Not much to say abou the latest power polls. Luke Winn at SI.com has Pitt at 5th.

At ESPN.com, Pitt is still in 4th.

Meanwhile, Dante Taylor is the centerpiece forNational Christian, in a West Virginia Tournament. They couldn’t beat Oak Hill, but Taylor was impressive.

The Eagles (17-5) found inside success early, thanks to an arsenal depending largely on 6-foot-9 senior Dante Taylor. National led 8-4 early with Taylor establishing himself around the basket. He scored six of those eight, the first two on a dunk.

Taylor was obviously the focal point of National’s offense. The Pitt signee finished with game-highs of 33 points and 11 rebounds.

“He’s probably one of the five best big men in the country,” National coach Trevor Brown said. “He’s a hard worker. He’s improved a lot over the last couple of years. From day one, over four years, it’s just been a steady improvement.

“What we’re trying to do with him is let people see that he is one of the best big men in the country.”

And apparently he will be a McDonald’s All-American.

Rivals.com has listed some names that have reportedly leaked out: Kenny Boynton, Avery Bradley, Dominic Cheek, DeMarcus Cousins, Abdul Gaddy, Keith Gallon, Xavier Henry, John Henson, Wally Judge, Ryan Kelly, Tommy Mason-Griffin, Alex Oriakhi, Dexter Strickland Dante Taylor, Maalik Wayns and David & Travis Wear. In all, 22 players are expected to be invited to play in the game.

Really not unexpected, but it means I may actually watch the game this year.

Just a note in the bottom of an article on Pitt shooting 3s rather well, but damn.

Kareem Robinson, the younger brother of Pitt’s Nasir Robinson, was shot twice in the back Wednesday afternoon, but the injuries are not life-threatening. Nasir Robinson, who could not be reached for comment, was at practice yesterday and is expected to play tomorrow.

He got very lucky.

Kareem Robinson, a freshman point guard, suffered two gunshot wounds Wednesday to his lower back while walking in the William Penn Housing Development. Initially treated at Crozer-Chester Medical Center, Robinson was airlifted to Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, from where he was discharged Thursday.

Chester coach Larry Yarbray said Robinson’s injuries were the result of a random act of violence. Yarbray said a bullet remains lodged a quarter-inch from Robinson’s spine. Though non-life-threatening, the gunshot wounds will keep the 5-7 reserve from playing the remainder of the season.

Just get well.

I’m just wondering. There’s the whole Deandre Kane affair, where Pitt probably doesn’t need him. Still, because he’s a local product they keep him hanging around. Which messes with Seton Hall that really wants him — and just needs some recruits.

Then there is this.

Pittsburgh associate head coach Tom Herrion is slated to come watch Jarrid Famous tonight against TCI at the Gauchos gym.

Herrion will be in New York checking out a few high school games during the day.

Famous is a 6-foot-11 center from Westchester Community College who is leading the NJCAA in rebounding at 14 per game and ranks No. 5 in scoring at 24 points per game.

Famous is really being pursued by Seton Hall. Not even sure why Pitt is interested in him, but hey it keeps the Pirates off-balance. That’s always amusing.

[Broad generalization alert] There are points where I think we can be hard on Sam Young, just because he isn’t DeJuan Blair. He isn’t a big smiling guy. He doesn’t seem to have the same joy of playing. He can suffer by comparison.

We identify with Blair easier. We love the game and wish we could have even a portion of that athletic ability and talent. Blair makes it easy to watch. He seems to get it, and plays like a big kid who enjoys it.

Sam Young looks joyless and at times grim. There are points where he seems to be sulking. At points, he probably has.

He said Young is good when he plays within the parameters of the offense. He isn’t good when he tries to freelance and operate outside the offense. I’m paraphrasing, but that was the gist of what Fields said.

Fields wasn’t exactly calling Young out for being selfish, but he was brutally honest in answering the question. It’s interesting because Fields is Young’s closest friend on the team. Young is a loner for the most part, but he and Fields have a good relationship. For Fields to come out and say what he said he had to feel like Young’s recent play was undermining the team’s play to an extent.

I’m sure some of Young’s demeanor is personal dissatisfaction with his play, but he is a senior and should be more careful in how he carries himself. If we’re noticing a difference, I’m sure the younger players who look up to him notice as well.

It would be nice if he would do a better job of covering up his true feelings, but again, this has been the way Sam Young has been his entire career. When he’s been frustrated by the way he’s playing,  injury or lack of playing time, his body language hasn’t exactly hidden his feelings. He doesn’t talk a lot, but he doesn’t exactly hide how he’s feeling either.

The one thing that can’t be forgotten is that Young wants to win. He may not be acting in the way we want, but part of why he is still at Pitt is he wants what we want.

“We’ve made some history and we’re continuing to make some history,” Young said. “And I think we’ll continue to make history down the stretch.”

Most of all, Young wants to make it in March, when Pitt has repeatedly failed despite being a Top 25 fixture for eight seasons. The Panthers, second-round losers to Michigan State last season, haven’t advanced past the round of 16 since 1974 or made the Final Four in 68 years.

While Pitt running back LeSean McCoy turned pro last month after two excellent seasons, Young will play his entire college career.

“It’s a chance for us to do things Pitt has not done in the past,” said Young, who considers a No. 1 seeding to be the first step toward a deep NCAA run. “Having the No. 1 seed, I think, would put us into the NCAA tournament with a big confidence boost. I think it’s very important for us to get that.”

Young has been in a funk — except when playing WVU. At least he’s in it now, and there is plenty of time to come out of it before March.

In both losses, Pitt had limited availability from Blair. That created the meme that Pitt can’t win without him on the court. Incorrect. Pitt can’t beat the best teams in the conference without him. Just like they couldn’t without Fields or Young on the court. UConn would struggle without Thabeet, Adrien or especially Price not playing. Villanova without Cunningham or Reynolds. Marquette without their guards and Hayward. Louisville without Terrance Williams, Samardo Samuels or Edgar Sosa.

Note, it isn’t whether they are playing well or not. It is whether they are playing. If those players aren’t on the court for big minutes, then teams can key in on just a couple other players. Always watch for the creeping  jump that goes from not having your best players on the court to not having your best players play well.

We have been frustrated lately by Sam Young’s slumping play. The fact is, he needs to be out there. Having him out there, means that Young still needs to be accounted for by opposing teams. He helps open up the court for the rest of the team. Just like not having Blair out there, means teams can play further from the basket on defense and have more opportunities for rebounds. Even if the star players aren’t playing well, their presence matters.

Coach Dixon won’t let the team use the lack of Blair’s presense as an excuse.

“We’ve played without him before and we’ve won,” coach Jamie Dixon said.

That isn’t to say that Pitt wants to experiment playing without him.

That shows how much of an impact Blair can have for the Panthers when he’s in the game. And how much it hurts when he’s not.

“I think they can get through it, but having him is a big difference,” Bilas said. “Their efficiency is nowhere near the same when he’s out of the game. He’s the best offensive rebounder in the country, so you’re automatically going to get second shots. Plus, when he sets screens, they’re screened. He opens the floor for everybody else. You have to pay attention to him.

“I think their defensive lineup is a (heck) of a lot better with him in it.”

It’s obviously helpful that Pitt has gotten a lot of production from the bench — even if not a lot at Blair’s spot.

Gibbs is the top 3-point shooter in the conference, having made 26 of his 52 attempts (50 percent) from behind the 3-point arc. He is averaging 4.8 points overall.

Brown, who was supposed to be the top reserve, has been a steady, if unspectacular, contributor. He is averaging 5.4 points and 3.4 rebounds per game.

But the player who is emerging as the top sixth man in the league is Wanamaker, who has been playing the best basketball of his short career in recent weeks. Wanamaker, who is averaging 7.9 points per game in Big East play (6.0 overall), has made 19 of his past 30 shots from the field and 9 of his past 15 3-point attempts. He is second only to Gibbs in 3-point shooting (46.3 percent) on the team.

“My confidence is sky high right now,” Wanamaker said. “When I see the ball going in the way it is now, that just makes me want to get to the gym every day and work harder.”

The strong play of the back-up guards has allowed Coach Dixon to go smaller at times and change the tempo. Even if Dixon isn’t completely comfortable with the pace.

More or less just past the halfway portion of the conference slate of basketball. It’s time for the latest liveblog and roundtable of Big East bloggers.

Brian Harrison at Orange 44 will be the host once more.

In addition to yours truly, here’s the line-up of participants.

Sean of Troy Nunes is an Absolute Magician;
Brian of Orange 44;
John of Mountainlair;
Dave of FriarBlog ; and
Kevin of TheUConnBlog

The fun starts around 9pm. Stop by and join the fun.

I know. Bad pun. It’s the fact. The crew was hideous. Jay Bilas had the quote of the game, “My ears hurt from all the whistles being blown.”

It was the story on both ends of I-79. Columnists weighed in with the poor officiating often by couching it in how unfair it was for the fans.

But the guy who’s going to have the toughest tape review today is Big East director of officiating Art Hyland. His officials — Karl Hess, Curtis Shaw and Joe Lindsay — had a rotten night. Sure, it’s hard to call a Big East game — any Big East game — because the players are so big, so fast, so strong and so physical. But this was ridiculous. When four of the five best players in the game — Blair and Fields of Pitt and Butler and Alex Ruoff of West Virginia — each have two fouls little more than eight minutes into the game and are on the bench, the fans are the losers.

I still love the comment from Jermaine Dixon, though these refs may not be so nice the next time they see him.

It’s no wonder that Pitt’s Jermaine Dixon, when asked if he and Ruoff were doing a little trash talking in the second half, shook his head and said, “Nah, we were talking about the refs. I’m not going to tell you what we said.”

I think the implication is understood. It was especially frustrating for the WVU side as this little anecdote reveals.

At one point WVU Coach Bob Huggins got upset when backup point guard Will Thomas, who had just entered the game, was called for walking.

Huggins reached the boiling point right there and was going to yank Thomas. He walked from one end of the bench to the other, looking for a replacement. Reaching the far end, he realized he had no one to go in for Thomas, threw his hands into the air in exasperation and walked back to his spot at the other end of the bench.

At another point he yelled out at Hess. Now this a paraphrase, but what the gist of what he said was “It’s all right, Karl, my fault. I really didn’t want my two top scorers on the floor anyway.”

Wouldn’t you just love to know the actual quote? I would.

There was no way not to acknowledge the impact of the refs on the game. To give some credit to the WVU players who talked, they still said the right things.

“You’ve got to play a perfect game to beat them here,” WVU freshman point guard Truck Bryant said. “We weren’t even close to that.”

Alex Ruoff fouled out for just the fourth time in 116 career games. The Mountaineers’ second-leading scorer was joined by the top scorer, Da’Sean Butler, who scored four points and missed 10 of 12 shots.

It was his third game in single digits this season and the fewest points he’d scored since getting just two free throws against Marquette as a freshman … 81 games ago.

“I consider myself a smart player as a senior and I realize I can’t let frustrations carry over to the next play,” said Ruoff, who fouled out with 7:27 remaining and his team down by 13 points. “(Monday) it was tough with every little touch foul, especially with two Big East teams who play physical.

“We did a bad job — myself and other guys — adjusting to the refs and the way they call the game. You can never blame the refs. You’ve got to adjust and we didn’t do that at all.”

Of course, part of the problem was that there was little consistency to the refs. They called a lot of stuff, but it was never clear what or when at times.

“I don’t care how they call the game. I really don’t,” West Virginia coach Bob Huggins said. “As long as they call it the same. I don’t care if they call it tight or loose or whatever, as long as they call it consistently throughout the game.”

Huggins didn’t say it and didn’t even approach saying it, but the inference was unmistakable: that the game was not called the same from start to finish, and that’s why players from both teams got into so much foul trouble. From one possession to the next, what constituted a foul seemed to change.

The difference in how Pitt was able to adjust better was with the point guard play. Levance Fields got back on the court with the foul trouble for a reason.

Fields was whistled for his second foul with 12:53 to play in the first half. But freshman Ashton Gibbs played well off the bench and then Dixon put back in Fields with 5:52 left in the first half. With Fields on the floor, Pitt took a 29-24 lead into the locker room. Dixon’s decision to reinsert Fields went against his conventional wisdom. The sixth-year coach almost never plays anyone in the first half with two fouls.

“I just had a feeling and it worked out,”

It was more than a “feeling,” despite Coach Dixon downplaying it. It was a calculated risk that was needed. Fields can still stretch in the first half. He’s a senior and he was trusted not to make the silly foul on either end. Pitt just could not work the ball inside. Sure they could attack the rim and drive, but they lacked someone who could make the passes to hit guys cutting to the basket or that were around the basket. That was needed.

This game left Da’Shawn Butler a wreck.

For most of this year, Butler has been the most dependable of the West Virginia Mountaineers, a go-to guy for a basket and a go-to guy for a quote, but now in the shadow of a 70-59 defeat to those hated Panthers from up Pittsburgh way, there really wasn’t anything to say.

Butler, instead, sat in the locker room, tears running down his cheeks.

This junior out of New Jersey who had just recently scored 20 points in six consecutive games, had what was unquestionably the worst evening of his Mountaineer career.

In foul trouble throughout, Butler scored but four points. Only once, as a freshman, he scored fewer points, getting two that night.

And never in 97 games at West Virginia, had Butler gone without a single rebound.

For Pitt, this game was a big win because it was another win where the team was able to do it without Blair. Not just that, but once the Pitt players grasped that he wasn’t going to be in too much, they got much better on the boards.

With Blair relegated to 16 minutes, eight points and nine rebounds, the Panthers (22-2, 9-2 Big East) still produced a 39-23 rebound advantage against a West Virginia team that ranks second in the conference in offensive rebounding and fourth in rebound margin.

“We can’t get outrebounded by 16. We just can’t do it and expect to win,” West Virginia coach Bob Huggins said. “Every possession for us is so important because we can’t score enough points in the paint.”

What also makes that number impressive is that Pitt solidly beat them on offensive rebounds. Considering the ‘Eers shot just 40.4% to Pitt’s 48.1% there were a lot more opportunities for them, but Pitt did the better job on both ends.

From a greedy stat perspective, that was the only reason I kind of wished Pitt didn’t go full scrubs in the final couple of minutes. It allowed WVU to make their last two shots, which got them just over 40% (21-52). Otherwise, they would have been held to below 40% shooting which is always a good thing to see.

The defense responding last night was excellent. Especially when the offense continued to click — albeit just in the second half.

Pitt got back to its defensive roots last night and shut down West Virginia, 70-59, at the Petersen Events Center. The No. 4 Panthers (22-2, 9-2 Big East) swept the season series from the Mountaineers (16-8, 5-6) for the second time in the past three seasons and have now won six of the past seven in this rivalry.

“This is something more like an old Pitt game,” senior point guard Levance Fields said. “We still have to work on it. They still shot 40 percent. Our [goal] is to be below 40 percent. We still have to get a couple of percents down to be where we need to be.”

In the second half, Pitt shot 61.5% (16-26). That was outstanding.

The other cynical good news for Pitt on Blair’s bad night, there were 20 NBA scouts there. Blair only had limited time to impress. It had to help Sam Young. He finished with 20 points on 7-12 shooting (plus 6-7 on FTs), 7 rebounds and 3 blocks. He’s been struggling with his shot lately and it has affected his focus, but really does well against the Hoopies.

It helped to have Fields pushing him.

Fields reminded Young of the latitude of the moment, how he needed to bear the burden defensively and on the glass. Most importantly, Fields told Young to trust the system.

“When he gets himself in trouble is when he’s taking bad shots,” Fields said. “Sometimes, he gets away from that. He’s better when he stays within himself.

“He’s a guy who can make tough shots, but within the offense he plays much better. Sometimes, he’s playing kind of by himself, away from the offense, deviating from the offense.”

Finally. I know it’s easy to hate Huggins. I happen to appreciate the honest villain. Plus, he doesn’t care half the time about being nice in what he says.

Huggins made an appeal to fill the Coliseum Friday night. He particularly challenged the students.

“All of this stuff about us having the best crowd–no we don’t,” Huggins said. “You have the best crowd when you show up all the time. If that offends someone then so be it. They show up when they want to show up.”

“We need them. We are fighting like crazy to get into the NCAA tournament. We’ve completely filled up the student section once every two years. It would be great to get those all of those students in there because we need help.”

“Everybody talks about that ‘sixth man.’ You don’t want your sixth man to show up every two years. You want your sixth man to show up every game.”

Now, be fair. They fill up once a year, now that Pitt and WVU have the annual home-and-home.

Okay late decision, but I’m doing the liveblog.

Join the fun, here.

Levance Fields will leave Pitt as yet another in a string of three straight excellent point guards. Perhaps the best of the three. He won’t catch Brandin Knight (785) or Sean Miller (744) in career assists, but then both were four-year starters. He will likely pass Jerry McCullough (552) tonight and will also pass Carl Krauser (568). He sits at 546 at the moment, so he also has a good chance to catch Darrelle Porter (617), especially with some deep runs in the Big East Tourney and the NCAA, to finish in the third spot.

He’s simply one of the best point guards in the country right now.

Fields, barraged with early season questions about his health, is, statistically at least, the best in the nation at a point guard’s primary duties — setting up baskets and taking care of the ball.

Fields owns an NCAA-leading assist-to-turnover ratio of 4.0-to-1 and is coming off a startling three-game stretch in which he had 36 assists and only three turnovers.

The senior point guard will be directing the Pitt offense again at 7 tonight when the No. 6 Panthers (21-2, 8-2) play rival West Virginia (5-5, 16-7) for the second time in two weeks — this time at Petersen Events Center in a nationally televised game.

“I think he’s just getting better,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said. “We pointed to January and February for a guy that’s been out for 11 months. He’s getting a better feel for it. He’s getting more confidence. He’s finishing drives more.”

Fields was named one of 17 finalists for the Bob Cousy Award as the nation’s best point guard Thursday, and he certainly earned some Internet votes when he matched a 33-year-old single-game Pitt record with 16 assists in a 92-69 victory at DePaul on Saturday afternoon. He had one turnover in 31 minutes.

DePaul coach Jerry Wainwright called Fields the Big East’s “consummate leader.”

“I’m sure he’s one of those guys that, in the locker room and anywhere else, all he talks about is winning,” Wainwright said. “That’s what makes them a good team.”

Speaking of the Cousy award, the link to vote is right here.

The freshman guard who has grown more comfortable in the offense is Ashton Gibbs. He knows his role is primarily to stretch the defense with the 3-ball, and he is fine with that.

“I like it,” Gibbs said of his new role. “Levance is a pass-first point guard. Any shooter would love to play with a pass-first point guard who is always going to look for you as a shooter.”

Gibbs showed off his 3-point touch against the Colonials. In a 31/2-minute stretch in the first half when the score was still close, he made all three of his 3-pointers during a 16-7 Pitt run that boosted the lead from 10 to 19 points.

Dixon had been slow to play Gibbs early in the season because Gibbs was lagging defensively and had not been demonstrating great shooting accuracy in practice. But those two aspects have changed, and Gibbs is earning more time in the rotation.

“Ashton is shooting the ball well,” Dixon said. “He obviously can shoot the ball. He’s given us some versatility. We can play smaller at times. And we’ve seen some zones.”

Gibbs is the type of player who can come in handy when teams attempt to slow the Panthers down by playing zone. With the top 3-point shooting percentage in the Big East, he can make teams go back to man-to-man quickly with his accurate outside shooting.

Gibbs is shooting 50% (25-50) on threes this season. Most important is he’s been consistent. He’s 15-30 in the non-con and 10-20 in Big East games. His defense still needs plenty of work, but that is not surprising.

CJ noted this story on FoxSports from last week.

The Jets hired Kerry Locklin as their new defensive line coach, and they hired Matt Cavanaugh as their quarterbacks coach. The Jets also said they’re retaining Mike Devlin as an assistant offensive line/tight ends coach, and they hired John DeFilippo as Cavanaugh’s assistant with the quarterbacks.

In an ironic twist, DeFilippo is the son of Boston College athletic director Gene DeFilippo, who fired Eagles’ head coach Jeff Jagodzinski for interviewing for the Jets’ head-coaching job last month.

Once again, though, there is no official word. The Jets press release only mentioned the hiring of Locklin and keeping another coach.

It is just very odd. I guess the one thing is that the time between the departure whenever it becomes official and the hiring of a new OC will be a much smaller gap. There’s been plenty of time to figure it out.

Call it a hunch, but ESPN might break slightly from the reserved manner of hype that they usually engage and show Ronald Ramon burying that 3 to beat the Hoopies last year at the Pete. A year and 1 days later (leap year), that does not get old — at least not for me.

Fast-forward 367 days. West Virginia (16-7, 5-5 Big East) returns to Pittsburgh today for a 7 p.m., ESPN Big Monday game against No. 6 Pitt (21-2, 8-2). Conventional wisdom says the Mountaineers don’t have a chance. But that’s to forget what happened for 39 minutes and 59.9 seconds a year ago.

“We know we can play there,” WVU guard Alex Ruoff said. “We did it last year.”

The cast of characters has changed on both sides, more so from a West Virginia angle. Gone are Joe Alexander and Darris Nichols and even injured Joe Mazzulla, whose 15 points that night remain a career high. Ramon is gone, too, although the trade-off for the Panthers is pretty good: Levance Fields was injured and didn’t play.

This part is eerily similar, too: After struggling last year and losing back-to-back games against Georgetown and Cincinnati, just before that game with Pitt the Mountaineers had won an important confidence-builder against Providence. This year, after losing three of four, West Virginia routed the Friars on Saturday at the Coliseum, winning 86-59.

The Mountaineers are not feeling particularly cocky about themselves for this game.

The Mountaineers are 0-3 in their last three visits to the Petersen Events Center, last winning there in 2005. Last season, West Virginia held a 54-52 lead with just eight seconds remaining before Pitt guard Ronald Ramon drained a game winning three as time expired.

The Panthers come into the game on a three game winning streak, scoring 90-plus points in each game and winning by an average of nearly 19 points. Pitt’s 79 points scored against the Mountaineers earlier this season are the most West Virginia has allowed all year. In that game, West Virginia shot only 41 percent, falling away in the second half to eventually lose by 12.

“They’re a top four team and we’ve almost got to play a perfect game to win,” said Mountaineer point guard Truck Bryant. “We’ve just got to be mentally focused and come in ready to play.”

The one difference for WVU since the last game is that Alex Ruoff has been hitting shots lately.

West Virginia (16-7) evened its conference record at 5-5 with Saturday’s triumph. Leading the way was senior Alex Ruoff with a game-high 24 points, including 6-for-7 from three-point range. His overall 8-for-11 goaling suggests that he has snapped out of his recent shooting slump.

Huggins said, “Alex coming in and hitting (three-pointers) had as much to do with us playing well as anything. Now, all of a sudden, teams have to chase him and they have to chase Da’Sean (Butler), and that opens up things for other guys.”

The other change is that Joe Mazzula is out for the year. While the PG didn’t play in the last game, he was still in a game-to-game situation. That meant the players did not know if he would be there. He’s now done, so there is no question that Truck Bryant is the point guard. Having some certainty always helps in preparation.

Of course with Ruoff shooting better and Pitt knowing that Da’Sean Butler is just a damn good player, Pitt needs to pick it up a bit on defense.

“We’re excited about the way we’re playing on offense, but the first thing coach does is come into the locker room and talk about our defense,” senior point guard Levance Fields said. “Unfortunately, we haven’t been able to get it done. I think we want to do it, but we’re just having a lot of slippage. Even when we get a stop, we give up second chances. We have to keep making [teams] hit the contested shots and don’t get away from that.”

DePaul was the fourth consecutive opponent to shoot 44 percent or better from the field. In the game before DePaul, Robert Morris of the Northeast Conference shot 57 percent.

…

Dixon might not feel comfortable with the way the Panthers are evolving, but they appear to have a different dimension from the teams that bowed out of the tournament with a whimper. This team is averaging 77.8 points per game in Big East games, and that instant offense quality is something that other Pitt teams of the recent past did not possess.

“We’re a good offensive team,” said sophomore center DeJuan Blair, who scored a career-high 32 points against DePaul and has been at the center of the offensive onslaught the past three games. “We’re a running team. We’re showing you guys that we can run. We can run with the best of them. A lot of people say we’re not a running team, but now we’re showing a lot of people.”

This is the challenge for any team when the talent level rises.  Offense is always considered more fun, and garners more attention. Defense is not. It is something that has to be done. It requires more concentration and a lot more communication.

Right now, Pitt players seem to be struggling with that. They set up okay, but don’t seem to be as aggressive. I wonder if some of that is with DeJuan Blair inside. He seems to be trying to avoid too much contact inside on defense — worrying too much about picking up fouls. We all know his importance to the team’s chances in any game, but he can’t be as timid on defense.

Still, with the way Pitt has been playing, there isn’t that much confidence down I-79.

If you are going to defeat Pitt — especially in the house of horrors that is the Petersen Athletic Center — you better go in with a full glass of testosterone and with your elbows sharpened. You don’t go through any back doors with the Panthers. If you’re going to beat them, you have to do it by beating down the front door.

And to make matters worse, the Panthers seem to just be coming together.

They have reached a point in their season where they aren’t just beating people, they are beating up people.

Pitt has scored 90 or more points in each of its last three games, last accomplished more than three years before Bill Clinton became President of the United States, scoring 105, 96 and 98 against Marshall, West Virginia and Robert Morris.

With a Bob Huggins team, this might be the thing to help Pitt get some intensity back on defense. The ‘Eers do want this game.

“It would mean the world to me,” senior guard Alex Ruoff admitted. “This may sound bad, but I really don’t like this rivalry.”

It’s mutual.

Everyone does realize that Matt Cavanaugh still hasn’t departed for the Jets as QB coach, right? Sorry, have to remind myself as well, there is still no official or even unofficial word. It has been a whispered immenint departure since last week and still no comments.

That means it is still speculation and some dreaming.

Q: Here is the perfect opportunity for Dave Wannstedt to go out and get a REAL “college coordinator,” someone with vision and an aerial attack. I’m thinking colleges like Boise State, TCU, Tulsa, Houston. Thoughts?

Zeise: This is a question I’ll answer very simply with another question — in four years of observing Wannstedt, have we seen anything — anything at all — which would make you believe that there is any chance at all of a spread, read-option, option, five-wide guy being hired by him? He even said it the other day: The Panthers will run a pro-style offense, period. So while fans are getting all giddy because their favorite whipping boy Cavanaugh is leaving, I’m thinking I am not going to go too far out on a limb when I say whoever gets hired will be very similar in philosophy to Cavanaugh. Now, the play-calling might change a little, but I just don’t see it changing dramatically.

I’m not expecting that. I am expecting a little creativity and just possibly using both tight ends at the same time on some plays.

As the names continue to percolate, the OC of the Chicago Bears rises.

One name that has surfaced is Chicago Bears offensive coordinator Ron Turner, who preceded Cavanaugh as Wannstedt’s offensive coordinator with the Bears from 1993-96. Turner, like Harris, played at Pacific and was head coach at Illinois from 1997-2004 before returning to the Bears in ’05.

Turner is the brother of San Diego Chargers coach Norv Turner, who coached alongside Wannstedt with the Dallas Cowboys. Turner is also the uncle of Pitt graduate assistant Scott Turner, who is Norv’s son.

It is not a prospect that has Bears fans living in fear.

This certainly only counts as rumor and speculation at this point, but Turner has to be feeling the wind blowing in his direction as the Bears OC.  If he was offered the job, maybe he’d consider it his escape hatch.

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but “Bring it home, Wanny!”

Yeah, that’s not promising. But Turner’s agent is not considering an escape hatch when the money is not right.

“Ron hasn’t called or anything or talked about anything like that,” [Frank] Bauer said. “It’s untrue. There’s no way unless Pitt wants to pay him a fortune. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see where that is going to go.”

Yeah, I’m filing this one in the “Wannstedt connection-speculation” file.

When you score 1/3 or more of your team’s points it is significant. In college when it happens, and the team scored 90+ it is very significant. Make it a double-double and, well, that is just a little scary. It also makes for the easy choice on story lines. Blair, Blair, Blair.

There he was, DeJuan Blair, just like his days at Schenley High School, playing handball with himself off the backboard glass.

Two times Saturday, Blair pulled down multiple offensive rebounds — off his own misses — while surrounded by DePaul players in a cruel version of keepaway.

Then, in scenes reminiscent of a City League blowout, he softly banked in a layup over his swatting, waving foes.

“I did that in high school,” Blair said, “but I didn’t think I could do it in college. That’s something cool for me, padding my stats.”

Blair, a sophomore center, finished with a career-high 32 points, and added 14 rebounds in No. 6 Pitt’s 92-69 victory over last-place DePaul at AllState Arena.

It’s been a strong week for Blair.

“If DeJuan is playing like this, we’re going to be tough to beat,” Fields said.

The book on the Panthers is that they are susceptible when Blair is in foul trouble. The flip side of that, of course, is that they are literally unbeatable when he is not. Pitt has two losses this season, and both happened when Blair spent large portions of the game on the bench because of fouls.

Playing undeterred with only one foul on his conscience yesterday, Blair was his usual dominating presence inside. He had nine offensive rebounds and raised his NCAA-leading total to 136 offensive rebounds.

“There’s an amazing statistic from this game,” DePaul coach Jerry Wainwright said. “They missed 30 shots and they rebounded [more than] half of them. That’s an amazing statistic. [Blair] is an exceptional offensive rebounder. He reminds me of Moses Malone. He almost gets the ball to get it on the glass and then he goes after it again. He has an exceptional combination of long arms and big hands. He really doesn’t even jump that much.”

Let’s hope Blair keeps it going as he wants. I also hope he doesn’t try to do too much on Monday night.

DeJuan Blair said there will be some special guests in attendance when Pitt returns to the court to play West Virginia (15-7, 4-5) on Monday at Petersen Events Center.

“There are going to be Steelers in the building,” he said. “They are going to be in there. It’s going to be packed. It’s going to be a big night.”

It was a slow start for Pitt. It briefly gave DePaul hope.

”We knew DePaul would be hungry for a win,” he said. ”I’ve seen them in some close games, and they haven’t pulled them out. We got what we expected in a barn-burner to start.”

The Blue Demons had the flame flipped on high for 15 minutes, racing past the Panthers for baskets, forcing seven turnovers and giving 9,814 fans plenty to cheer.

But the fire was doused in the last 25 minutes, the Panthers regrouping with a 19-4 run to close the first half and set the tone for a second-half pounding that led to their 92-69 victory. The turn-around came not just because of Pitt’s burly senior duo of DeJuan Blair (career-best 32 points, 14 rebounds) and Sam Young (10 points, 10 rebounds). It also was sparked by senior point guard Levance Fields, who finished with a career-high 16 assists, 13 points and six steals.

”It starts and ends with Vance,” said Dixon, whose team moved to 21-2 and 8-2. ”That’s a huge amount of assists. He was out 11 months (with injuries), and we were looking at January/February for him to be near full strength. He’s always had a gift. … He knows when and how and delivers at the right spot.”

For all the talk of the importance of ”big men” in the Big East, ”guards run our league,” Dixon said. ”You need to have great point guards to win the league, and we’ve been fortunate to have many — and now with Vance.”

Pitt’s big three all had double-doubles in this game. Pitt’s size, strenght and depth were another factor that Coach Dixon cited for the second half romp.

“Wearing teams down is kind of what we do,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said. “We have a history of depth to finish teams off.”

DePaul doesn’t go deep, and players coming off its bench are mostly freshmen.

At this point, DePaul has lost 11 straght. They have an excellent chance of running the table in the Big East with road games at Louisville, Pitt, WVU and Georgetown. They do have a couple chances with home games with Seton Hall and St. John’s. Not much else Jerry Wainwright can do, but claim to see the positives.

The Blue Demons (8-16, 0-11) built a 6-point lead late in the first half and played with a bit of a swagger – until Pittsburgh reeled off the first half’s final 13 points in just 2:20.

“Obviously, we’re at a point in time where the positives are far more important to us than the negatives,” Wainwright said. “We’ve made really significant improvement, in all honesty.”

During DePaul’s early run, it enjoyed a mix of transition baskets for Dar Tucker (18 points) and Will Walker and set plays that featured center Mac Koshwal.

Koshwal (18 points, 5 assists) would either slash for layups or feed 7-foot-2 freshman Kene Obi (career-high 9 points) for easy shots.

“We were real excited about ourselves and having fun out there,” Tucker said.

And then they were not.

Coach Dixon, Rick Pitino, Jim Calhoun and Jay Wright would like to thank USF for that upset of Marquette. Not because it opens things wider to win the conference regular season. No, it’s a tremendous object lesson that you never assume a win. All it takes is one bad night.

I actually watched that game (my son fell asleep on my lap so I had nothing else to do). It was a horrible shooting night for Marquette. The Bulls did not do anything different. They didn’t have an incredibly great shooting night. Marquette just had a collectively bad game. Horrible shooting from the perimeter. Shockingly bad free throw shooting — even from good shooters.

So with that happening, you have to believe Pitt will come out and take care of business against DePaul. Regardless of whether they are winless in the conference and may not have Dar Tucker.

“We’re not sure,” DePaul coach Jerry Wainwright said Thursday, “if he will be available.”

DePaul (8-15, 0-10) has lost 10 in a row and 15 of its past 19 games since a 4-0 start.

The news got worse this week when Tucker, averaging a team-high 18.5 points per game, suffered a sprained left ankle when he stepped on a teammate’s foot during the afternoon shootaround before Tuesday’s game with No. 8 Marquette.

Tucker, who scored a game-high 23 points against Pitt last season in a 98-79 Panthers victory, is being replaced in the starting lineup by 6-foot-10 senior center Matija Poscic.

“We’ve been practicing as if (Tucker) is going to play,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said.

Wainwright said his team showed positive signs in the Tucker-less 76-61 loss to Marquette.

Junior guard Will Walker scored a career-high 30 points, and freshman Michael Bizoukas recorded a career-high eight assists, keeping the Blue Demons close most of the game.

Jermaine Dixon is saying the right things about this.

“We’re not going to look past anybody,” junior guard Jermaine Dixon said. “We need every victory we can get. Even though they don’t have any victories in the Big East, they’re going to come out and compete. They’re going to play hard. We know that.

“A lot of their guys go hard. They fought Marquette hard. They took them down to the wire. They made a big comeback. We know they’re going to play hard, but we’ll be ready.”

The game is on ESPN FullCourt, MSG, MASN, and FoxSports Pittsburgh.

Consider this the open thread for the game.

I don’t expect any Pitt player to take home the Wooden Award. Still, it’s nice that Pitt actually has two of the thirty remaining candidates in Sam Young and DeJuan Blair.

There are four teams that have two candidates on the midseason cutdown list: Pitt, UConn (Adrien and Thabeet), Marquette (Matthews and McNeal), UNC (Hansbrough and Lawson).

The Big East placed 1/3 of the players: Young, Blair, Adrien, Thabeet, Matthews, McNeal, Flynn (‘Cuse), Harangody (ND), Monroe (G-town), Williams (L-ville).

Levance Fields is a finalist for the Cousy Award — best point guard. There are 13 D-1 finalists.

Jonny Flynn, Dominic James (Marquette) and A.J. Price (UConn) are the other Big East PG Finalists.

Sam Young also is a finalist for the Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award. There are ten finalists. Sam Young could use some help in the fan vote. And he has more planned in his off-the court community service.

Pitt stayed at #7 in Luke Winn’s SI.com power poll. He notes Ashton Gibbs’ emergence on the perimeter and Jermaine Dixon knocking down 3s of late to make the team more complete on offense.

The ESPN.com power poll has Pitt at #4.