The more observant reader might have read the fine print under the title of this post and said to themselves “who the hell is Pabs and what did he do with Chas?” No worries, I assure you that Chas is fine; all charges were dropped after he had a change of heart and allowed me to start posting.

Anyway, welcome to Pitt by Numbers where we will take a look at Pitt basketball through the lens of tempo-free statistical analysis. Most of my data will gathered from Ken Pomeroy’s excellent website but if you know of any other places that provide great data like kenpom.com please let me know.

Today Pitt faces off against Tennessee at the Consol Energy Center (3:15pm, ESPN) so here’s a quick and dirty preview of things to look for in Pitt’s matchup with the Vols.

Pitt’s depth will be tested – We’ve all gushed about how this is Jamie Dixon’s deepest squad yet. Today will be the bench’s biggest test as the Vols do a better job than just about anybody in the nation at getting the other team in foul trouble. Tennessee shoots and absurd .59 free throws for every field goal attempt which is the most in the nation by a comfortable margin.

Also Tennessee has always historically played more of a transition game than Pitt and will probably look to try to lure Pitt into a making this game a track meet which will test Pitt’s fitness. Jamie Dixon will have to use his bench effectively to offset Tennessee’s ability to both run and get teams in foul trouble.

Guard play can lose this game, but it won’t win it – Pitt usually plays low turnover games. The Panthers rank 39^th in taking care of the basketball and 234^th in forcing turnovers (calculated by % of possessions that end in a turnover). Tennessee is very average in both statistics ranking 196^th offensively and 141^st defensively (there are 345 teams playing D1 hoops). Neither team looks like they are in a position to exploit the other in the turnover battle.

The Vols don’t rely on their guards for a lot of offense as 57% of their possessions are run through either 6’7” Scotty Hopson or 6’8” Tobias Harris. The Vols rank 303^rd in 3-pt field goal frequency (3-pt attempts/FG attempts) which would make them poor candidates to exploit Pitt’s 206^th ranked 3-pt FG defense. 

What Tennessee does do very well is defend the perimeter as they rank 40^th in 3-pt FG defense so Ashton Gibbs could be in for a long day today. Up and down the line it doesn’t appear as if either team is well equipped to exploit the other team’s perimeter weaknesses.

Will the Panthers continue to dominate the boards? – The Panther’s rebounding statistics have been downright silly through the first ten games this year. The Panther’s have grabbed 48.5% (1^st in the nation) of all of their misses and 73.5% (20^th in the nation) of their opponents misses. This obliterates the respective national averages of 32.8% and 67.2%. Tennessee will present a tremendous challenge on the glass for Pitt. Tennessee grabs 40.7% of their available offensive rebounds and 71.6% of their available defensive rebounds.

Tennessee will bring a size advantage into this game. They rank 40^th in effective height (height of players who play significant minutes weighted against the national average height on a position by position basis). Pitt ranks 118^th at 1.6” shorter across the board than Tennessee.

Because both teams rely on dominating the boards and neither team holds a distinct exploitable advantage anywhere else on the court, it isn’t hyperbole to say that rebounding is the key to winning today’s game.

Pomeroy has Pitt winning this game 83% of the time and predicts a 75-65 Pitt win. At the end of the day I think Pitt wins because they are a slightly better shooting team and they had the distinct advantage of sleeping in their own beds last night.

That said, if the Panthers don’t play their style game then Tennessee is in a very good position to take advantage and leave Steel City with a victory. All in all it will be a very interesting strength on strength matchup that I can’t wait to watch…if for no other reason than to take my mind off Pitt football. Hail to stats and Hail to Pitt.

Big game today. Liveblog will kick in sometime around 3:15. The game’s start is not necessarily going to be on time since it follows the thrilling Rutgers-Auburn game.

As usual it is a moderated chat. Luke will start out in control of things. Let’s try and stay on the basketball side of things. Just this once. I’m stuck on DVR delay due to family obligations.

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Kentucky QB Brian Hartline apparently is a much-maligned figure. This column from a couple days ago advocates on his behalf.

21. A final verse of Hartline bashing. No sooner had the final seconds ticked off on Kentucky’s loss to Tennessee, than some UK football fans were agitating for the Cats to use their bowl trip as a training opportunity for Morgan Newton and Ryan Mossakowski rather than play fifth-year senior starter Mike Hartline.

20. Poor Hartline. Did Kentucky sit senior starter Andre Woodson for the 2007 Music City Bowl to train heir apparent Curtis Pulley? Of course not. No difference here. All Hartline did this year was have one of the best senior seasons of any UK QB (3,178 passing yards; 23 touchdowns with nine interceptions).

19. Joker Phillips’ response. “We gotta go try to win the game,” the Kentucky Coach said of UK’s appearance against Pittsburgh. “… Mike gives us the best chance.”

Hartline was also named 4th team All-SEC (A 4th team All-SEC? Really?) QB. So, given Pitt’s porous secondary and linebackers, this figured to be a major concern.

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Pretty self explanatory. Bowl challenge by confidence. Rules are on the site if you are unsure as to how it works.

You rank your picks 1-34. If your pick wins, you get those points. Whoever finishes with the most points at the end of the Bowl Season will receive a prize that Chas will announce shortly.

Click here to create your entry. The password is pittblather

I know it would seem that Oklahoma State OC Dana Holgersen is one of, if not Pitt’s top target. But when Tom Dienhart is saying it, then I just don’t see it happening. The guy tends to throw stuff out there from any and every agent that contacts him.

Holgersen for his part is claiming not to have been contacted by Pitt, but also issued a non-denial when asked if he would be interested in the job.

“I have not been contacted,” Holgorsen said.

Rumors of discussion between Holgorsen and Pitt began swirling Thursday, but the Cowboys’ first-year coordinator maintains he’s pretty happy in Stillwater.

Asked if he would be interested in the Pitt job if contacted, Holgorsen said, “I’m pretty happy where I am at.”

A report surfaced that Holgorsen was in Pittsburgh interviewing for the job on Thursday. Holgorsen denied that report Thursday night via text message saying, “I’m in Houston, have been all day.”

Holgersen made $360K last year as OK St. OC. He has a new contract that he has not yet returned. And certainly does not seem in any rush to do so.

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This may be a fruitless effort to turn to basketball and hope that somehow the comment thread at least stays on this sport. Don’t worry, there will be plenty more coaching carousel posts. Breathlessly posting every possible rumor or puff of smoke from the AD’s office is best done on Twitter.

For those able to go or watch on their computer, Pitt did what they were supposed to do against Delaware State last night. Just beat the crap out of them and give lots of minutes to everyone. Even Coach Dixon saw little reason to complain in cruising to a 70-42 win.

“This was a good all-around performance against a team we knew would be very patient and rely on penetration from their guards,” Dixon said. “We anticipated they’re going to be the best team in (the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference), and they traditionally have been the best team in their conference. We did a good job rebounding and defending, for the most part. It’s been a good stretch for us the last couple games.”

Ten players had double-digit minutes. The high was 24 minutes for Travon Woodall.

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The open lie in recruiting is that the players commit to the school not the coach. That’s what the NLI says. That’s what every program claims. Even in the face of statements from the kids who say upfront that they committed because of the coaches and/or the system they run. They may like the school, programs offered, the players they meet. But those are lower on the list.

Everyone knows it. When there is a coaching change, losses to a recruiting class have to be expected from all but the most deluded. When it is a coach like Dave Wannstedt, who is highly personable and very involved in the recruiting, I expected significant losses to the recruiting class. And for it to happen quickly.

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Florida’s Urban Meyer is stepping down at Florida. The reasons are irrelevant. What isn’t irrelevant is the impact on Pitt’s coaching search.

Pitt and Florida are not on the same level in terms of present day prestige, money or potential. So, no Pitt and Florida are not going to be competing for the same coaches.

What it does do is set in motion potential dominoes that do compete with Pitt for the same guys.

First of all top assistants like Gus Malzahn, Dana Holgorsen and others are now going to wait and see if they get any chance to even interview with Florida.

Then there are schools like Louisville and Mississippi State with Meyer coaching tree guys. They are at the very least on the list to interview given their connections and recent success as head coaches. If one of them goes, it opens up another team looking for a head coach that pays somewhere in the same neighborhood as Pitt. That drives up the price on candidates.

If, say, Bobby Petrino at Arkansas were plucked by Florida, then the carousel spins longer as it trickles down. You can argue Arkansas isn’t much better a job than Miss. St., but Arkansas is willing (and able) to pay more.

You can create all the scenarios possible, but it just comes down to Pitt’s next hire could take a longer than wanted.

A hattip to PittScript who tweeted this last night, and posted this morning on it. Jon Baldwin made it very clear that he is leaving for the NFL. He blasted the coaches and his QB on the way out.

…but when asked, “Why would you stay [for your senior season] when you have no chemistry with QB Tino Sunseri, a new coach/system taking over next season and possibly hurt your draft stock for the 2012 draft, Baldwin clarified, “Oh, I misunderstood you … Heck yeah I’m leaving. It can only get worse. They had me running a lot of deep routes [this year] and yards were hard to come by. I barely ran intermediate routes; it felt like they were purposely trying to disrupt my draft stock.”

Not exactly the nicest things to say, and I don’t think he seriously believes they were trying to kill his draft stock.

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And it is already making my head hurt.

Since I didn’t see this coming (and yes, DeVanzo I owe you a DT from our bet during Saturday’s liveblog), I just haven’t given the whole next guy to coaching Pitt a lot of thought. Instead, I had been trying to draft a post rationalizing why I was keeping my season tickets. Now, the only way I have to resume work on that is if Paul Rhoads gets hired.

Others already have their lists out. Chris Dokish, Paul Zeise, Chris Mack, and Chris Peak (subs only — and I am of the belief that he put that picture of Paul Rhoads at the top just to see how much I will freak out at that prospect).

Lots of good points and interesting suggestions in the lists. I don’t think any one list is that much more superior than the other. I agree/disagree with some assessments on all of them. My feeling is to try and keep an open mind about all of them (well, almost all).

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Shows how much I know about the timing of these things, huh? I pushed that post out, and then had to spend the afternoon at my daughter’s dance performance. It was out in poor reception, so I didn’t even get some of the texts right away.

Pitt put out an official press release.

Dave Wannstedt announced today he will resign as head football coach at the University of Pittsburgh. Wannstedt informed Pitt athletic director Steve Pederson of his decision Tuesday.

He will remain at Pitt in the capacity of special assistant to the athletic director.

“The past six years have been among the most gratifying of my entire career,” said Wannstedt, a 1974 graduate of Pitt and former standout offensive tackle for the Panthers. “To be the head coach at my university was the realization of a lifelong dream. It has been an honor and privilege to serve Pitt and its football program.

“I’ve always told our players that the University of Pittsburgh will mean more to them than just four years of school and football. It will influence and inspire everything they do long after their last class and final game. I know that firsthand. I owe so much of my life to the education and experiences I had here. Pitt has always been, and will continue to be, an incredibly special place for my family and me.”

“On behalf of the University of Pittsburgh, I’d like to thank Coach Wannstedt for his passionate and committed service the past six years,” Pederson said. “This has never been just a job for Dave. He is wholeheartedly committed to Pitt and its people. We are greatly appreciative of his efforts to build a strong program on and off the field.”

It’s weird.

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I don’t know. It’s either prelude to a shake-up or Paul Zeise has the nice scoop.

Pitt athletic director Steve Pederson will meet with football coach Dave Wannstedt over the next few days to discuss his future, multiple sources have said.

As usual, it is on his blog, where he gets a little more blunt.

Here is what I can tell you – based on a lot of conversatons I’ve had in the past 24 hours, it is does not look good for Wannstedt and it seems like the University is set to go in the proverbial new direction.

Now, I’m not saying it is a “done deal”, but it clearly looks bleak for Dave at this point as I haven’t talked to anyone who has even said “he will be back with certain conditions.”

He then lists the reasons you would expect for the fact that Pitt’s administration apparently willing to pull the plug. Missing from the list is “support from wealthy booster(s) willing to help pay the buyout.”

To be honest, that is the one thing that has me hesitant to believe it will happen. There does appear to be a snowball going that way, but I am not quite there.

The other thing, is that the meeting has no set date. Over the next few days is rather vague. I also wonder if Pitt and AD Pederson would make this happen before Saturday. Do they really want to pre-empt/upstage the big Tennessee-Pitt game at the Con?

So if the meeting gets pushed until next week, then I might be further inclined to believe that Head Coach Wannstedt is done

Guess we are all in for waiting and speculating. Whee.

Delaware State is an ESPN3.com internet broadcast tomorrow. So, no liveblog. Open thread will be posted.

Scout.com updated its top-100 2011 basketball players. Khem Birch checked in at #10 and Durand Johnson is listed at #80. Neither were on the list before. Birch came in because he reclassified from 2012. Johnson, just earned the move-up by how he has played and improved.

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Offline stuff has been dominating for the last couple of days. I have been trying to figure out the right way to phrase my feelings of Pitt going to the BBVA Compass Bowl in Birmingham after such a letdown of a season. Instead, I’ll just let someone else sum it up.

Pitt was the preseason pick to win the Big East. Dave Wannstedt should use this matchup as a teaching point: “Guys, when we mess up during the season, we get sent to Birmingham in the postseason. Let’s not mess up anymore, OK?”

That would be the message to send behind closed doors. Publicly. It is about putting a happy face on it (and paraphrasing things said by Herm Edwards).

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One thing I learned doing marathon liveblogs at FanHouse. They rarely work that well. Everyone gets a little weary. Bigger gaps in the comments. It just takes a toll. Yet, it is always fun to try.

So there is some significant overlap of the football and basketball. Plus, for those not in Pittsburgh or around NY the football game may be the only option. We’ll give it a shot and see what happens.

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