I’m back. A bit of traveling for the holiday week(end). Try to get back into things Monday night and the storm that ripped through our area knocked the power out for a good 12 hours or so. The power outage wasn’t the worst — except to my 12-year old daughter who found her tablet useless without wi-fi. Especially since it happened at night and we were able to sleep through half of it.

The worry was all the contents of the fridge and freezer. Well, it was the worry of my wife. Within the first hour of the outage, she’s ready to declare everything in the fridge is doomed. Followed by the ice cream in the freezer. By the morning, she’s planning to toss everything from the freezer. Lose power for more than 24 hours and she is considering a new refrigerator, because who knows what may linger in the old one.

Keep in mind that the minute we lose power, she all but padlocks the doors to the fridge so none of the precious remaining cold escapes.

My only concern was how soon the water from the storm would get into the ground and into our basement. Every time there’s an outage I think about how I really need a battery back-up for the sump pump. And every time the power comes back I put off the move.

Anyways…

The non-con schedule for the 2014 basketball season has been released. The full schedule with the ACC and TV times usually doesn’t hit until late-August/early-September.

Not much else happening in the college basketball landscape as the recruiting cycle doesn’t begin until after 5pm today. So, this got a little more coverage than usual. Apparently there has been a lot of built up resentment about Pitt’s past non-cons.

This is an OK schedule, but you’ll notice that, outside of Maui and the mandated ACC/Big Ten game, Pitt’s best non-conference opponent is either Manhattan or Bona. Both home games. Only one true road game prior to conference play?

These are the things that can come back and haunt in mid-March.

Most of the article is really about complaining about how bad the past schedules have been. Same here.

There may not be a program in the country that is more notorious for their weak non-conference scheduling that Pitt.

In the 11 seasons that Jamie Dixon has been the head coach of the Panthers, they’ve averaged a KenPom non-conference schedule strength of 250.1. Their highest ranking during those 11 years was 129th back in 2007. Only three times in Dixon’s tenure has their non-conference SOS been in the top 200, none of which were in the last five years.

Because, once again, when it gets to the actual schedule itself for 2014…

The Maui Invitational is a nice addition, but it’s not a guarantee. If the Panthers lose their first game and wind up in the loser’s bracket, they could end up in a situation where they play Chaminade, a Division II program, and Purdue, who doesn’t look like they’ll finish in the top ten in the Big Ten next season.

A trip to Indiana is also nice, but it’s part of the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, meaning that Pitt had no say in the scheduling of that game. The only other road game on Pitt’s schedule is a visit to Hawaii, which comes as an acclimation to Hawaiian time for the Maui Invitational.

The schedule should be an upgrade of last season, but Dixon once again did not exactly putting together a murderer’s row.

Notice, that the schedule bar got raised at the end. It isn’t that it is a bad schedule, it is that it isn’t a tough schedule. It’s also amusing to see that doing the Maui Invitational and going to Indiana in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge are dismissed because Pitt didn’t directly schedule those games. Not sure the logic there, other than to bolster the argument that Pitt/Jamie Dixon didn’t make the call to set up those games.

Again, the complaints seemed more about the past than this year.

There’s certainly some validity to the idea Dixon has historically scheduled meekly in non-league play, but the criticism of this slate seems over-the-top.

Considering the caliber of a beefed-up ACC that now includes potential preseason top 25 teams Duke, North Carolina, Syracuse, Louisville and Virginia, Pittsburgh doesn’t need a loaded non-league schedule to ensure chances for marquee wins or to finish with respectable RPI. What’s more, this year’s schedule is an improvement on the anemic slate the Panthers played last season when they still went 25-9, reached the NCAA tournament as a No. 9 seed and finished with a top 40 RPI.

Unlike last season when its holiday tournament was a Legends Classic that featured Stanford, Houston and Texas Tech as the other high-profile teams, Pittsburgh will play in the always formidable Maui Invitational this November. Among the other teams in the field are Final Four threat Arizona, preseason top 20 San Diego State, Big 12 contender Kansas State and respectable BYU, Missouri and Purdue.

The rest of the schedule isn’t menacing, but it’s still an improvement over last season when a neutral court game against Cincinnati was the only notable matchup. A Big Ten-ACC challenge road game at Indiana will be challenging, and home games against Manhattan and Florida Gulf Coast represent a modest attempt to bolster the mid-major portion of the schedule.

Pitt’s biggest problem last year was the failure to notch those big conference wins. As much as last year’s non-con slate was lousy, I’m not sure playing better teams would have helped them. Having more chances to win big games, doesn’t mean you will. Pitt really, really struggled with that last year.

The biggest thing about the non-con — specifically the Maui Invitational — is that people will have a better idea about this Pitt squad a lot earlier than last year.