Barely a mention of tomorrow night’s game. Coach Dixon apparently made an effort to say that “Seton Hall is a very good team,” but the talk centered on a contract extension and the Academic Progress Report.

“I’m confident that Jamie Dixon will be our coach,” Long said Wednesday.

He was responding to recent reports that Dixon’s name has been linked to several men’s basketball job vacancies, as well as an anticipated opening at Arizona State, where Rob Evans is rumored to be out at season’s end.

Dixon, in his third year, has four years remaining on a contract reportedly worth more than $550,000 per year.

“I’m not surprised his name is being mentioned, and there will be more,” Long said. “Arizona State is not the only place you’re going to hear Jamie Dixon’s name.

“Pitt is prepared to make Pitt the best opportunity for Jamie Dixon.”

There are 2 ways an AD can deal with the stories and questions that arise from them. Ignore/deflect them by saying things like, “we have not been contacted by any schools,” or “this is something that will be addressed after the season, right now the full attention is on winning ‘X’.” The other way is straight on, as AD Jeff Long appears to be doing (mostly).

The contract negotiations could be a little different this time.

“I want to make it clear that we think the job Jamie is doing is outstanding, and we want him to be here a long time. It’s my job to keep Pitt the best opportunity for Jamie Dixon. And I think Pitt is the best opportunity for Jamie Dixon.”

Dixon, 40, has four years remaining on his current contract that pays him in the neighborhood of $600,000 annually. His original contract was extended after his first season.

Dixon is a Big East and national coach of the year candidate and has directed Pitt to its third consecutive NCAA tournament appearance in three seasons.

He does not have an agent, but he had a lawyer look over the contract extension he signed after his first season. He said he did not hire an agent because Pitt asked him not to have representation. Since then he has been approached by agents and did not rule out having one represent him in the next round of contract negotiations.
…
One of the published reports linking Dixon to Arizona State indicated he could be had because “Dixon is one of the lowest-paid coaches in the Big East.”

Long disputed that assertion yesterday. He would not say how much Dixon is making or where he is slotted in the conference, but he did say that Dixon is not one of the four lowest-paid coaches in the Big East.

He also said it would do no good to announce a contract extension during the season and that such a statement wouldn’t quell rumors about other jobs.

“There would be speculation regardless,” Long said. “Every time a job opens, there’s going to be the rumors.”

If I had to guess, I’d say that these 4 coaching jobs are paying less right now: Cinci, St. John’s, USF and probably Seton Hall (or DePaul). Dixon is almost assuredly, though, in the lower half. UConn, Louisville, Syracuse, Marquette, and Villanova are all $1 million + annual deals. RU was up near that until yesterday. WVU and ND are in the upper-half.

The article also mentions that AD Long will be trying to get the team on more chartered flights to get the players back faster.

The other big story, is of course the Academic Progress Report. Apparently it was a little closer to penalties than would have been liked for the Pitt basketball team.

Only men’s basketball was below the APR’s two-year standard of 925.

But while the program scored 905, it fell within the NCAA’s safe range and will not be subject to scholarship penalties.

Unlike NCAA graduation rate reports that document academic performance six years prior, the APR, which was instituted last year by the NCAA, measures current student-athletes’ progress by rewarding points annually for retention, eligibility and graduation on a term-by-term basis.

Seems like there are still bugs to be worked out of it.

“It’s more up to date but there’s still problems with it,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said. “This past year, we lost kids who had already graduated. You’re talking about losing points when you’ve reached your goal. We put our kids in a position to graduate early, and we’re being penalized. That’s flawed.”

Dixon isn’t overly concerned but said he has been in contact with NCAA officials to point out what he insisted are inaccuracies in the report, adding, “They were not aware of it.”

Both Chevon Troutman and Mark McCarroll had fulfilled requirements and technically graduated over the summer before the season started, but were taking more classes. Neither (along with Chris Taft) finished their classes in the Spring semester.

But they needed to be enrolled in classes the second semester to be eligible to play basketball. They enrolled, but failed to finish the courses after the season ended.

“We’ve had to adjust how we do things,” Dixon said. “It’s actually more of a benefit to us if we slow kids down to graduation and delay them a semester,

“It’s still a flawed report. However, I still think it’s better than the graduation rate. The NCAA is working on legislation to improve the APR.”

The good news for Pitt is that all its other programs are in good academic standing, and most of them received excellent marks. The football program scored a 943 — significantly higher than the national average for football programs (929) — the volleyball program scored 1.000 and the women’s basketball program a 983.

Several other local programs fell below the minimum standards but remained within the confidence boundary. They include Duquesne women’s basketball (920), Penn State men’s fencing (900), Robert Morris field hockey (921) and West Virginia women’s basketball (915).

Here’s Pitt’s actual report from the NCAA (PDF). There is an observation on the way the information is put out there:

Take a look at the user-unfriendly APR display on the NCAA’s website, which allows you to look up individual schools but denies you the opportunity to actually see them compared on a single sheet. Not by design, right? No, of course not…

Never.

For Pitt to get that #4 seed in the Big East Tournament and the all important first round bye, this has to happen:

1. Marquette needs to lose to either Louisville or Providence.
2. Georgetown somehow manages to lose to South Florida.
3. Pitt has to win against an unpredictable and dangerous Seton Hall team.

I was resigned to the #6 seed, but now a glimmer. Louisville knocked off Marquette in OT, 67-60!

At the very least, Pitt could find itself in the #5 seed with a win over Seton Hall.

Go Bulls!

Yesterday morning there were rumors that Robert McCullum the Head Coach at South Florida would be fired and that there were some big-time boosters ready and able to get Bob Huggins.

An influential USF booster told SI.com this week that supporters of the program have had numerous conversations in recent days with Huggins’ Cincinnati-based attorney, Richard Katz, who indicated Huggins would be interested in the Bulls coaching job if it opened up. Third-year coach Robert McCullum is not expected to return after USF’s season ends this week with home games against Connecticut and Georgetown. The Bulls are currently 0-14 in their first season in the Big East (6-21 overall) and will not be among the 12 teams to qualify for the conference tournament, which begins on March 8 at Madison Square Garden.

“No decision has been made, but there is really a groundswell here amongst some of the core guys to bring Huggins in,” the booster said.

One potential sticking point is South Florida president Judy Genshaft, who is said to be good friends with Nancy Zimpher, the president at Cincinnati who pressured Huggins into resigning last August. When reached by SI.com on Monday afternoon, Katz declined to comment about the South Florida situation but added, “Coach Huggins is certainly interested in coaching major college basketball again and will be reviewing all situations.”

Then reality set in, as that “sticking point” seemed to make a difference. In fact, the AD released a statement yesterday night. McCullum looks likely to get another year on his contract.
Huggins might end up at Temple next season is the alternative hot rumor.

Rutgers is set to let go of its head coach.

Rutgers coach Gary Waters announced Wednesday he will resign at the end of the season, finishing his five-year tenure with the Scarlet Knights.

Waters said during a conference call with the media Wednesday afternoon that “it’s time to move on.” He said his resignation was a mutual decision. “They [the Rutgers administration] asked me to clean up the program and the program is now clean. It’s time for me to move on to a different place. It wasn’t the right match.”

Waters was a dead-man walking last year when RU hired Fred Hill, Jr., the top assistant and ace recruiter away from Villanova. I think Hill is also the son of the RU baseball coach as well. Hill is expected to take over for next season.

The season was another disappointment and when he got stuck in Ohio because of a snowstorm and missed coaching the team, that was the final piece for the fans to end the farce.

Then WVU Coach John Beilein being courted by Missouri won’t die (Insider Subs.).

Sources said Missouri has already tried to make some inroads with West Virginia’s John Beilein, but he’s not talking to anyone until after the season — and even then, he will be incredibly difficult to wedge away from Morgantown. Beilein has always been an East Coast guy, and there is no indication he would go to the Midwest.

His buyout may not be the biggest stumbling block since one of the big boosters at Missouri happens to be a Wal-Mart heir.

While Cinci has made noise about thinking of keeping Andy Kennedy, it may be due to the costs of getting the two guys long rumored to be their top targets:

Major buyouts for Wake Forest’s Skip Prosser and George Washington’s Karl Hobbs are stumbling blocks for either moving anytime soon, according to sources.

And of course, Louis Orr at Seton Hall continues to twist in the wind.

The Academic Progress Report from the NCAA was released. No Pitt athletics team was affected.

In Division I-A football, Temple (9), New Mexico State (6), Toledo (6) Hawaii (5), Middle Tennessee (5), Western Michigan (5) Buffalo (3) and Northern Illinois (2) were penalized.
…
In Division I basketball, Cal-Poly (2), Centenary (2), East Carolina (2), Hampton (2), Jacksonville (2), Kent State (2), Maryland Eastern Shore (2), New Mexico State (2), South Carolina State (2), Texas State (2), Sacramento State (1), DePaul (1), Florida A&M (1), Lousiana Lafayette (1), Louisiana-Monroe (1), Louisiana Tech (1) and Prarie View (1) were penalized.

Those numbers in parenthesis represent the number of scholarships they will lose under the penalties.

According the the NCAA press release, this might be interesting.

Eight institutions have not yet completed the process for determining penalties under APR: Arizona State University; Northern Arizona University; San Diego State University; San Jose State University; Texas A&M University, College Station; University of Arizona; University of Kansas; Tulane University. The NCAA will release APR data on these institutions in the near future.

[Emphasis added.]

There is no indication as to what sport the penalties would apply, but if it was b-ball for ASU it would be another negative in their chance to lure away Coach Jamie Dixon if the rumors are true.

This is the full list of schools, teams and number of lost scholarships (PDF). Here’s a good starting point from the NCAA if you want to know more about the APR.

CBS Sportsline/CSTV.com are once more offering the 1st and 2nd round games (not being shown in your area) of the NCAA Tournament on streaming video. This year it is free.

I mentioned it a while back, but it is getting closer and they are making claims that they only have limited capacity. You have to sign-up for it, but if you did it last year or have a CBS Sportsline sign-in, you can use that to sign-up for it.

The streaming quality is about the same as ESPN’s computer feed, but hey it’s free.

Come August, you can bet we will be hearing, in excruciating detail, all about Coach Wannstedt’s, uh, interesting conditioning/team spirit building off-season workouts.

The first change Wannstedt made was instituting accountability wherein if an individual fails to live up to his responsibility, the whole team pays. If a player misses a meeting with a tutor, is late for a study hall, is late for a meeting with an academic advisor or a workout or physical therapy, then every member of the team has to do more running.

“I have moles all over campus,” Wannstedt said, with a laugh. “Actually, the refreshing thing is this — I haven’t had to check up on every little thing because the players are doing it themselves. We have guys calling other guys in the morning to wake them up and make sure they get to class. We have guys calling around to make sure other guys have a ride to the South Side for training. We’ve had amazing results.

“Our leaders have really attacked this, and the other guys have indeed followed. We have a team that is much closer right now because they all have more ownership in it. They all know they need to rely on each other to come through — and that’s really what we’re after, team unity.”

Okay, nothing that out of the ordinary there. Fairly common tactic.

The other initiative has been a tough training program informally known as “Fridays with the coach.”

The players have their usual weightlifting and conditioning program all week, but Friday is special. They show up at the South Side facility at a designated time then board buses and head to an undisclosed location to train in the streets — Rocky Balboa style.

One Friday, they ran up the hill from Second Avenue across the Swinburne Bridge into Oakland. Another time, they ran the steps inside the Cathedral of Learning — all 36 floors — twice. One time, they showed up at 5:30 a.m., only to be told to run down the walking path next to the Monongahela River, even though it was dark and cold. Their instructions were to keep running until they ran into the other coaches — who were a few miles down the path.

Um, is it really a good idea to have them running and stumbling down darkened paths? I know that trail, and while there is no risk of falling in the river or traffic, running effectively blind doesn’t seem like the smartest idea.

Of course you get team leaders saying that it is building the camaraderie and esprit de corps and such.

Wannstedt said he has been impressed that the players have rallied around each other. The results of the conditioning program are obvious. Last week marked the seventh Friday, and every player — including the linemen — made all 10 trips up and down the steps with little problem.

“The first Friday, it was ugly,” Wannstedt said. “Guys were puking, they were falling out. It was freezing cold, and we had guys who had tears frozen on their faces. Now, it is almost not any fun anymore because they are all in such good shape. But that was the goal.

“And next week, we’re going to reward them with some fun. I’ll have an obstacle course or something set up, and we’ll have a little competition. They’ve worked hard, they deserve to enjoy themselves a little.”

Has he been watching “Knight School” on ESPN or something?

Why do coaches get so happy when they make their players throw-up? “Yay, we’ve made them sick!” I’m not singling out Wannstedt here. This is a common thing. I recall Urban Meyer and his “circle of pain” or something that resulted in positive team vomiting. Like this is a good thing to push the kids to the point where their bodies want to expel all things from the system.

I await the point where some coach proudly points out that he worked some kid so hard that he collapsed and crapped himself. (My money’s on Ole Miss Coach Ed Orgeron.)

And just out of idle curiosity, since these things were taking place on public streets and paths, who cleaned this stuff up?

Like I said, we’ll read all about this again come the end of the summer as the myriad of preseason stories start being told. This will get near the top of the list. And then we can expect to hear it being told as “color” during the first couple of games. And if Pitt does very well, this will become an oft-repeated tale of team building and bonding and stuff.

This isn’t to totally rip on Coach Wannstedt, but if this was taking place in Columbus, State College, Lubbock or anywhere else we’d totally be mocking it. Might as well get out in front of it.

Practice schedules for the Big East.

I’m a bit dumb-founded that at UConn, where basketball is king and a deep tournament run is expected, they actually have Spring Practice starting on Friday. No one is going to pay any attention. Hmmm. Maybe that was the plan.

Louisville knew what the deal was expected to be regarding coverage and attention. They don’t start until April 1. Except for Cinci (March 28), everyone else looks to start around the 3d week of March. Pitt begins on March 19.

ESPN.com has a capsule look at all of the Big East teams as they head into Spring practice.

Lead local recruiter and associate head coach Bob Junko recently underwent heart surgery. His return date isn’t certain.

Three assistant coaches rebuffed overtures from other teams in order to stay with Dave Wannstedt. Defensive ends/special teams coach Charlie Partridge could have gone to Wisconsin. Wide receivers coach Aubrey Hill could have gone to Miami, and offensive line coach Paul Dunn had discussions with the New York Jets.

Safety Mike Phillips, coming off a broken ankle sustained early last season, will likely sit out spring ball but is expected to be ready in August. Linebacker Brian Bennett, who tore an ACL against Rutgers last season, is also expected to sit out the spring but be ready for the season.

Unfortunately, DC Paul Rhoads was not among those looking elsewhere.

It’s hard to believe that at the start of the season, I felt that 10-6 would be the upper range of what Pitt would do this season in the Big East, but now, even if Pitt finishes 11-5 it feels a little disappointing. Knowing Pitt will be a 6th seed in the BE Tournament (even as officially tied for 4th) has that effect.

What is even more impressive is the leagues’s depth. With five games remaining in the regular season, only one team — South Florida (0-14 in Big East) — has been eliminated from the conference tournament next week at Madison Square Garden. Before last night, seven teams were within two games of one another in the standings.

But, perhaps, this is the best way to articulate the degree of difficulty in the Big East this season: Pitt, a top-10 team in the national polls and the Ratings Percentage Index, in all likelihood will be seeded sixth in the conference tournament and will be forced to play a first-round game to qualify for the quarterfinal round.

“You don’t have to go to Harvard to figure out that the Big East is the best league in the country,” ESPN basketball analyst Dick Vitale said yesterday. “You don’t have to be a genius. A dummy like me can figure that out. When I look at my coach of the year candidates, Jamie Dixon is in my top five. Jamie has done a fantastic job. He has lost some heartbreakers on the road, but that’s because winning on the road in the Big East is so difficult. They’ve been able to win at home. And that’s the key when you play in a tough league. You better win your home games.”

Pitt did have a very tough conference road schedule, especially when contrasted with its home set. The key now is to beat Seton Hall, (who beat Cinci last night, and are on the NCAA bubble) and preserve the perfect home record on Friday night.

This is probably the best piece on the end-of-the-game decisionmaking by Krauser.

After the game, Krauser, usually a boisterous and upbeat person, was visibly shaken. He said as the leader of this team – one of only two seniors on the roster – he needs to take those late-game shots. It’s his responsibility to win close games, to throw the rest of the team on his tattooed shoulders and carry the Panthers to victory.

So, even though he was hounded by J.D. Collins and other West Virginia guards, Krauser continued to take shots. He had a poor 4-3 assist-to-turnover ratio. He admitted to bad decisions and bad play.

“I’ll take the blame,” Krauser said. “It’s my fault.”

Dixon wasn’t pleased with the insinuation that Krauser shouldn’t have been able to control the final moments of the game. For that, he’s correct.

But Krauser is not the team’s point guard anymore. And though he’s improved as a shooter, Ramon is the team’s strongest outside threat.

The Panthers are 3-5 in games decided by five points or less. That’s not a record indicative of a clutch team.

Does that mean Krauser should be on the bench in the waning moments of a close game? That’s lunacy. But he must perform better when he’s out there.

That’s not to say Krauser should give up the reigns in those situations. In the NCAA Tournament, teams need that one go-to player. Krauser is that for Pitt. He’s proven he can be.

At the very least, however, he could give up the basketball a few times. That’s especially true when he isn’t playing well on a given night.

Knowing when someone else is a better option is being the ultimate leader. Krauser needs to recognize this.

I think Krauser made bad decisions at the end of the game. He let his emotions, personal frustrations and desire to make things right, overrule the best thing for the team. This game, of course, was magnified for the significance and being a rivalry game.

His teammates seem to be rallying to his defense a bit.

“Maybe it was a lack of our defense. They got a lot of wide-open looks and they missed a lot of wide-open looks, too,” said Pitt center Aaron Gray, who is averaging a double-double but was limited by the Mountaineers to seven points and seven rebounds.

Senior guard Carl Krauser, Pitt’s leading scorer, struggled and finished with 10 points, including four in the final 22 seconds. He shot 3 for 16 from the field and conceded afterwards that he forced a number of shots out of frustration.

“Carl’s a great player. I mean, he comes out here and gives us his all. He just wants to win every single time,” said sophomore guard Ronald Ramon, who tied with freshman forward Sam Young as Pitt’s high scorer with 12 points.

Young shot 6 for 6 from the field, including several impressive dunks that helped Pitt stay close.

“They left a lot of opportunities for me to take advantage of, because they were so worried about Carl and Aaron,” Young said.

Krauser, however, couldn’t get on tracked, and the 7-foot Gray was unable to overcome double- and triple-teams by the Mountaineers, who got 26 points from senior Kevin Pittsnogle.

In the previous meeting, Pittsnogle, West Virginia’s leading scorer, was held without a point, a performance that much resembled Krauser’s effort on Monday.

“He’s a senior, and he just feels he has to help the team in any way he can,” Young said of Krauser. “I just trust that he’ll make the best decisions.”

I am a little concerned about the reception he gets on Senior Night at the Pete. Krauser has been one of the best players in Pitt history, a team leader, will graduate, is involved in his community and a responsible father. He is a great representative of the student-athlete at Pitt.

Hopefully, people will be able to give him the love for his full career, not the previous game.

Why can’t this topic just stay comatose for a few more months?

A Smizik column calling for Pitt to stop playing Penn State in any sport. Ostensibly because WVU is now Pitt’s biggest rival.

Pitt-West Virginia is so much more. The rivalry, always intense, has been heightened in recent years by two factors. For one, the conference rivalry has escalated the importance of the games. In football and basketball, Pitt and West Virginia repeatedly have played crucial games the past several years. For another, the absence of Penn State has put more significance on the football game. If Pitt were still playing Penn State, it possibly might diminish, the Big East games.

There aren’t many examples of non-conference rivalry games in football, but somehow I don’t think the Clemson-South Carolina or Florida-Florida St. annual match-ups have diminished from the conference battles. It seems that Florida-Georgia still carries some weight. As does Florida St.-Miami.

Somehow, in basketball, I think things still matter in their conferences for Louisville and Kentucky after they play each other. How about Cinci-Xavier? The Big 5 in Philly?

Smizik’s conclusion of hope is so false — and he knows it.

If Joe Paterno wants to hold a grudge, and that’s what this is about, let him. But let him hold it with no leverage. Pitt doesn’t need to be waiting for Paterno to get over the fact it rejected his plan for an Eastern all-sports conference in the early 1980s and instead joined the Big East, which then was only a basketball league.

Maybe if Paterno realizes no one cares about his grudge, he’ll get over it.

Paterno will never get over the grudge. The football rivalry is dead until he is. That doesn’t mean you have the Athletic Directors cut everything else off. How does that really make a difference, other than to further distance the schools and connections and animosity?

I’ve written this before. I want to see Pitt and Penn State play in every sport (especially basketball) at this point. Because each time they meet, it is also a reminder to their fans about what they are missing in football. Even basketball is a pale reflection to what the feelings were when the football teams played. Meeting in other sports just drives it home.

They want PSU to beat Pitt in everything, just as we want Pitt to beat PSU. With them playing each other, it keeps the ADs talking and working together. A relationship that will matter more after Joe Paterno.