gets the rebound and his putback proceeds to roll all around the rim and out. Taft grabs the rebound and is fouled going back up.
A TV timeout at 15:25. Pitt looks totally flummoxed by the Syracuse zone. There is no surprise that it is completely collapsed inside. Syracuse’s backcourt is well experienced and fast enough to rarely leave the perimeter shooters a truly open look.
Out of the TV timeout, Taft misses both his free throws. Pathetic. At the other end, Ramon gets whistled for a foul trying to get around a screen. McNamara drops a 3 from about 25 feet out. 12-3 Syracuse.
Ramon tries another 3, and misses again. Kendall gets the rebound and gets fouled as he beat McCroskey to the ball. Gray comes in for Taft at this point. Sadly, Pitt still can’t get anything for their troubles as Graves whiffed on an open look for a 3. Another Pitt rebound but Gray turns it over when he steps on the line.
Showing good ball movement, Syracuse gets it inside to Pace for an easy lay-up. 14-3 Syracuse. Pitt continues to struggle as Gray turns the ball over when he bobbled the pass and traveled. McNamara decides to take it himself and gets Ramon to foul as he was driving inside. Ramon has to come out. McNamara sinks both to make it 16-3.
An 11-0 Syracuse run. Pitt hasn’t scored in over 4 minutes. 3 points in 7 minutes.
Pitt finally gets some points. Gray moves along the baseline and gets fouled as he goes to the basket. He sinks both free throws. 16-5.
Pitt actually gets a stop, but does nothing as Graves airballs another 3 point attempt. Taft makes a spectacular block at the other end. Swatting the ball 3 rows deep. There is a TV Time Out.
Out of the timeout, Graves steals the ball from Edelin, but McNamara steals the ball right back from Krauser, and McNamara lays it in. 18-5. The crowd which was trying to use the block to stay into the game goes dead.
McCarroll, who is in the game, makes his first attempt. His jumper rims out. McNamara grabs the rebound and drives the court and makes a fantastic pass to Roberts for the jam. 20-5. Pitt takes another timeout.
ESPN graphic shows that Syracuse is shooting 7-12 and Pitt is 1-12. No need to mention Syracuse going 5-5 at the line while Pitt is 2-4.
So right out of the timeout, Krauser hoists yet another 3. Truly a WTF moment? No setting up the play. No trying to get the ball inside. Just throw one up. Naturally Syracuse rebounds and Roberts gets another dunk. Make that 8-13 and 1-13 shooting. 22-5 Syracuse, at the 10:31 mark.
Syracuse starts to get a little sloppy. Taft hits a jumper to give Pitt its first points in almost 3 minutes and its first bucket in 7 minutes. McNamara decides to take it himself inside and misses the lay-up. Pitt is able to run and Taft gets a slam and is fouled by Roberts who was late. Taft sinks the free throw to make it 22-10.
Roberts turns the ball over as Syracuse just doesn’t seem to be taking care of the ball. McCarroll gets an open jumper. Looks good, but it rims out once more. McCarroll just can’t buy a score. In an obvious bit of frustration and embarrassment, McCarroll fouls Warrick at the other end. Warrick hits 1-2. 23-10.
Keith Benjamin hits a runner to make it 23-12. Pitt is actually on a 7-1 run and the crowd starts making some noise.
Syracuse turns the ball over, then commits a foul. You almost start to feel hope again going into the TV timeout with 7:47 left in the half. Then Krauser throws the ball away on the inbounds play. Syracuse scores an easy lay-up. 25-12.
Ramon hits a needed 3. His first points. 25-15. Len Elmore, though, is all over Chris Taft. Just ripping his game. Showing how Taft doesn’t even try to look at the basket when a man is on him.
Syracuse answers with a Warrick lay-up. 27-15.
Then Benjamin hits an open 3. 27-18, and Pitt actually has it within single digits.
Ramon, though commits his 3rd foul trying to stop Edelin. Ramon has to come out and Edelin hits 1-2. 28-18.
Troutman answers with a jumper from the FT line. It’s 28-20, and suddenly Pitt is playing better and the crowd is getting loud. Syracuse misses its shot. Pitt gets the ball, but Kendall launches a quick 3 that misses.
McNamara does his best to silence all and snuff hope when he sinks a 3-pointer. The lead goes back up to 11, 31-20.
Krauser gets blocked from behind on his shot by Edelin, but stays with it to grab the ball and pass to Kendall who now sinks the 3. 31-23.
Warrick misses a jumper, and Pitt runs. Taft misses with a jumper, but Troutman gets the tip-in. 31-25. Syracuse takes a 30 second and then a TV timeout. Immediately off the inbounds play, McNamara launches a 3 that misses. Both teams miss opportunities, then Troutman with a nice pass inside to Gray for the lay-up and the foul. 31-27. Gray misses the free throw.
Of course, Warrick answers with a nice move to get a lay-up.
Troutman seems to be waking up in the last five minutes. He draws a foul from the defender when he was too far under the basket. Hits 1-2 on free throws.
At the other end Krauser then fouls McNamara. McNamara shocks everyone by going 1-2. 34-28 with 1:15 left. Taft threw the ball away when Kendall tried to cut to the basket.
For some reason, McNamara launches an absurdly long 3 that results in chants of Air-Ball!
Troutman draws a foul as he drove to the basket. He goes 1-2 to make it 34-29 with 10 seconds left in the half. Syracuse can’t get a shot because Troutman stripped the ball.
The half ends on a definite Pitt upswing. Only down 5 after an absolutely pathetic start.
Syracuse was really a 2 man show of Warrick and McNamara. Warrick had 11 points on extremely efficient 5-7 shooting and McNamara with 14 with almost half coming at the free throw line.
Pitt had no player with more than 6 points (Troutman and Kendall) and 2 more with 5 (Taft and Benjamin). Krauser didn’t make a bucket but had 6 assists and only 2 turnovers.
Second Half
Sloppy start for Pitt. Graves missed a 3 when he hesitated first. Krauser throws the ball away on the next possession and then Krauser misses yet another 3-point shot. Luckily, Syracuse only got one point in the same stretch of the first 2 minutes.
Kendall then hits a 3. His 3rd of the night, and Pitt is only down 35-32.
Warrick answers with a lay-up.
Then Krauser launches a 3 from the top of the key. Maybe it was just me, but I thought I heard a collective “Nnnnoo-Yes!” from the crowd when the ball swished through. 37-35 Syracuse.
McNamara tries to answer, but misses his 3.
Kendall attempts a 3, miss. Troutman grabs the rebound and kicks it out to Krauser who shoots another 3 but misses. Kendall fouls McNamara on the rebound, and then Troutman gets whistled for the foul on Warrick at the other end. Warrick makes 1-2 FT. 38-35.
There is a TV timeout at 15:57. Pitt comes down and Krauser drains a deep 3 to tie the game. The Pete is sounding very loud. McNamara answers with a runner to give Syracuse the lead.
Pitt hits a rough patch of bad play. Kendall commits the double dribble. Troutman makes a lazy bounce pass, that McNamara intercepts, and then commits the dumb foul at the other end. Suddenly it is 44-38 and Pitt has to use a time out at 13:46.
Benjamin hits his second 3 of the night after the time-out. Then at the other end, he steals the ball from Warrick. Benjamin’s jumper doesn’t go, but only Pitt players seem to be around the basket. McCarroll misses a tip-in, but Gray is there to get it down the second time. 44-43. 12:47 left.
Pitt seems to be missing opportunities, as they get close. Krauser seems to be limping from rolling his ankle, and gets blocked from behind on a lay-up. Then McCarroll is blocked on his own lay-up — is there anyone having a worse season than McCarroll at this point?
Benjamin gets whistled for foul that results in a TV timeout with 11:44 left. Out of the timeout, Syracuse tries another 3 and misses. Both teams have been taking a lot of deep shots, having trouble getting inside. Pitt early, Syracuse as the game got deeper.
Benjamin gets fouled from behind by McNamara. Benjamin sinks both free throws and Pitt has its first lead at 11:20, 45-44.
Edelin hoists and misses another 3-point shot. But Pitt gives the ball right back when Troutman gets whistled for traveling. But Pitt gets the ball back when Benjamin gets a steal from McNamara. You can see the new confidence in Benjamin as he brings the ball up court. He is wanting to take charge.
Kendall misses a 3, but Troutman is right there for an easy put-back. No ‘Cuse player was near him. 47-44 Pitt.
Syracuse takes a 30 second timeout. Out of the timeout, Warrick misses a jumper and Benjamin grabs the rebound. Krauser hits a runner to make it 49-44.
Syracuse is a mess. Nichols launches a quick 3 that misses badly. Warrick gets the rebound, and lets Nichols try again. Same result, but this time Syracuse turns the ball over.
Pitt lets Kendall try yet another 3, but again Syracuse didn’t box out Troutman who had an unmolested put back. 51-44.
Syracuse takes another quick timeout. Warrick misses another jumper, but Syracuse gets the rebound and Warrick is fouled by Kendall. There is a TV timeout before the shot. 7:28 left. Still plenty of time.
As Warrick goes to the line, my phone rings, Caller ID says it’s Lee. Actual conversation.
Me: If you jinx this, I’m going to have to drive to Altoona and kill you.
Lee: Fine. I’m stuck in the Baltimore Ikea
Me: You’re not watching the game?
Lee: [annoyed] No. What’s happening?
Me: Pitt had another horrible start to be down 17, but now has a (Warrick makes the first) 6 point lead probably going to be 5 in another second or two.
Lee: Really? How much time left?
Me: 7 and a half minutes.
Lee: Damn. Guess I better find a sports bar fast. Bye.
Boggles the mind.
Krauser, who is just feeling so much better about his shot, now drops another 3. 54-46.
Syracuse just seems so out of sorts now. Trying to get quick scores, and not setting for shots or trying to get rebounds. Pitt is doing everything right.
Taft goes up for a slam that Watkins blocks — but Watkins is called for a foul. Replays make it look questionable that it wasn’t a clean block. Taft hits the first, misses the second, but Syracuse wasn’t ready and Troutman had an easy tip-in. Giving Pitt an 11 point lead at 6:21.
Pitt just kept extending the lead and at 2:22 Pitt had a 67-52 lead. The game was iced. Pitt was content to let Syracuse take uncontested 3s so they were in better position to grab the rebounds. That was how Syracuse closed the gap as much as they did. In the final 2:10, Syracuse shot 4-6 on 3s. Problem is they shot 0-9 in the rest of the second half and 2-7 in the first.
Pitt wins with the final score 76-69.
After a hideous 1-13 start to shooting, Pitt went 22-41. Syracuse went the other way. An 8-13 start, and a 14-38 finish. Syracuse, clearly lost interest in banging inside as the game went on. Pitt outrebounded Syracuse 39-28 in the game, 21-12 in the second half. Syracuse started taking way too many 3-point shots, and they weren’t falling.
Syracuse had Warrick who went for 25 on extremely efficient shooting and McNamara for 26 based on volume. That’s 73.9% of Syracuse’s scoring in the game. No one else on the team had more than 4. Pitt’s efficiency and volume scorers — Troutman and Krauser — only accounted for 48.7% of the team scoring.
