Football news has been less than sunshine, rainbows and unicorns this week. How about something from the basketball side?

The Pitt basketball schedule may not be out yet, but ESPN put out it’s Big Monday Schedule and it is highly Pitt-centric. There are 8 Big East Big Monday games, Pitt plays in three of them.

Jan. 17: Villanova at Connecticut, 3:30 ESPN

Jan. 17: Syracuse at Pittsburgh, 7:30 ESPN

Jan. 24: Notre Dame at Pittsburgh, 7:00 ESPN

Jan. 31: Louisville at Georgetown, 7:00 ESPN

Feb. 7: Pittsburgh at West Virginia, 7:00 ESPN

Feb. 14: West Virginia at Syracuse 7:00 ESPN

Feb. 21: Syracuse at Villanova, 7:00 ESPN

Feb. 28: Villanova at Notre Dame, 7:00 ESPN

In addition to those, before “Big Monday” officially kicks off, there will be three other Non-Big Monday, Monday games including UConn-Pitt on December 27 at 7:30. The one downside is that the Oakland Zoo will be on winter break.

Oops. Seems the full schedule for Pitt is out — big hat tip to PittScript for being on this.

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[My high speed modem died on Wednesday, which felt like losing a limb. Just got a new one set-up.]

Some very direct candor from Coach Wannstedt regarding Jason Douglas, Dan Mason and the DUI.

Also, middle linebacker Dan Mason was demoted to second team after being in the same car as running back Jason Douglas during a hit-and-run early Sunday on the South Side.

Max Gruder will start at middle linebacker and Tristan Roberts and Greg Williams will start at outside linebacker against Miami on Sept. 23.

Douglas, 19, who was driving, was charged with causing an accident resulting in serious injury, aggravated assault, DUI and underage drinking. Mason was a passenger in the car, but wasn’t charged.

Wannstedt met with Mason and his family Wednesday morning.

“This is for his good,” Wannstedt said. “He needs to prove to me that he can do the right things and be accountable off the field, in the classroom and on the football field. When he does that, he will get his job back.”

I don’t think it will be too long before Mason is back in the middle. But this is the minimum that has to happen to him.

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