Pitt 51 WVU 70

That was one of the worst performances by a Pitt basketball team I have seen since Ralph Willard. The fact that it came against a rival makes it all the harder to understand. First the bad.

Pitt, as a team, had five assists (three coming from Nas Robinson).

Gary McGhee had an impressive seven offensive boards, but managed to miss eight shots (all layups) and had two (as in 2) defensive boards.

Dante Taylor got dominated by a guy who has never played a game of significance in America (and deservedly got benched the rest of the game in favor of J.J. Richardson a.k.a. Not the incoming McDonalds All-American).

This is Brad Wannamaker's line for the evening: 30 minutes, 0-4 FG, 0-2 FT, 2 D-RB, 1 STL, 0 AST, 2 TO, 3 PF, Zero Impact. As solid as Wannamaker has been this year (despite being my favorite whipping boy in his first two years), it was very disappointing that he just did not show up tonight.

Gil Brown had a similar line, but managed only 18 minutes of non-existence.

Travon Woodall had a nice layup, but then managed a turnover by simply walking the ball up the court.

Lastly, Ashton Gibbs. He was terrible, and has not had a good game since Cinci (8 games ago). No more excuses, he needs to play better. If he doesn't start shooting much, much better, someone else needs to step up to take more shots, unfortunately it doesn't seem like anybody is up for the task (or worthy of it).

The only good news; this is probably the most talented WVU team since the Jerry West/Rob Thorn era. It may not be the best team (those Beilein teams were pretty damn good but mostly due to coaching... and Kevin Pittsnoggle), but this team is long, quick, and deep.

The other good news, there are still eight more Big East games left, plenty of time for Pitt to turn the season around. But they better figure it out sooner or later (preferably sooner), because I don't know how much more of this type of basketball I can take.

Besides the actual play, there was some other interesting stuff. Bob Huggins the PA guy (a task I've seen him perform several times), Tom Herrion (CofC's coach my first two years there and an absolutely dreadful head coach, but has found his niche as an assistant with Pitt) getting nailed by a coin right in the face, and then the color commentator going on an intense rant about safety at basketball games, after which it got really awkward (like when you get reprimanded by your boss at a holiday party).

My thoughts, why would anybody be surprised by this type of behavior from Mountaineer fans? Their scum, plain and simple (well, most of them at least). Although I did appreciate the "Suck my Dixon" chants. You stay classy, West Virginia.

As for the fight/scrum/a couple brothers falling on top of an old white guy, I was surprised McGhee didn't get thrown out because it looked like he attempted to (open-hand) slap Flowers in the face after being elbowed and then again when he was falling towards the floor (he missed on both). I thought Flowers showed great restraint as he was coming down towards McGhee at the end, because it looked like he was ready to unleash a hay-maker. It didn't really matter, although I still don't understand how Nas Robinson and Ebanks got the only two technicals.

I stole that pic from Mondesi's House by the way. I'll be waiting to hear from his lawyers.