The theory that I have at least been telling myself the last 10 years as to why my bracket has fallen apart is that my Pitt biases are just too strong for me to logically analyze and make bracket picks.

Guess it’s time to put it to the test.

Time for the annual Pitt Blather Bracket Challenge.

The group is locked, and semi-private. To join, the password is: PittIsIt

This year the prizes include a $50 gift card, a couple Pitt shirts and any other free shwag I’ve accumulated and can regift. (I swear, John I’m going to get your prize pack for 2011 mailed any day now.)

Last place is a copy of the game program from the Buffalo-Pitt football game featuring a smiling Fraud Graham on the cover. A collector’s item to be sure.

I apologize (sort of) if you think you are being singled out in this rant. Honestly, it isn’t directed at any one person. It’s just that I’ve gotten a little worn down over the course of this season — and especially in the last week. It just seems that too many Pitt fans have gone off the deep end.

Maybe it’s taking the success this program has had for granted. Maybe it’s the frustration of the season. Maybe it’s the frustration of feeling so close in previous years. Maybe it’s because the football program has been such a source of angst that the basketball side has been the tether on the sanity that got cut this year. Maybe it’s just a very vocal minority.

Pitt is somehow above playing in the CBI. That this is an embarrassment. The players and coaches should hang their heads in shame and apologize to all, personally for this season. When did so many Pitt fans think they should be as twisted and warped as the fringes of UCLA and Kentucky?

I don’t know, but suddenly Pitt finally has a season where they truly take a step back. Where they don’t just underachieve, but fall flat on their face. And now the previous ten years of going to the NCAA Tournament is ancient history. The prior eight years of Jamie Dixon being the head coach are reduced to the failures — and any success was merely an aberration. That this year is the true norm.

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