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MERNAGH’S WEEKEND THOUGHTS ON THE BIG EAST

by RAY MERNAGH

Storylines really developing as we enter the final four games of the Big East regular season. I’ll feature three from the weekend past and look at one leading up to tonight.

Can Pitt Win Regular Season Big East Title?

Yes, if they win out/ go 3-1 in their final four games and Syracuse/Villanova stumble some. Pittsburgh — 10-4 — goes to Notre Dame Wednesday, then to St. John’s, before finishing up at home with Providence and Rutgers. The ‘Cuse (12-2) goes to Providence, has Villanova and St. John’s at home and finishes on the road at Louisville. Nova (11-3) hosts South Florida, goes to Syracuse and Cincinnati then finishes at home against West Virginia. WVU — also 10-4 — goes to Connecticut tonight, has Cincinnati and then Georgetown at home before finishing up on the road at Villanova.

Pittsburgh can lose any of those games because it happens in this league, but the last two showings by the Panthers have made even the most vocal critics of Pitt’s supposed lack of talent stand up and take notice that, once again, Pitt is a damn good basketball TEAM. Really, if you were to design a program for continued success in the last ten years, wouldn’t Pitt be the model that all struggling programs would try and follow? Three weeks ago Pitt was struggling defensively and Jamie Dixon was trying to get across to his guys the value of getting stops. Now?

The Panthers have put on back-to-back defensive clinics against guard-wing-oriented teams. Travon Woodall is beating guys to the spot and taking charges — a thing that allows him to be on the floor more where he makes everything flow better offensively according to Jamie Dixon. Gary McGhee has other BE coaches scratching their heads about how to deal with him.

Jay Wright, entirely classy as always after the game especially when you consider he’s yet to win a game at Pittsburgh (but I guess the win last March in Boston makes up for that just a bit). “I thought McGhee was great all game, especially on the glass and Dixon came up with some big plays down the stretch for them, just another great Pitt/Villanova Big east type game,” said Wright. Concerning Mouph Yarou’s lack of PT and whether he contemplated using his young big more Wright said — “I did a little bit but you know I put him in there and 15 seconds later he gets a foul, puts McGhee on the line and he makes two and I just looked at it like if that’s the way they’re gonna call it all night when you tuouch him I’m not gonna put him on the foul line all night.” Count me among the folks that thought Yarou might have helped on the boards and maybe gotten some desperately needed putbacks for Nova.

Also count me among those that thought the whistle in this game slightly favored Pitt (something that’s usually the case for Nova, who really like to get into people and use their hands a lot on defense). Wright also kind of dismissed the notion that this Pitt team is a huge surprise at least to him (can we get a look at his preseason BE ballot by any chance?) “I think they’re basically the same kind of team you know I said to Jamie before the game ‘you’re doing a great job but you know you’ve also got a really good team’ and he said ‘I know, we knew it, we knew we had these guys’ and he’s doing a great job and I think he did a great job last year with these guys preparing them for this year. It’s not a surprise to any of us, these guys, you know watching the final eight game from last year to prepare for this game he had Gibbs in there in crucial situations he had Robinson (?) in there, he had Wanamaker in there, Brown and these guys were ready when it was their time. You know Brown’s been in this program for awhile and I know he had his problems, and Dixon was a starter, so he did a great job last year getting these guys ready and now that its their turn they’re doing a great job.”

Another thing Wright said afterwards that really stood out was in reference to a question about Pitt’s balance and how that makes it hard to prepare for them, where he ended up paying a huge compliment to Ashton Gibbs, who’s kind of quietly (is that even possible with his shot against WVU) regained his form as Pitt’s primary scorer: “Yeah, you can’t overcommit to Gibbs, but I want to say this about Gibbs, what makes him great is he hasn’t come with any of the hype you know he’s not playing for TV, he waits and he waits and he waits until he gets his shot and that’s why he never misses them. He doesn’t take bad shots but he knows he’s always a weapon out there, he knows even if I’m not shooting they’re scared of me and you know he’s one of their leaders and you can tell that and the rest of the guys play off that. It’s very, very impressive what he does for them.”

At some point soon I’m going to write 800 words on how impressive Nasir Robinson is in what he does for this team as he battles in the paint defensively and fights for rebounds, deflections etc.

A few weeks ago some were wondering if Pittsburgh, after a fast start, was in danger of missing the NCAA’s for the first time in nine years. Now I’m still amazed at the number of new wrinkles getting put in offensively — cuts you haven’t seen before, Dixon and Woodall finding people for layups. Woodall springting to the line and sinking pressure free throws down the stretch. And all of a sudden the attention has turned to whether they might win the regular season title and wondering how high of a seed they’ll get on Selection Sunday. Newest reports say the RPI is now at #9.

Great job by Jamie Dixon (National Coach of the Year line starts behind him folks), but also a great job by a bunch of really, really good basketball players.

Is Marquette In?

After the Marquette at Cincinnati yesterday — coupled with (South Florida’s crushing loss to St. John’s and Cincinnati’s loss — for now, yes. The former Warriors keep beating the teams they’re competing with in the league for a bid (South Florida at home and now Cincinnati on the road not to mention the earlier win at UConn). Buzz Williams’ bunch now has 8 wins in conference with four Big East games left. They go to St. John’s and Seton Hall next (neither are gimmees) and finish up with Louisville and Notre Dame at home. I find it hard to imagine a team with 10 wins in the Big east being left out but stranger things have definitely happened. If they get 11 Big East wins, plus one in NYC, that would keep them safe. Beating Louisville — and any combination of two the others –would be huge.

Dwight Buycks’ ankle is a concern for the depth-deprived Golden Eagles. Buzz Williams’ text to me this morning said “today is an important day for Buycks to see how his ankle responds to treatment.”

What’s Up With Yancy Gates and his Minutes?

Cincinnati coach Mick Cronin asked a reporter who he would have guard Lazar Hayward when asked about Gates only playing 22 minutes in a loss that cemented — barring a miraculous run in the Big East tourney — another year of missing the big dance for the Bearcats. Gates played 22 minutes, sat a significant portion of the second half and didn’t play at all in the overtime. Gates was 6-9 from the field and on the year is shooting 55% and only commitng 2.3 fouls per game. He should be Cincinnati’s biggest nightmare for opponents yet he only plays 24 minutes a game.

It seemed as if Pitt’s win Thursday night showed how to punish the vertically-challenged Golden Eagles. Maybe the question Cronin should have been asking himself is “who can guard Yancy Gates?” Lance Stephenson is a shell of himself as well at this point and also saw limited minutes. Seems crazy now that “Born Ready” passed up a chance to play at a school about to make their ninth tournament in a row because his people were concerned their wouldn’t be enough talent around him to win. Now he’s barely playing in the biggest game of the year for a team that isn’t even going to sniff the tourney. If he felt the need to go to school in Ohio, Stephenson would’ve been better off going to Akron and playing for Keith Dambrot. Cincinnati was supposed to breakthrough this year — Instead, they’re crashing.

Big Monday: WVU at UConn

7 pm tilt has Connecticut looking for another “notch in the belt” win as they try to overcome the inconsistency issues caused by a myriad of issues (including Jim Calhoun’s medical leave). Momentum is a great asset particular when you have the kind of ballers UConn does at their disposal. Winning tonight is again a must for the Dawgs. Intriguing matchups uo and down the rosters on this one but the ones I’ll be watching closely are — Kemba Walker vs Truck Bryant (reunion of Gauchos point guards). “Young Kemba” has been a Lion as of late and I’m not sure West Virginia has an answer for him or Jerome Dyson on the perimeter. Da’Sean Butler — who guards him? Stanley Robinson maybe? Stanley Robinson and Devin Ebanks will undoubtedly go head up at least a few times throughout the night. Finally, I’m curious if this isn’t a breakout game for Deniz Kilicilli. Gavin Edwards, who’s been very good all year for UConn, will do his best to prevent it. Home court is always huge.

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