If you read this story, you might think the Bearcats are coming in with an advantage.

Pitt must contend with a rested Cincinnati, which hasn’t played in six days, when the Bearcats avenged an earlier loss to Louisville with a 74-68 home victory on Feb. 6.

No. 14 Pitt, meanwhile, is coming off a 57-53 victory over No. 9 West Virginia on Thursday. Cincinnati, two days before facing Louisville, dropped a 66-57 decision to the Mountaineers on Feb. 4 at WVU Coliseum in Morgantown, W.Va. Cincinnati leads Pitt in their series, 6-1, but the teams have not played since 1979, when the Bearcats earned a 61-60 victory over the Panthers. Pitt registered its only victory in the series in 1977, 65-64, at Fitzgerald Field House.

Then of course, there is the story from Cinci.

The Bearcats will try to counter Gray’s inside presence with 6-foot-6 senior Eric Hicks, who will be surrendering six inches and about 25 pounds.

Hicks will spend the bulk of the time trying to slow Gray, the leading rebounder in the league. But it would be foolhardy to expect Hicks to stop Gray by himself.

“It makes us have to make some changes and be flexible as to what may work,” Kennedy said. “We’re going to have to try a lot of different things.

“You can’t go to a steady diet of zone because you have no size. The zone is not nearly as imposing with small guys. You can press some but we can’t make a living off pressing because of our numbers. You’re going to get fatigued and you’re going to be more susceptible to fouls.”

To complicate matters for UC, Pitt also plays excellent defense. The Panthers allow 61.1 points per game, third in the league, and rank fourth in field goal percentage defense at 39.8 percent.
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If Pitt’s size inside, its defensive prowess and the presence of Krauser weren’t enough, the Bearcats will also have to contend with perhaps the best home-court advantage in the league.

Spurred by the Oakland Zoo student section, the Panthers are 14-0 at the 12,508-seat Petersen Events Center this season and are 62-5 since the building opened four years ago.

“It’s something we’re proud of,” Dixon said. “Our fans, our students, the Oakland Zoo, they’ve been a big part of our success. Our students are right on top of you. It’s something we did four years ago when we built the building. It’s a good situation.”

The rest for Cinci was mitigated by the lingering effects of the concussion on Hicks and White’s sprained ankle. Cinci also gives up a lot of size — though they are athletic and guys who play taller — with no player taller than 6’7″ and two starters under 6′.

I expect Gray will be contending with the double team once more. That means Pitt is going to have to hit some jumpers and perimeter shots to help him get free. Hicks is 3d in the BE in rebounding (9.7) despite being only 6’6″. He’s fearless inside.

Cinci is also playing to get in the tournament. They are somewhere on the bubble as the team has been sliding without Kirkland. Right now, no Cinci area teams are looking good for the NCAA.

The stories in Pittsburgh media focus on Cinci and their rough year, as I noted in an earlier post. There’s the whole adjusting to life in the Big East deal.

“It’s your typical Cincinnati team from what I’ve known in the past. They’re very athletic and they’re very experienced,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said.

Cincinnati (16-8, 5-5), with three seniors in the starting lineup and a fourth lost for the season with an injury, is coming off a crucial 74-68 home victory Monday over slumping Louisville, another first-year Big East member.

Both teams previously were members of Conference USA but find themselves scrapping to stay afloat in the Big East standings.

“The Big East has certainly lived up to all the expectations,” Kennedy said. “Night-in and night-out, the league is just so brutal. There’s just no off-nights.”

And of course all the turmoil at the school and the program.

From the day he took over as men’s head coach at Cincinnati in August, Andy Kennedy gave his team a mantra to live by: adapt and overcome.

The Bearcats lost their coach on the eve of the fall semester when Bob Huggins, who had been the head coach at Cincinnati for 16 seasons, was dismissed by school president Nancy Zimpher after multiple missteps involving the successful head coach, an assistant and some players.

Then after winning 13 of its first 15 games to start the season, senior forward Armein Kirkland, one of the best players on the team and a veteran leader, was lost for the season when his left anterior cruciate ligament was torn in a loss at Connecticut Jan. 9.

But through the coaching upheaval, injuries and a short bench — Kennedy has just eight scholarship players at his disposal — Cincinnati enters a game against Pitt today at the Petersen Events Center with a 16-8 overall record (5-5 Big East) and is in position to contend for an NCAA tournament berth in its first season as a member of the Big East Conference.

Here’s what DraftExpress had to say about the game

-CINCINNATI AT PITTSBURGH. Cincinnati got a much needed win against Louisville which helped stop the bleeding somewhat. If they can pull off a win in this game they’lll be very much back in the bracket picture. Pitt is still a very solid team who appears to be headed toward the pod system. They just got a big win against West Virginia and are still hanging around the top of the Big East Standings. Winning is important as far as that goes because they are chasing both Villanova and Connecticut not just for the conference lead, but for a spot in Philadelphia. They are two games out of first and another loss in a game like this might put it out of reach. They’re a very solid tournament team either way though.

Roughly translated: they looked quickly at the standings and schedule each played and went with the standard generic info.