From the Ray Fittipaldo B-Ball Q&A today.
Q: I am concerned that Pitt is not beating teams badly enough. Sure, there have been plenty of comfortable 15- and 20-point victories, but where are the full-fledged blowouts? Florida beat Southern by 56 points and North Florida by 46 points. North Carolina won a game by 46 points. Ohio State has a number of 30-point victories this season. Shouldn’t Pitt be dominating lesser competition in the same fashion? Maybe I am just being crazy. Please put my mind at ease and tell me this isn’t something to worry about.FITTIPALDO: Some of its has to do with the caliber of competition Pitt is playing and some of it has to do with the fact that Pitt, by its nature, tends to play in a lot of low-scoring, close games. You mentioned Florida beating Southern by 46 points. Well, Southern is 0-9 and is ranked No. 302 in the RPI. Pitt’s non-conference games have been against tougher competition. Let’s say Delaware State is Pitt’s worst non-conference opponent. Delaware State is 1-8 but its RPI is No. 117. That’s a huge difference, and it shows the difference between scheduling for Florida and Pitt this season.
But I’m not going to put your mind at east completely, Jason. Pitt does play a lot of teams closer then it should, and one of these times it’s going to come back to bite the Panthers. I’ll put it this way: If Pitt plays the way it did against Buffalo, the Panthers will lose by double digits to Wisconsin and Oklahoma State.
Records matter at this point, RPI not so much. The sample sizes are too small and one game creates a wild fluctuation. We’ve seen in the past how games that look like big wins early become meaningless later if that team is a disappointment. What is a big difference in why Pitt doesn’t blow out teams is that Pitt is playing one of the slowest tempos in all of basketball. While many teams are playing at a faster pace, Pitt isn’t.
Taking a look at Ken Pomeroy’s stat page, Pitt’s adjusted tempo is for 63.0 possessions/game. 313th slowest. By comparison, North Carolina is averaging 74.5 poss/game (21st). Both teams are playing teams are very efficient in their offenses, but if you are getting more opportunities and converting them, you will score a lot more and make the wins look that much bigger.
