Between the new coaches, position swithces and the eligible transfers, there’s a lot to re-learn.

Spring practice is already finished for the morning.  Bobby Engram in Pitt gear has happened.

Yesterday, Coach Paul Chryst did the pre-Spring Practice press conference. He sort of said every position was open — and not really.

 On if any jobs are wide open:

“Eleven on offense and 11 of defense. The great thing about sports and in football is that in every game you have to prove yourself and every year you have to prove yourself. We can all make a pretty good bet on some spots and who should start. The great thing is they still have to go out and do it. There is nothing more important than this team and Pitt football and I talked to the group about that. If you’re true to that then your best 11 players shouldn’t sit out. Your best linemen will play, your best skill guys will play and your best defensive backs will play so I think they really are all open.”

Read into or don’t read anything into that.
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The NCAA Tournament really tips in less than an hour.

See, the play-in games simply cannot count when you don’t have to pick them for bracket pools.

Hope you have made your pick for the annual Pitt Blather Bracket Challenge.

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

A little time left to make the picks.

Not surprisingly, the fans really didn’t. They weren’t showing up as much by the end of the regular season. No real surprise when they don’t show for the 3d-tier post-season exhibition competition.

On the bright side, Pitt didn’t fail to show-up against Wofford. Unlike, say Arizona being at home against Bucknell. Especially since Bucknell was an 8 seed in a 32-team NIT field. Between the Arizona loss, and the pasting USF put on Cal last night (if you didn’t see the game, the final score was no where near indicative of how badly Cal was abused), it becomes an open question of whether Pitt would have made the NCAA Tournament if they played in the Pac-12. I’m thinking Providence could have had a shot. I mean, we are talking Big East football bad for Pac-12 basketball.

Pitt blew out the Terriers 81-63. There was some familiarity to it, as Pitt let Wofford make a run in the second half to get within single digits. Then Pitt reasserted themselves and pounded Wofford back into submission.

Pitt had a big night shooting from outside, as J.J. Moore’s jumper was falling. Moore finished with 32 16 points and hitting 4-6 on 3s. Woodall and Gibbs also dropped four 3s in the game.

Probably more surprising was Talib Zanna had an easy time inside grabbing 7 rebounds and 12 points (6-8). It was that kind of night for Zanna and the other guards that had Dixon saying after the game that he screwed up on not playing some of the other guys  as much as he should have.

The Panthers were 14 of 25 from beyond the arc to tie the record for most 3-pointers in a game at Petersen Events Center. Because they shot so many long-range jumpers, Pitt went to the free-throw line only three times and made one.

“We need to get the ball inside more,” said coach Jamie Dixon, who stuck basically to the same substitution pattern he employed all season. “I probably should have played [Malcolm Gilbert] more and I need to get Cam [Wright] more minutes.”

That sounded almost Wannstedtian.

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