It’s almost unfair to pick on the articles in both papers about how Pitt’s flaws were exposed by the Louisville loss. How teams will study the tape and use it as a blueprint from here on out against Pitt. I mean, my first thought was, “Duh.”

Of course teams are going to look at the tapes and see stuff on there. Once again, though, few teams can do it like that. Generally speaking, the press is very effective at creating turnovers against a lot of teams. It’s not used by a lot of teams because it is also very difficult to execute well and consistently. Not to mention personnel issues. Not every team can play as deep as Louisville did — and space out the fouling.

It’s like asking Pitt to try and create more turnovers on defense faster. Pressing and going for the steals. It isn’t to the players’ and team’s strength. I was always a fan of the Richardson-Arkansas “40 minutes of hell” style of defense, but that was not nearly so effective when the wrong players were trying to play in it.

I’m not dismissing the articles out of hand. There is stuff in there that makes good points.

The Huskies will pay extra attention to the Louisville tape. They will notice how Louisville switched from a zone defense to a man-to-man whenever Pitt got the ball inside the foul line. The objective was to prevent Gray from passing to a perimeter shooter for a 3-point attempt.

It effectively neutralized Gray’s ability to find the open shooter, one of his strengths.

The strategy worked. Pitt, the Big East’s top 3-point shooting team, was a season-worst 3 of 21.

“When the ball goes inside, they are very smart finding their shooters,” Pitino said. “So, once it went inside, we weren’t going to let it go outside to a shooter.”

But the counter-point is that Pitt will be working on solving that issues. Starting with the next opponent, Washington, you are also talking about a team with players that size and style-wise aren’t anything like the Cardinals.

Still, there were some amusing things.

Pitt has proven in the past that it is more than capable of coming back from seven or nine points down. Once the deficit reaches double digits, however, the Panthers have a hard time getting back into games.

Louisville jumped on Pitt early and led, 13-2, before the game was five minutes old. The Cardinals led by as many as 19 in the first half and 20 in the second half, forcing Pitt into a catch-up mode, something with which the Panthers are neither familiar nor comfortable.

Does the term truism mean anything? It generally doesn’t happen that a team comes back from double-digits. They make a run, they can get close, but it  generally doesn’t happen. That’s why teams don’t like to go down by double-digits. They can comeback, but it ain’t easy.

I did a post today for AOL about the NCAA letting 20 writers take a crack at putting together a mock bracket based on all the information the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee has. It really was a good idea.

Now, let me just add that I am now pissed at the writers. They put Pitt as a #3 seed. Seems Kansas and A&M were both given #2 seeds.
If I understand how it worked, in their mock-up Pitt ended up losing the Big East Tournament to Marquette (and it would appear that Pitt was swept by Marquette in the regular season). So Marquette was a #2 seed. Naturally Marquette was the lowest #2 seed and Pitt was the highest #3 seed. And since they are the same conference, Pitt got bumped lower in the brackets. Geez, even in the mock Tournament selection, Pitt gets slammed.

That said, it seems like an interesting experiment. And actually damn smart move by the NCAA.

Did you know that every time you watch the Pitt Panthers, you might actually be seeing…a NFL team coached by a guy who died over 30 years ago?

“It’s always hard preparing for Pitt because they do such a great job,” said Mountaineer coach John Beilein. “It’s like the Vince Lombardi teams. You know a bit of what they’re going to do but you just can’t stop it and it’s hard to score on them. What this team continues to have is more and more experience playing every single day as a unit with very unselfish players. That’s made them special.”

Jamie Dixon and Vince Lombardi. I’ve never made that connection before. But seriously, Beilein makes a good point. We’re going to try to get it into Gray if they’ll let us but if they want to put extra defenders on him then the guards (Levance and Graves) will do what they’ve done previously: make shots. So in that sense, the ‘Eers know what we want to do. Our execution (mainly making shots) is the key though and it’s usually very good.

They mention WVU’s surprising 18-4 record, something I looked at yesterday.

Each team takes very good care of the rock in the offensive zone and neither team tries forcing the ball through passing lanes that are either too small or don’t exist at all.

Both teams have been extremely adept at handling the basketball. For the style that they play, Pitt has a terrific 435-276 assist-to-turnover ratio. West Virginia’s is nearly as good at 386-253.

“To think that there are two teams that play so well handling the ball and passing the ball it’s pretty unique and rare and doing it in different ways with different styles of play,” said Dixon.

WVU is somewhat downplaying the importance of the game.

“Yes it’s Pitt and it’s a league game,” he said. “But we’ve just got to keep going and plodding through like we have been all year and not put any more importance on one game than another.”

Does Coach Beilein sense a loss and doesn’t want his young team getting too low if they lose to a rival? Actually, the same can be said conversely; if they were to upset us then he doesn’t want his players getting too high going into a non-con game against UCLA on Saturday.

I’m going to have to conserve on the posting. Pitt’s off until WednDavesday. Good god is that going to be a crazy day. NLI day starting in the morning. Then the basketball team in Morgantown that night. Great. Just great. Well, at least they didn’t schedule Pitt to play on Superbowl Sunday again.

Aaron Gray made the cut-down for the Wooden Award. He has no chance at it, but it’s nice he made it another round.
David Aldridge has a story on Jamie Dixon and remembering his sister. Hey don’t forget, David’s brother was a Pitt player if you can remember Andre Aldridge.

Dave Jones at the Harrisburg Patriot is bummed that Villanova hasn’t proved itself yet, and envious about Pitt.

Last night’s 65-59 loss to No. 7 Pittsburgh at the Wachovia Center was another in a string of second-half fold jobs against key opponents that has to have ‘Nova fans wondering.

…

For Pitt, it was just another win in a game where they had substantial stretches of the uglies. You don’t often shoot 8-of-27 and commit 11 giveaways in the first half on the road and come out smelling this sweet.

Pittsburgh came out much steadier at the outset of the second half, got better shots and still fell back by eight.

“I sensed some frustration during a timeout there early in the second half,” said Pitt coach Jamie Dixon. “I said, we’re getting good shots, we’re doing the right things. I think we’re in good position to win.”

Sounds like a team that knows it’s going to win, one way or another.

The story is the same, since it is about Villanova making little mistakes. Actually, the only thing about the story worth seeing, is one of those good old predictable play on words headlines. “IT’S THE PITTS” Just good to see it not being applied by Pittsburgh papers.

Looks like this place wasn’t the only blog to discuss the game as it went. Cinci Post beat writer Josh Katzowitz has a Bearcats blog and had insights of his own. Media riot when the food ran out early. UC students getting on Kendall. Good stuff.

Three meetings don’t seem like enough to create a rivalry. And yet, the few times we’ve played the Marquette Golden Eagles have been great games with all kinds of twists and turns and now we might be witnessing the formation of yet another “new” rivalry.

Yet after torching Connecticut, West Virginia and Louisville, one thing remained clear: Marquette is Pitt’s biggest threat for Big East supremacy this season.

In this age of an expanding Big East, we rarely see a head-to-head clash of this magnitude more than once — nor do we see one that heads to overtime like Sunday’s. Luckily for college hoops fans everywhere, the two programs meet again March 3 in Milwaukee, Wis.

“We are definitely looking forward to playing them at their place,” Pitt guard Antonio Graves said after Sunday’s loss.

So as both teams continue to stockpile talent and develop the programs, meetings like this will continue, manifesting themselves only every so often. And one thing became certain Sunday: Every ensuing contest between Marquette and Pitt will be a rivalry showdown — a must-see matchup at that.

We’re just finalizing the UConn-Pitt basketball rivalry in terms of both teams becoming great for a long period of time after playing them in all of those Big East Tournament finals. Pitt and Marquette are not anywhere near that stage so I’m not going to call this a rivalry quite yet.

Paul Zeise’s chat yesterday featured a question focused on tomorrow’s game against the Town of George.

slr: What does Pitt need to do to shut down Georgetown?

Paul Zeise: Well I think Georgetown does a pretty good job of shutting itself down. I mean the real question to me is what do the Hoyas have to do to shut down Pitt? I watched Georgetown the other night score 52 points in a loss to Villanova. They are not a very good offensive team and frankly i think they take one of their best players, Roy Hibbert, completely out of the equation with the offense they run. That Princeton style is great when you have a lot of players of similar skills — but when you have a talented 7-footer like Hibbert, you need to come up with ways to get him the ball more in a position he can score. They don’t do a good job of it and I think it is a reason they’ve struggled. There is just something missing with that team on offense and I think it is that the system doesn’t fit the talent.

I just figured we’d be able to get some Rollabannas behind the basket they’re shooting at. That would definitely distract them and shut them down. Just remember folks, let your Rollabanna whip itself back into scroll form when the Panthers are shooting.

You know where a team ranks on the sports landscape at times when you take a look at the byline of the articles. To be fair most of Florida is preoccupied with the Florida Gators and the BCS game tonight (*ahem* blatant plug AOL Fanhouse will be liveblogging it, I’ll be helping with peanut gallery snark on the side). The beat writers for USF apparently were pulled in and shipped off to Arizona. (At least when the Steelers were heading to the Superbowl last year the beat writers for Pitt stayed with the b-ball.) So, the articles from the Tampa and St. Pete’s papers were from Pittsburgh sportswriters.

Colin Dunlop who usually covers high school and recruiting for the P-G moonlit for the St. Petersburg Times. Meanwhile the Tampa Tribune hired the Trib-Review‘s beat writer, John Grupp to do the story (labeling him as a “Tribune Correspondent”), meaning Grupp got to do two for one. Just one of those things that amuses me.

Mike Cook wonders if the Pitt team just lacks morning people or something.

“I think it’s the early game,” forward Mike Cook said. “We struggled with that last year, too. We weren’t shooting well. We weren’t passing well. We weren’t doing anything well. We relied on our defense.”

Despite shooting 34 percent in the first half, Pitt led, 32-22, at the break after limiting the Bulls to as many field goals (9) as turnovers in the opening 20 minutes. USF managed only three field goals in the final 7:16 of the first half.

“I think we’re improving defensively,” coach Jamie Dixon said. “I don’t think that we’ll ever turn the corner. But we’re getting better. And we should improve. We are working a lot on it.”

That’s about as close as Coach Dixon will come to publicly calling out the defensive effort from his team, and it just got tossed in there as an aside comment. It was a good defensive effort, though, and nice to see Pitt clamp down when the shots weren’t going.

“When arguably your best player can have an off night and you can win convincingly you have to feel good about your team,” McCullum said. “Their perimeter shooting is one of the areas they have improved greatly. Offensively, it gives them so much more balance. It sort of makes you pick your poison. You can drop off and help on Gray and make him kick it out. They do a great job of knocking down jumpers. They have good chemistry.”

Fields was 3 for 4 from 3-point range and Ronald Ramon was 3 for 5. Levon Kendall, Keith Benjamin, Antonio Graves and Tyrell Biggs made one apiece.

I have to be honest seeing Biggs make a three bothered me. Mainly because he will probably take more 3s when he should almost never do that.

Ron Cook wonders what is going on with Aaron Gray? Well most of us are at least a little concerned at this point. I’m more concerned about the poor shooting than the lack of touches.

Pitt’s competition is about to improve dramatically. Maybe it won’t happen so much when it plays at DePaul Wednesday night, but it certainly will when it plays Georgetown, Connecticut and Marquette in a three-game homestand that begins Saturday night. Those teams are capable of lining up and playing Gray man-to-man and covering Pitt’s perimeter players. It’s fair to believe the Panthers will need Gray’s offense to win.

“Absolutely,” Gray said, nodding. “The big thing is we’re winning, but I know I have to be more consistent. I have to do my part. I think I bring a lot to the table for this team. I just have to show it.”

Wednesday night at DePaul would be a nice time to start.

The DePaul game scares the hell out of me. DePaul is unbeaten at home. They have knocked off Kansas and Cal there, and blew Wake Forest completely out of the water. The Blue Demons are a Jekyll and Hyde team, and at home they are Hyde.

I’ve written it before, but it bears repeating. I’m a big fan of the newspaper Q&A and chats with beat writers. Not that they are that informative, so much as they are more honest about the biases and POV of the writers. What styles of play they like, players they  prefer and so on.  I haven’t posted on the chats and Q&A in a couple weeks.

Paul Zeise is doing some chats regarding Pitt basketball lately.

Frank_Fizzle: Paul – You have Pitt ranked No. 12 in the preseason — what do you think of the Panthers so far?

Paul Zeise: I think what I thought at the start of the year — the Panthers are a good team, they are a top 20 team, perhaps even a top 15 team but they aren’t a top 10 team. They don’t have a go-to guy on offense — and when I say go-to guy I’m talking about a wing player or a guard who can take over a game at any time – I think that they will be hurt by any team who can match their size with legitimately athletic big men because their frontcourt, especially when Young is not in the game, is not very athletic.

Coach_with_a_SAG_card: Paul, since it’s inconceivable for a team to win a championship without a go-to guy, is there any reason for Pitt to play the rest of its games since the Panthers don’t have a go-to guy? Seems like they might as well just hang it up now, right?

Paul Zeise: Um, no. I think there are plenty of reasons to play. But if you are being sarcastic, tell me all the teams who have made the Final Four in the past decade or so, other than George Mason, which was a fluke, that didn’t have at least two legitimate NBA-caliber players. Pitt is a good team, an excellent team. From what I’ve seen it is not yet an elite team. Who are the NBA prospects on this team?

I have very mixed feelings about this sort of thing. It’s the same sort of thing where no teams win in the NCAA without at least one McDonalds All-American High Schooler. It’s a trend, and a reliable one. BUt, I think that trend has been on the wane as players are more often leaving sooner for the NBA. I mean, to turn it around, how many teams with at least 2 McDonalds All-Americans have failed to even make the Final Four? How many times has the “go-to” guy failed to deliver for a team, and the rest of the team can’t pick up the slack?

Part of it is that, especially in the NCAA Tourney, is often when the “go-to” guy emerges. Or, it is a course of the season thing. For Pitt, there is still plenty of time for another “go-to” guy to emerge. And there are choices: Levance Fields, Sam Young and Mike Cook all show that potential.

I guess, my biggest problem is that it is just too simplistic a justification. “Sure they are a good team, but they don’t have a single player who can take the ball and dominate.” Last year, Florida arguably had multiple players emerge as the go-to or big game player at the right time. They had tremendous talent that gelled last year, but which player was absolutely indespenisble for them to win any given game?

Ray Fittipaldo, since he has to cover Pitt basketball full-time, treads a little softer with absolute statements.

Q: Coach Dixon better pray that Sam Young stays healthy; he is the key to their success. If he can’t rebound, this team is done. When Gray misses a layup, no one is there to rebound. Kendall can’t shoot, play defense or rebound. He looks lost on the court. Has a team ever dropped from No. 2 to out of the top 25 in a month? The inability for this team to guard athletic players will be fatal. They look out of sync. I counted at least half a dozen instances where they should have gotten a pass into Gray. Instead, they continued passing the ball and ended up with a poor shot and no chance for a rebound. Where is the leadership? The mix is not working. Two meaningful games, two opportunities to impress, two poor performances. Right now, Pitt is a No. 7 or No. 8 seed at best and is on its way to an underachieving season. A healthy Young is their only way to success. I hope they prove me wrong.

Fittipaldo: Young and Fields are going to determine how far this team goes. We all know Gray will be there on most nights. In my opinion, Young and Fields are Pitt’s next most talented players. Fields has started to take on more of a scoring role at the behest of the coaches. If he continues to progress defensively and can keep his turnovers down, he’ll be tough come March. Young can be the difference maker, though. He is such a force athletically that teams cannot account for him at the power forward position. Pitt needs him to be healthy to have a shot at a deep tournament run. If you think Pitt is a No. 8 seed that means you think this team will lose seven games in the Big East. I cannot see that. They won’t roll through the league like many expected, but I still think they are the best team in what might turn out to be a down year for the Big East. I see Pitt losing no more than five games in the league and at worst at No. 4 or 5 seed. We shall see.

The Q&A also displays a lot more negativity in the questions from the fans which, by their nature I would say forced Fittipaldo to defend the team more. It’s fascinating, and I saw and read the same sort of freaking out around here after Ohio State got smacked silly by Florida.

I can’t help but wonder if there is something of a carry over in the football mentality. The limited number of games, and any mistakes means the big dreams are over. That a bad game or any kind of loss is absolutely killer for the team, the season, the hopes and prospects.
Basktball is completely different in that way. You can have, even a few bad games and a few more losses in the season  without it meaning the team is bad or a reflection of their worst performances.

He has a Q&A today and a chat yesterday.

Just an idle thought. I figure Fittipaldo assumes he is one of the most hated college sports beat writers. He is hated by plenty of Penn State fans who assume he is biased against/hates their football team as the P-G beat reporter who also covers Pitt b-ball; and by plenty of Pitt fans who assume he is biased against/hates the b-ball team as the P-G beat reporter who also covers PSU football.

From the chat there was someone with unbelievably out of whack expectations for 3-point shooting:

MPM: Thanks for taking this question in advance. Going into last night’s game the Panthers 3PT shooting seemed adequate. Last night was horrible. Was it just a bad night or could this be a problem area for the team?

Ray Fittipaldo: Pitt was shooting 47 percent from 3-point range before last night. After going 2 for 17 from behind the arc, the Panthers are now shooting 41.2 percent. That is still good enough to lead the Big East. One of the reasons Pitt’s guards kept shooting last night was because of the supreme confidence Jamie Dixon has in them. Ron Ramon is shooting 57 percent from 3-point range. Antonio Graves is shooting 45 percent. Ramon is one of the top 3-point shooters in the country. I would view last night’s game as an aberration, but it also goes to show how opposing teams will defense Pitt. Most teams are going to try and stop Gray and force the guards to win the game. It will be interesting to see how Pitt fares in a Big East game when the shooting is off. They were able to get it done against Robert Morris. But will they be able to find ways to win against ranked foes?

“Adequate?” Jeez, I know everyone is hoping for big things, but keep in mind that shooting 40% from beyond the arc is like shooting 60% from inside. Pitt has an excellent chance of averaging over 40% this year with the way teams have to defend inside, but keep it realistic.

The Q&A has a question about Pitt recruiting DC versus NYC:

Q: I was excited about the signings in November. But I was surprised that none were from New York City. I hope the pipeline has not dried up. I find that it is very important to have those guys when playing conference games against east coast teams. Can you provide insight here?

FITTIPALDO: Pitt has not forgotten about New York City. It just happened to be one of those years when New York did not produce many high-caliber players. I did some research on this and wrote a story about it when Dixon hired David Cox as his director of basketball operations back in the summer. One of the reasons Dixon hired Cox was because of his connections as a former AAU coach in Washington, D.C. The Washington-Baltimore area, for the moment, has surpassed New York City as the recruiting hotbed on the east coast. New York City did not produce a top 70 recruit in the 2007 recruiting class. The Washington-Baltimore area had five players among the top 25. I think Dixon would like to make more inroads in the area. He signed Sam Young two years ago. I would expect to see more in the future.

It’s also part of why the football team is looking to tap the area as well. There’s just a boom in athletic talent in the area right now.

There were some questions about Sam Young struggling. As the Fittipaldo story pointed out earlier, part of it is Young playing a different position this year. It’s what Dixon has done plenty of before. Think about the way he has shifted the guards the last couple of years. Having them play both point and shooting. It’s about creating more depth and allowing Pitt to play the best players at once. Young at small forward may not last, but given that Young is 6’6″, not 6’8″ or bigger Young should want to embrace the position. It would enhance his pro prospects more than as an undersized power forward.

So Ron Cook puts the fact that Pitt and other teams that go 6-6 will be going to a bowl at the top of his outrage list for college football. Something that everyone has been well aware since it was announced that they were going to 12 game seasons in CFB and there are just way too many bowls.

Looking for it…

Looking for it…

Searching…

Nope, can’t find the outrage. Can’t work up a lather. Hell, I’m having a hard time working up a lather about the other sins he lists:

Penn State going to the Outback Bowl — big deal. It’s a Big 11 tie-in bowl and that’s where they landed in the pecking order. Why does that make them undeserving? Compared to who else in the conference? They may get creamed by LSU or someone like that, but that doesn’t make them “undeserving” so much as point out how top heavy the Big 11 was. Non-BCS bowls are about money and what schools and conferences can bring the most fans for the games. The Big 11 has among the largest fanbases and has historically traveled to bowls well.

Potential Michigan-tOSU rematch for the BCS National Championship. Wait? You mean the BCS is screwed up? Damn, I thought the system was fine. Again, old news.

It’s the feigned outrage in the column that amuses me. These are old complaints wrapped up in an attempt at mouth-breathing anger. Don’t necessarily disagree with them, but spare me the weak emotional effort.

It seems for a team tabbed for the preseason top spot, they are reasonably loose before the media horde.

Reporters were swarming Jamie Dixon on Wednesday when Pitt senior center Aaron Gray held out an invisible microphone and posed a question to his coach.

“How does it feel to be talking to this many reporters?” Gray said.

Dixon looked at his 7-foot star and deadpanned, “I tried to get rid of one of them, but he came back.”

Considering how Coach Dixon has struggled generally to show a personality in media settings and the volume of media friendly and quotable coaches in the Big East, this is progress and says something about improving skills for Coach Dixon in being comfortable in his skin and his position.

This is the third time Pitt has earned Big East preseason No. 1 status. The other two times, in 1987-88 and 2002-03, the Panthers either won or tied for the regular-season title.

So Pitt has that going for it.

Not that Pitt players and coach don’t know it also makes Pitt a target for everyone’s best game and that preseason rankings are not that important.

“We have to accept the challenge and stay strong,” senior guard Antonio Graves added. “We’ll be faced with ups and downs. With this team, the key will be how we stay strong in the storm. With all the pressure and attention, how we handle adversity will be the key to this season.”

Pitt coach Jamie Dixon took the news in stride. He recognizes that being picked No. 1 is a tribute to his and his staff’s ability to coach and recruit, but he also knows the recognition means nothing if the Panthers don’t play to their lofty expectations.

“I think it’s a good thing for our program,” Dixon said. “I think it says a lot about where we’ve come from. I always said when this conference was getting changed around and everyone was wondering what was going to happen, I said we want to play against the best. If we’re picked at the top in the preseason in this conference, I think that says a lot.”

The one thing that can derail any season, though, are injuries. It seems there are some little injuries in the preseason worth keeping an eye on.

Pitt has been bitten by the injury bug this preseason. Freshman guard Gilbert Brown was diagnosed with mononucleosis 10 days ago and has yet to take part in a practice. Sophomore point guard Levance Fields is hampered by a groin injury and senior guard Antonio Graves (back) and sophomore forward Sam Young (knee) have minor injuries.

Graves said the practices have been extremely competitive.

“Guys are still competing and fighting for positions,” he said. “Practice is very competitive, very physical. We’ve had a couple of injuries. It’s been a battle. It will make us a better team.”

Brown, a consensus top-50 recruit, is to be reexamined today. He just started doing some light running on the treadmill earlier in the week and could be out for a while.

“It’ll change some things if he’s not ready to go,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said.

Gilbert Brown was about the only freshman expected to bust through the rotation this season. The issue will be his conditioning coming back from mono. Knee problems for Sam Young are nerve inducing. He needs to healthy knees for his explosiveness.

So, let’s see. Ron Cook warned everyone and sure enough goes with it.

Bad, bad, bad.

Two big dropped passes. A lost fumble. Five sacks. Eight penalties. One bad coaching decision. A defense that broke down at the worst time. A bunch of missed tackles. A whopping 268 rushing yards for Rutgers, including 225 by superb tailback Ray Rice.

Horrible, horrible, horrible.

Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt didn’t even try to find the silver lining, probably because there was none.

“If we do those things against The Citadel,” he said of the many blunders, “we’re going to be scrambling around to win.”

The game showed that the 6-1 record Pitt lugged in was an illusion, built against weak competition, an opening-night win against Virginia aside. It also showed how far Pitt has to go to become an elite program. There’s no question it’s better than it was last season in Wannstedt’s first season. But it’s just as evident that it has been surpassed by Rutgers and isn’t on West Virginia’s or Louisville’s level in the Big East Conference. It won’t catch up until it starts taking care of business at Heinz Field.

It’s very hard to write about this game without getting negative. Mainly because so much of it was so familiar.

Rice joins a growing list of recent-era 200-yard rushers against Pitt that includes West Virginia’s Pat White, Virginia Tech’s Kevin Jones and Notre Dame’s Julius Jones. Rice finished seven yards short of Terrell Willis’ school-record 232 yards against Temple in 1994.

It’s also frustrating because there is a gameplan to beat Rutgers. Everyone knows it, but Pitt couldn’t do it.

The Panthers entered the game with the idea that if they could get a lead, they could force the Scarlet Knights out of their comfort zone and make quarterback Mike Teel, not the running backs, win the game.

But Pitt couldn’t get any momentum on offense early, and as a result, Rutgers didn’t have to take many chances. The Scarlet Knights were content to wage a field-position battle the entire first half and it led to a 20-10 win.

Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt said the Panthers’ lack of execution on offense early in the game was frustrating.

No pressure on the QB. No stopping the running game.

Teal only threw 18 times, a stat Wannstedt felt was one of the telltale stats of the game.

“We played right into Rutgers’ hands because the way to beat them is to jump on them early and make them throw, but they had the luxury of only needing to throw when they wanted to,” Wannstedt said. “We have a bye coming up and we’ll need it to regroup and get ready to play at South Florida in two weeks.”

The first half saw both offenses make plenty of mistakes which is why it was only 6-0 Rutgers at halftime. Rutgers, though, was moving the ball. They couldn’t score, but they kept the defense out there and was able to put Pitt deep.

The Panthers had horrendous field position in the first half, while giving Rutgers excellent starting drives, but held the Scarlet Knights to Jeremy Ito field goals from 32 and 21 yards. Ito also missed wide right from 38 yards and led 6-0 at halftime. Pitt had several chances to make plays in the first half, but dropped two passes, saw two other plays wiped out by penalties and had quarterback Tyler Palko harassed throughout.

“They were able to do some things that we just weren’t able to stop,” Pitt center Joe Villani said. “I don’t think it was as much physical as it was mental, but we have to be able to keep them off our quarterback.”

Ah, yes, the lack of protection for Palko. Five sacks allowed, and Palko had to escape several others.

The Scarlet Knights rushed for 271 yards and limited the Panthers to 67 yards rushing. Both totals were indicative of the way the Scarlet Knights physically manhandled the Panthers on both sides of the ball. As another measure of Rutgers’ physical superiority, the Scarlet Knights had five sacks while Pitt had none.

That doubles the amount of sacks the O-line allowed through the prior 7.

Still, despite that. Despite a defense that had coaches paying lip service to stopping the run, while refusing to stuff the box, bring the linebackers closer and bring up a safety. Despite all of that, Pitt was never out of the game because Rutgers struggled to finish drives.

And Pitt finally put together a drive that could go without penalties, overcome no running game and dropped passes. Going no-huddle and moving, Pitt even overcame the lack of pass protection with Tyler Palko providing a highlight reel scramble and evade before throwing a perfect strike to Oderick Turner in the back of the endzone.

That put Pitt only down 13-10 with nearly an entire quarter left to play. The crowd was fired up and ready for the roaring comeback. Pitt may have been outplayed for 3 quarters, but the game wasn’t out of reach.

On the ensuing kickoff, Rutgers’ Willie Foster fielded the ball in the upper corner of the end zone but was drilled by linebacker Clint Session at the 10. The crowd came alive, cheering wildly and giving Pitt an opportunity to take over.

Then, Rice took the handoff from Teel and bolted through the middle, slipping through the grasp of free safety Mike Phillips until cornerback Darrelle Revis chased Rice down at Pitt’s 27.

The Panthers, Wannstedt said, were “in shock.”

“That hit us in the heart,” Turner said. “We had them pinned down there and thought the momentum had changed.”

Added linebacker H.B. Blades: “It’s frustrating, because we had all the momentum at that point, and that just switched everything.”

And with that run, Ray Rice joined those tailbacks that have absolutely killed Pitt. Credit, though, also has to go to the Rutgers O-line. They opened up a gaping hole right up the middle for Rice to get through and build up a head of steam to blow through the stunned secondary.

“Everything just fitted right,” Rice said of the long run. “It just parted and I just burst through it. That was the turning point in the game. That did it.”It was a regular base call. We knew they were having problems with it. If the linebacker doesn’t take a direct angle, it parts. I was hitting it all game, but this one was a big one. I was just running out there.”

Rutgers coach Greg Schiano told his star back to prepare for a heavy workload in the second half, as the Scarlet Knights held on to the lead.

“About four minutes into the second half, I said, ‘Hey, you got it in you. We’re going to ride you,’ Schiano said. “He looked at me and said, ‘I got it in me.’ “

Rutgers ran 66 plays. Rice had 39 carries and the other backs had 9. That means Rutgers ran the ball 71% of the time. And yet, Pitt wasn’t consistently stuffing the box against the run when it was a hell of a good chance it would be a running play.

His Q&A is up with questions about filling the stadium, how good is Rutgers, and from the department of “because that would make too much sense.”

Q: I don’t think Rutgers is very deep at receiver. Can Pitt cover man-to-man and then load the box and bring the house to stop the run?

ZEISE: That’s not been Wannstedt’s style. He doesn’t like to commit too many guys to any one area and he doesn’t like to blitz a lot because it leaves a defense vulnerable. I’d expect they’ll play a lot of their normal cover two and cover three stuff as well and let their corners play up in bump and run. I’d be shocked if they commit more than eight guys up inside to stop the run on a consistent basis. The defense is built on the concept of your defensive line getting the job done by winning one-on-one match-ups and thus allowing the linebackers to clean up all the rest. The line has played fairly well and it has worked so we shall see what happens now.

Aaiigh!

Rutgers hasn’t played from behind all year. They have yet to be put in a position where they are forced to throw. They are weak at receivers and Mike Teel has been inconsistent at best. This is not about blitzing. Like committing to the run, it’s committing to stopping the run. You have to at least bring the safeties up and force TE Clark Harris to stay in and block — taking away their best receiver in the process.

From his chat yesterday.

FearTheStache: Hi Paul, If Rutgers double teams Kinder then Turner will kill them deep and vice versa. how do you see Rutgers defending the pass?

Paul Zeise: They like to play a lot of man coverage, which Pitt has eaten alive any time any team has tried to do it. They will certainly need some safety help to stop Pitt’s passing game, but their real strength comes in the fact that they can put lots of heat on passers without having to bring the kitchen sink since their front seven is so good. If Pitt’s O-line can block well, which they have all year, I think Palko could have a big day.

I expect a couple early deep balls. To test their corners and also see how the pass protection looks against Rutgers.

Bunch of things needed to be done this morning, and then I will have the monitor duty on the AOL Fanhouse — watching and posting on all the college football games — this afternoon and evening (yes that includes making snarky comments on the Michigan-PSU game).

So, the media write-up is going to be lots of link and little commentary and excerpts.

Starting with the locals, which I’m sure most of you have already scanned.

It’s hard to play up the “bad luck” angle of Friday the 13th when the game was over so quickly. The road blowout by Pitt was their biggest in years.
H.B. Blades had a great game and impressed the Butkus Award Committee — which happens to be run by the Orlando Downtown Athletic Club — which is a nice coincidence. The watchlist gets cutdown from 66 to 10 next week.

I’ll skip analyzing the Smizik column that hardly skimps on backhand slaps at Pitt, to simply observe the abject shock he is experiencing at the idea of a Rutgers-Pitt game that really matters.

The AP story has Coach Wannstedt apparently answering a question about trying to score again before the half.

The second kick came as the clock ticked off to halftime, when despite a 38-point lead, Pitt pushed for a TD.

“We had 30 minutes of football left,” Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt said. “We would never intentionally run the score up, but it was the same play we ran last week against Syracuse to run the clock out against them. And he was open.”

I don’t think anyone can really accuse a team of running up the score when it is still in the first half. I was happy with it, because it was about putting UCF away. The stepping on the throat that you want your team to do.

Now for the Florida media. They were in a surly mood.

UCF couldn’t stop Pitt on Friday night.

Not on the opening kickoff.

Not on the Panthers’ first possession.

Not on the Panthers’ last possession.

Not anywhere in between.

Pitt never punted. The Panthers converted 10 of 12 third downs. George O’Leary, UCF’s frustrated coach, couldn’t remember another game in which his defense failed to force a punt.

Now, when you get trounced you can play up the “bad luck” angle. But that can only account for so much.

The only problem was that from the very first play of the game Friday night, it was clear to almost everyone in the announced crowd of 35,858 at the Florida Citrus Bowl that UCF’s woes had nothing to do with simple bad luck.

On the bright side, UCF seems to have found another WR to compliment Mike Walker.

This seems to have upset the media to some degree because of who was coaching Pitt.

Wannstedt, a flop as head coach of the Chicago Bears and the Miami Dolphins, has energized his alma mater into a powerhouse once again. Pitt improved to 6-1 and is riding a four-game winning streak. The Panthers, whose lone loss was to Michigan State, could play a major role in the national championship race as they close the season with consecutive home games against No. 5 West Virginia and No. 7 Louisville.

More later.