Carl Krauser: I don’t think it’s any secret that I’m a fan. Chris Thomas had the slightly better stat line: 16 points (6-12), 4 rebounds, 7 assists, 1 steal, 1 turnover versus 16 points (6-14), 4 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 steals, 1 block and 4 turnovers. The difference, Thomas disappeared in the last minutes of the game. Krauser rose to the occasion. Thomas’ own coach says to judge a point guard by wins and losses. Krauser at the helm has Pitt 3-0 versus a Thomas led ND.

Chevon Troutman: Solid, but not great game. He spent most of the time banging around inside. Wearing down the entire corp of ND big men. 13 points (4-9 FG, 5-7 FT), 4 rebounds, 1 assist, 3 steals, 1 block and 2 turnovers. Keep in mind, though that the ND big men couldn’t score inside. Their center, Jordan Cornette got 9 of his 10 points shooting 3s. Francis, Latimore and Cornett combined for 4 points and 12 rebounds.

Ronald Ramon: Key scoring early in the game. Solid defense late. Not a great overall shooting game, 4-11 and 3-8 on 3-pointers to get 13 points. Had 4 rebounds, 3 assists, a steal and a turnover. Did a solid job running the point for Krauser while he was being fixed on the sideline.

Antonio Graves: The longer the game went, the more exposed his perimeter defense was. That will be what cuts his minutes in games. Today, Pitt was short handed and needed him. He maintained his confidence and showed much more willingness to drive to the basket. 10 points on 4-8 shooting. Still needs to take better care of the ball. He had 3 turnovers.

Aaron Gray: After a couple subpar games, Gray bounced back with 9 points on 3-5 shooting. He had 5 rebounds and 2 blocks. More importantly, he provided important energy in the second half when Pitt was struggling to get the ball inside.

Levon Kendall: Only 17 minutes in the game. Mostly in the first half. Lots of hustle, but not much in the stat sheet. He played good defense, but Pitt needed to stay with a smaller faster line-up against ND’s 3 guards. That’s why he didn’t play as much.

Mark McCarroll: Given solid important minutes in the game and clearly responded. Was willing to help clear under the glass. Didn’t try to force his shot (except for the 3-point attempt).

Chris Taft: I don’t know. Led the team with 6 rebounds in only 17 minutes, but showed no effort or energy. I honestly hope it was the flu, because there is no excuse for him to come up playing that small in the big games. He has more talent than any of Pitt’s big guys, but no where near the passion it seems. Pitt needs him to play big for them to go far, but he doesn’t seem to care. It’s easy to say bench him for Gray, but his talent is so needed, and you have to hope he finally snaps out of it. It frustrates the fans, and I can’t imagine what the coaches must be thinking. The team was still playing better with him in the line-up than without. Consider the difference between the 1st half (14 minutes) and 2nd (3 minutes).

John DeGroat: In his 2 minute spurt, 1 rebound, 1 assist, 1 foul. I would really like to see him at least be given a chance to play 5 straight minutes. He was working hard out there, trying to do the defense first. You need to reward him a little.

Keith Benjamin: Only 3 minutes, all in the first half. Surprised not to see him play at all in the second half.

Coach Jamie Dixon: Nearly let this one get away. Let the team get away from pounding the ball inside. No reason why Troutman and Gray only had 14 attempts combined. Too willing to yo-yo DeGroat and Benjamin in the line-up. If Taft wasn’t ill, you need to find a way to reach him now.

I heard a bit after the game that Krauser wasn’t just getting his lip cleaned up, following the collision in the game. He had 2 teeth knocked out. He came back and scored 5 of Pitt’s final 6 points in the game to give Pitt the win. After a performance like that, anyone that questions Krauser’s drive, determination, toughness or will is nuts. He may not play like a classic point guard, but he gets the wins and he leads this team. Box Score and Game log.

College GameDay spent most of the time talking about the Duke-Maryland game and ancillary things. Digger Phelps was wearing his green tie. About 10 minutes to 12 they get to the ND-Pitt game. Phelps picks ND, but he was “nervous” about this pick. Jay Bilas goes with Pitt.

The game starts in the usual way for Pitt. Disjointed and not in rhythm. It takes Pitt 2-and-a-half minutes to score (3 missed shots). Troutman just muscled inside for an easy jumper.

Notre Dame had scored first on a 3 but wasn’t exactly lighting it up. 1 for their first 6, and 5 of the shots were 3s. Amazingly, ND was 1-7 on 3s early in the game. The problem for Pitt was that the Irish quickly found their stroke. ND hit 5-6 3s in the rest of the half and shot 50% on 3s in the second half (8-16).

The officiating was to Pitt’s liking. The officials weren’t calling much underneath the basket except over the back or (some) pushes. A foul wasn’t called until 16:17 in the half when Kendall was fouled going up for his shot. That was the start of a Pitt 9-0 run. Pitt up 11-5.

ND answers with a tough, but pretty pull-up jumper from Chris Thomas (he does have a sweet looking shot). Pitt then commits the turnover allowing ND to break and Latimore slams it in. 77-9 Pitt, under 11 in the half.

The turnover was charged to Krauser, but it was caused because Benjamin was handling the ball, but got no one to come and help him when he started getting trapped. He had no one coming to him so he could pass out of it. Team mistake. Benjamin is still a freshman, and he is going to make that mistake. The rest of the team compounded things by not recognizing and going to help.

Ramon was on early. He hit 2 straight 3s to give Pitt a 17-9 lead at 9:48. He had 8 of the team’s points. ND kept missing and only getting one shot, and Pitt stretched the lead to 21-9 by 8:33.

Then Cornette hit an open 3. The start of the point where ND just could not miss on their 3-point shot. At first, Pitt responded and then some. The lead was stretched to 13, 3 different points. The last at 4:29 left when Graves dropped a short jumper to make it 30-17.

The player keeping ND even that close was Chris Quinn. He answered again with another 3 to make it 30-20 and Quinn had 11 of ND’s points. Pitt committed at couple turnovers to help ND to a 7-0 run.

Len Elmore around the 3 minute mark, noted that Taft was not making a great effort so far in the game. Taft had 5 rebounds to lead everyone at that point, but he missed a couple shots and just seemed slow.

ND kept hitting 3s and got the game close as the half neared the end. It was 33-30 , Pitt with 40 seconds left. Pitt was holding for a shot near the end, and Krauser got fouled as he started an initial drive with 11 seconds left. Neither team was in the bonus so Pitt could get the last shot after inbounding. Krauser again, drives inside and hits a nice runner. ND has no chance to score. 35-30 Pitt at the half.

If officiating stayed as loose in the second half as it did in the first, there is no excuse for Pitt not to win and pound inside.

Unfortunately, Pitt got away from its game in the second half. The first 8 minutes of the second half saw Pitt blow the lead and go down 49-44. In that stretch, Chris Thomas was on fire, scoring 12 of ND’s 19 points. He was just abusing Antonio Graves. Shulman and Elmore were all over Graves’ defense.

Pitt also just couldn’t score. Missing outside and some inside. But mostly, not getting the ball inside. Instead, the perimeter guys were trying to answer ND with 3s of their own.

Taft was pulled just after the TV time out under 12 minutes left in the game. He played 3 minutes in the second half total. Maybe it was just me, but he looked worn down. Aaron Gray was sick during the week, as was Krauser and DeGroat. It seems likely to me that Taft was ill. He was still the leading rebounder for the game, and one of Pitt’s best players. I don’t think this was the game that Dixon simply had enough and said Taft was done. He hasn’t all season, I don’t see it happening now. Of course I could be dead wrong.

DeGroat and McCarroll start getting some minutes. McCarroll played almost half of the second half and DeGroat got his usual 2 minutes. Still, they both played vital roles that didn’t really show up. DeGroat, in particular, the last few games has shown something. He isn’t trying to throw the ball up any longer. He is trying to fit in on defense and get rebounds. He committed a very important hard foul at 9:43 on Torin Francis to keep him from getting an easy slam. Instead, Francis had to shoot free throws and was only 1-2. This kept the ND lead to only 3.

McCarroll was making a good effort after inadvertently hitting Krauser in the mouth. McCarroll was going for a rebound, and was pushed into Krauser, but there was no call on anything. At that point, Elmore and Shulman said they thought it was a cut lip on Krauser that was being worked on. Hope they retrieved the teeth.

While Krauser was out, Pitt came back and got the lead with an 11-0 run. Ramon had a great 3 in the corner that bounced all over the rim before falling in, and was fouled. DeGroat outfought a Domer for a rebound. At the other end, McCarroll got a solid put back and the foul. Couldn’t convert, though.

Krauser returned, and committed the dumb foul on Colin Falls shooting a 3. Falls was the one guy not hitting 3s (thankfully, or Pitt would have been toast). Falls made all 3. Troutman got a basket. Then Cornette hit another 3 when left alone. That was Cornette’s last contribution. A minute later he committed his 5th foul as Krauser was driving. Krauser only hit 1-2. 61-56 Pitt, with 4:09 left.

The teams exchanged misses. Then Quinn hit a jumper at 2:48 to bring ND to within 3. Pitt wasn’t ready when ND decided to go with full court pressure and Graves turned it over and Quinn dropped another jumper, 61-60 with 2:26 left. This time Pitt got the ball up, but Quinn — again — stole the ball from Ramon and layed it in to give ND the lead 62-61. 2:01 left. That’s 6 points and a steal in 47 seconds. Not exactly Reggie Miller versus the Knicks but pretty damn painful.

Pitt took a 30 second timeout to regroup from that minute of hell. Pitt then worked the clock down, and Krauser from the top of the key drained a perfect 3 to make it 64-62.

Colin Falls continued his bad shooting missing a 3, but ND got the rebound. Krauser, though, stole the ball from Cornett, and got the ball to Troutman on the breakaway. Cornett then committed the intentional foul. Troutman drained the first. Then Len Elmore spoke of how Troutman has become such a good freethrow shooter. Right on cue, he misses the second.

Since it was an intentional foul, Pitt gets the ball back. Latimore commits the quick foul on Troutman again 1:02 left. Troutman again misses. The second FT attempt gets waived off because Pitt committed a lane violation. According to the game log, it was Krauser who was guilty.

ND brings the ball up and Quinn from beyond NBA 3-point range, drains a clutch 3 at the key to tie the game with 42 seconds left.

Pitt brings the ball up court, and calls a time-out with 17.2 seconds left. Krauser takes the ball and drives and shoots it rolls around the rim and in! Pitt up 67-65 with 9.6 seconds left. Apparently that wasn’t what he was supposed to do.

Krauser wasn’t supposed to take the shot. He got open when 6-foot-7 Chevon Troutman created a lane to the basket.

“I was supposed to look inside for Chevy but he was covered and was giving me a great screen,” Krauser said. “If I missed it, our guys were underneath to get a tip-in.”

Aggressiveness and driving to the basket creates more opportunities.

When ND got the ball down court, McCarroll made a good foul on Cornett. Cornett didn’t look happy going to the line, and even less so after he airballed his first FT attempt. He made the second, and no one was sure if he was supposed to miss or not.

Pitt got the ball to Ramon who got free on a screen. He was quickly fouled with 2.5 seconds left. Ramon missed the first shot, but got the second. 68-66. He should have missed the second on purpose, ND had no timeouts left.

It became moot when the inbound pass sailed high and Chris Thomas could only put a finger on it before it landed in Kendall’s chest. Game over.

Wow. Pitt needed that. Knew this would be a close game. Both teams made runs, but being aggressive and going inside gives better shots and got Pitt to the free throw line much more than a perimeter shooting team. Pitt shot 14-22 at the line while ND only had 6-10.

ND was actually shooting better and more from the 3-point line than inside. 14-29 (48.3%) on 3s, and only 9-28 (32.1%) everywhere else.

Pitt had very balanced scoring. 4 players with 10 or more points, and one more with 9 points.

Pitt only had 13 turnovers (lower than their average), and got ND to commit the same amount (above their average).

Now time to get ready for Syracuse.

What a game! Not pretty. Not an even performance. Plenty to criticize (perimeter defense). Plenty to praise. Bottom line.

Pitt wins!

68-66.

I have a Jackson that in tomorrow’s papers, it will be reported that Taft was battling the flu.

Going to try and keep this quick. Curious to see how blatantly biased Digger Phelps goes to his Irish (not that there is anything wrong with blatant, up front biases, or then I’d be a hypocrite regarding Mark May during football season) on the 11 am College GameDay.

The Pitt players are not only confident about this game, but still confident about what they can accomplish this season. There are legitimate questions.

Can Chris Taft play hard enough often enough to dominate, at least during portions of games, as Pitt needs him to?

Will Pitt grasp the importance of effort and execution for 40 minutes on defense?

Can the Panthers expect consistent contributions from their bench?

Will they protect the ball?

Although the Panthers are young at some spots and have been working all season to come to grips with no longer having Julius Page and Jaron Brown upon which to rely, the pieces are in place for Pitt to become a special team. Not Illinois special, not Duke or North Carolina special, but better than last year’s Sweet 16 team, the program’s third in as many seasons.

There’s not time to get into it now, but I will posit that the local media and some fans are the ones that seem to be having the problem coming to grips with Page and Brown no longer being on the team. There’s only 3 weeks left in the regular season, 6 games after today, and the issue of Page and Brown keep getting raised after every game it seems. Time to let it go. Different players. Different team.

What Pitt can expect from the Irish, is not a shock. It’s what teams have been doing in the conference with some success. It’s what the Irish, generally, like to do. It’s taking shots around the perimeter. Not necessarily always going to be 3s, but 15 to 18 foot jumpers.

The trick for players like Graves, Ramon, Benjamin and Kendall — don’t give the easy foul, by going for the fake step. Falls and Quinn prefer to make their own shot and take jumpers. Using the head fake, a short first step like they are going to drive then using the separation to pull back for a jumper.

Thomas, is the perimeter player who drives. He’s had a season that has not lived up to all the hype (when has he?), but he played well against BC. He should be matched up with Krauser, the Pitt perimeter player who drives. This is the match-up everyone wants to talk about for the game.

Each has a fierce desire to win, as well as an ability to create his own shot and take over a games. If this were a prizefight, Krauser would be considered a brawler, a guy who looks for the crowd-pleasing knockout, while Thomas would be considered a ring technician, a calculating finesse fighter.

“He’s one of the toughest point guards in the nation,” Krauser said of Thomas. “I think it’s going to be a good battle.”

Thomas averages 13.7 points, 6 assists, 5.2 rebounds and 3 turnovers this season. Krauser averages 15.8, 6.3, 4.7 and 4.1. Both have been sporadic — offseason knee surgery has hampered Thomas and led to substandard play; Krauser is prone to turnovers — but more often than not, they’ve found ways to lead their teams to significant victories.
…
“Winning games is what you have to judge (point guard play) on, not points assists or turnovers,” Notre Dame coach Mike Brey said.
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“I have a lot of respect for his game,” Krauser said of Thomas, who has hit just 33.7 of his shots this season, compared to 41.5 for Krauser. “We both just want to win.”

In head-to-head competition, Thomas has produced better statistics than Krauser, but Krauser is undefeated at 2-0. Thomas scorched Pitt for a total of 52 points in two games last season (including 29 on 7-of-13 shooting from 3-point range in a three-point loss), in addition to amassing 10 assists. Krauser contributed 34 total points and seven assists.

Wins not stats.

ND has yet to win at the Pete, but the shooters seem to like it.

It is, according to the most accurate shooter in the conference, one of the best shooting arenas in the Big East.

“The Petersen Events Center is a great place to shoot,” Notre Dame guard Colin Falls, tops in the Big East with a 44.3 percentage from three-point range, says of Pittsburgh’s facility.

Pitt is going to need Ramon on defense. Hopefully his shoulder is getting better than previously indicated. Graves just is not that good on defense, and it affects his shooting and ball handling when he starts getting torched.

Let’s Go Pitt!!!