God-damn that Jim Calhoun. How dare he? Actually making clear that UConn needs this game.

“It’s not a critical game for us,” said UConn coach Jim Calhoun, downplaying the importance only slightly. “It’s an incredibly important game for us, as every single game is.”

…

“We have some good players back. They have some good players back,” Calhoun said. “But they’ve been able to avoid a couple of the losses that we haven’t been able to avoid.”

Okay, so that seems a little downplayed. The key is in what he said to his players and how they are talking.

“For us, it’s a must win,” point guard Kemba Walker said. “We need a win for right now. Pittsburgh is playing well right now. They’re 3-0, so it’s going to be a very important game for us.”

UConn, on the other hand, is 2-2 in the conference. More disturbing for them is that they are 0-3 against teams that were ranked when playing the Huskies. That’s part of why they need this game.

“We’ve played great the first or second half [against ranked teams] but we just haven’t put two halves together,” Jerome Dyson said. “Sometimes we get caught up in running up and down the floor too much. When we had the lead [at Georgetown], we really didn’t run offense late in the game. We made it easy for them to come back because we missed some shots and they made shots.”

Admittedly blowing big leads on the road or at home seem to have been a common thing in the Big East over the weekend. Notre Dame nearly blew a 20+ point home lead on WVU before hanging on for 2-point win. The obvious UConn blowing things at Georgetown. Then there was Villanova coming back from 17 down on the road to beat Louisville on Big Monday.

I will admit, though, I would feel better about Pitt’s chances if the Huskies had held on to the win at G-town. Now it’s about bouncing back at home and knowing they can’t let up after the way they blew the game.

“Any time you lose a game, something happens to you, and you’re never really sure until you play again,” Calhoun said Tuesday. “Every time you win a game, something happens to you, and you’re never sure if you think it’s going to be easy now. … It doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to win the next game because you’ve won. And it doesn’t automatically mean you’ve lost your confidence if you lose a game.”

Sorry, I have trouble believing that loss broke the spirit of UConn — and I just don’t think Calhoun would let it happen.

It freaked them out a bit. Calhoun was completely out of sorts after the loss.

Then, before walking away from the podium, he mentioned that Wednesday’s home game against Cincinnati now takes on added importance.

That might have been a good indication that this disheartening loss to the Hoyas could be difficult for UConn to immediately move beyond. The Huskies actually face Pittsburgh Wednesday, not Cincinnati.

…

Calhoun? Well, he’s never at a loss for words, and he spoke in great detail during his press conference. He wasn’t the ball of fire you might expect. His temper was in check. He didn’t have overly sharp criticism for a particular player. Part of that is probably because there is more than half a season remaining and one loss, no matter the type, doesn’t define a season.

Calhoun gave the team Sunday off — not always the case after a loss.

“It’s the most heartbreaking loss this year,” Calhoun said. “It’s not even close.”

Calhoun doesn’t think the practices have told him much about how his team will respond to the loss.

On the opposite side, Coach Dixon has had to contend with the long layoff — before Pitt plays 3 games in a week’s time — so practice has some meaning even as they battle history.

One of the highlights of the week was Saturday’s live scrimmage, which featured a pair of 12-minute halves with game officials. Guard Travon Woodall hit a 30-footer at the buzzer to give his team a one-point win.

“It was good,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said. “It was lively. It was productive. It was good for them, and we played well. I feel pretty good where we are at.”

Pitt will have to make a little history to earn its third consecutive road win. All told, the Big East has scheduled Pitt to play back-to-back-to-back road games 11 times since 1985, with every trip marred by at least one loss.

This is only Pitt’s second such trip in the past nine years.

In mid-January 2006, the Panthers won at Louisville and at Rutgers to improve to 15-0 before losing at St. John’s, 55-50, as a top-10 team.

Few Big East teams are able to survive such a rugged stretch without a hiccup. Since 2004-05, only one Big East team in 17 tries — Connecticut in 2008-09 — won three successive conference road games without a home game in between.

Oh, and something else to consider. Neither team has won more than 2 straight against the other since UConn won 6 straight between 1998 and 2002. Pitt has won the last two meetings, so, *gulp*.