It’s still a long way until November. Even going into the 2004-05 season or those teams in the 80s, I don’t think Pitt has had its fans this curious about, this ready for basketball season this early.
With all that has played out in the off-season already — good and bad — from the contract issues with Coach Dixon, the upheaval on the coaching staff, the tragedy of Maggie Dixon, actual top Div. 1 basketball talent in the area, and Aaron Gray’s decision to return for his senior year. This has been an off-season that has kept a lot of attention on the basketball program.
The return of Gray has Pitt already considered a top preseason team. In July.
“The NBA draft is over,” he said. “Every college team in the country knows what players are returning and what players have left. I’ve made my decision, and I haven’t looked back.”
Gray is one of Pitt’s four returning starters, and several players who made significant contributions are back.
Senior Levon Kendall was a staple in the lineup last season. The 6-9 forward averaged 7.0 points and 5.9 rebounds per game.
Junior guards Ronald Ramon (8.0 ppg.) and Keith Benjamin (4.6 ppg.) were in coach Jamie Dixon’s opening lineup at season’s end, though illness forced Benjamin to miss the NCAA Tournament.
Sophomore forward Sam Young (7.9 ppg.), senior guard Antonio Graves (5.0 ppg.) and sophomore guard Levance Fields (6.8 ppg.) also averaged high minutes, sometimes in starting roles.
“One of our biggest additions, Mike Cook, who sat out, has gotten a taste of how competitive the Big East is,” Gray said. “He knows exactly what is going to happen. There’s going to be no surprises. That’s a big advantage to us and something we’re going to look forward to.”
Cook, a 6-4, 230-pound forward, led East Carolina in scoring (15.0 ppg.) as a sophomore in 2004-05.
…
“Our whole mind-set, as a team, is we’ve got to get better,” Gray said. “It was a learning process for a lot of us last season. We were playing many times with three freshmen in the lineup, so we were real inexperienced. But we played the whole year knowing what things were going to be like.”
Only Gray and Graves are left from Pitt’s Sweet 16 team in 2004, and neither player made much of an impact that year.
“I played like eight minutes a game over my first two seasons,” said Gray. “Right now, we realize the potential we have, but we really haven’t done much.”
Gray is pleased the entire team is on campus and working out this summer. He said he asked every one of his teammates to make the type of commitment that he felt he was making by returning to school.
“We understand if we want to get better, there’s a lot of things we have to change,” Gray said. “We not only have to change our work ethic and how much we workout but also our mind-set.
“We can’t settle for making it to the Big East championship game and losing. We can’t settle for being the fifth-best team in the Big East during the regular season. We can’t settle for making the NCAA Tournament, or even getting into the second round or even the Sweet 16. We have to set our goals higher.
“Right now, we’re just working as hard as we can to achieve them. This season, it’s going to be special, man.”
[Emphasis added.]
I’m very high on the addition of Cook. I think it gives Pitt an option to totally change the appearance and style of their lineup to keep other teams off-balance. A line-up that could have Benjamin, Young and Cook on the court at the same time with Ramon and Fields would be one that could attack the basket from at least 3 spots and leave Ramon and Fields wide-open for outside shots as well. The ability of this team to change the entire style and tempo with only a couple substitutions intrigues me.
