What Rick Pitino says, becomes the rule for lazy sportswriters.
It’s impossible to prove. But there might be more contact in Big East basketball than Big East football. That supposition is based on our only up-close glimpse of Big East football, in which Rutgers watched Arizona State put up 45 points in the Insight Bowl on Dec. 27 at Chase Field.
The nation’s largest major conference – it has 16 hoops-playing members – is harking back to the days when every night seemed like a brawl. Nine of the top 60 teams in scoring defense are from the Big East.
Just ask Louisville coach Rick Pitino, whose team was outmuscled by unbeaten Pittsburgh 61-57 on Sunday.
Not that he’s bothered watching anything in the Big East. He just saw a quote from Rick Pitino and assumed it for all. Fine journalism in action.
Dick Vitale thinks Aaron Gray is the most improved player in college basketball (hat tip Joe). Far be it from me to take anything away from Pitt pub and positive stuff, but I’m not buying. Gray just didn’t play last season because Chris Taft was ahead of him in talent and what he had done. It’s not like he beat Taft out for the starting role. This is not to rip Gray, but I would consider most improved to be a player who clearly raised and improved his game. Not someone who has blossomed once in the role. Gray showed improvement in his brief spells last year. It just doesn’t work for me.
A Syracuse site ranks the toughest BE schedule (surprise, Syracuse has the hardest) for the 10 best teams. This is what he said about Pitt:
The Panthers play 10 games against the best the BE has to offer. They play Notre Dame, Syracuse, and Cincinnati at home; Louisville, Connecticut, and Georgetown on the road; and have home-and-home series against West Virginia and Marquette. Oddly, they don’t play in-state rival Villanova at all. Something I’m sure the Wildcats’ players are happy about, not having to be pulled, grabbed, scratched, clawed, kneed, and elbowed for 40 minutes. Pitt’s recent win over Wisconsin shows they will be a force in the Big East again this year.
The Big East Basketball Blog has a good preview of tonight’s game and predicts a Pitt win.
As Pitt gets on the national radar and tonight’s and Saturday’s games will be in the NY/NJ area, longtime NY Daily News Columnist Dick Weiss does a piece on Pitt.
There were also questions about whether Dixon could get a relatively inexperienced team with only two seniors to play cohesively if Carl Krauser continued to dominate the ball at the point. But the Panthers have forced us to take notice. They’re 14-0 and ranked ninth in the AP poll after defeating a ranked Wisconsin team at home and winning their first three league games. This is Pitt Week in the metropolitan area. The Panthers play Rutgers at the sold-out RAC tonight, then play St.John’s Saturday at noon at the Garden.
“I thought our league would be good, but it’s even better than I thought,” Dixon said. “Rutgers is much better than the two teams I saw on ESPN Monday – Kansas and Missouri. There’s going to be an astounding number of teams that have a shot at the tournament.”
With the NY connections of the team, expect a few more stories from the NYC papers. Especially if Pitt wins tonight.
