We know that Syracuse fans like getting the perspective from the opposition, so we’re thankful that Panthers fan, Pittsburgh Basketball Shouting took some time to answer our questions and humor our nonsense.
TNIAAM: Looking at the numbers, it seems like the offense has been the problem for Pitt. What’s the main cause in your opinion? It looks like they struggle to make shots against better teams so is it the athletes or the shot selection?
PBS: HELLO THERE! SO THIS IS THE MOST POORLY CONSTRUCTED ROSTER
OF – nah, kidding, we’re not doing that for a thousand words.
This the most poorly constructed roster of the Capel era. There are some good pieces; I think most of our important players would get minutes on other big-time rosters. But they haven’t formed into a cohesive whole. They’re very reliant on the shooters having good nights, they don’t move the ball around well, and they’re small compared to the rest of the ACC, so they get beat up front and can easily fall out of games when no one has the hot hand. I won’t try to ascribe blame to why they’re like this, but it’s January and this team still hasn’t quite figured out an offensive identity.
Capel has also almost always run a very short rotation out there, which last year and this year has made the team especially vulnerable to foul trouble within games and injuries in the span of the season. (They haven’t played very aggressively this season, although I don’t know for sure if that’s related.) In Pitt’s first two ACC games (against Miami and Clemson) they have actually kept it pretty close in the early going – again, the roster is not devoid of talent – before a late fade as they got worn down by bigger and deeper teams.
TNIAAM: Cameron Corhen leads the team in scoring and rebounding and it looks like he’s got to carry a heavy load inside. How does Pitt try and get him the ball on offense?
PBS: So, to the depth point: we netted Dishon Jackson (6’11”) as a transfer in the offseason, who was the starting center for a very good Iowa State team last year. But then he was sidelined for medical reasons before the season began. Papa Kante (6’10”) hasn’t played since the end of November, and we found out earlier this week that he’s now out for the season. I tell you that so you understand that while Cam is a serviceable-to-good frontcourt player, his counting stats and usage numbers have a lot to do with him being the only real rotation guy left who’s taller than 6’6″, plus none of the other players having emerged as The Guy. (Five players have led the team in scoring in the last seven games.)
I don’t think any Pitt fan would call him the team’s best player or star, but he definitely has a heavy workload; he’s the only true, healthy big on the roster besides 7’0″ developmental prospect Kieran Mullen, who is now getting minutes out of necessity. (The next tallest guy on the roster is a 6’7″ walk-on. Not great.)
TNIAAM: Neither team shoots the 3 well, do you expect to see both try to pack in the defense and let their opponent take a lot of outside shots?
PBS: Pitt’s going to clog up the middle out of necessity because of the frontcourt depth situation I just mentioned, but your guys probably shouldn’t – this is (IN THEORY) a team built around shooting, whose best moments have come on days where the stars align and the shots drain. The best this team has looked all season was a neutral-site game in Hershey against Penn State in which they shot 50% from deep and had the nitters doubled up at halftime. (Granted, those guys are also terrible this year, but a win over Penn State is always a win over Penn State.) Pitt probably needs either Barry Dunning or Damarco Minor, who had a game-winning three over Ohio State that kept the season out of “total disaster” territory, to shoot well from range for them to stay competitive in ACC play. So regardless of whether it’s working or not, I don’t expect Pitt to totally abandon the long ball.
TNIAAM: It sounds like both fanbases are ready for a change, is there any chatter about possible replacements for Capel? Was there a good reason he was brought back this year?
PBS: I think the case for Jeff Capel returning this season involved both a lot of coasting off of the goodwill of the 2023 and 2024 teams (Portland Trail Blazers Call Up Blake Hinson Right Now) and the looming promise of an elite 2026 recruiting class coming in next year. I was never optimistic about this year’s team, but back in October I did think he’d survive with an anonymous 8-10 sort of season just to keep that class together. But things have gone south in such a way that to the extent that there IS chatter about Pitt basketball this season, it’s in favor of canning the guy. I can’t speak to how feasible this is for us financially, as Pitt is famously not QUITE public, but I do find it weird that even as a relative broke boy program we somehow don’t have a buyout fund saved up from all the times Pat Narduzzi wriggled his way out of a jam. (You know he’s now the EIGHTH longest-tenured football coach in FBS? I barely remember life without him anymore.)
If Capel were to get canned tomorrow, the fans would definitely clamor for Brandin Knight, who’s been an assistant at Rutgers for years now and I think was interviewed for the job both after Dixon left and after the Stallings fiasco. But that would also be Allen Greene’s first major hire as Pitt’s AD, and if it’s not Knight or someone already beloved by the fans it might have to be some big swing just to show that this program can survive in this current era of athletics. That’s right: we’re poaching Sean Miller from Texas. No one can stop me, and I will never die!
TNIAAM: Would you be ok if we let Carl Krauser and Eric Devendorf suit up to add some juice to this game?
PBS: Make it Chris Taft for our side and you’ve got a deal. (All love to CK.)
TNIAAM: Who wins the game and why?
PBS: Hofstra, somehow.
Before you get mad, remember that we ALSO lost to them this year; between that and an earlier loss to Quinnipiac, I’ve been trying to reassure myself that this team is not worse than the extinction event that was the Kevin Stallings team that went winless in conference. I do believe this team will pick up some conference wins soon, but they’ll be on days with some hot shooting from three of the backcourt guys, plus Corhen staying on the court for 35+ minutes and not getting overwhelmed by a star big on the other side. (If not for foul trouble, Malik Reneau would’ve had the game of his life against us the other week.) There are some serious matchup problems for this team in ACC play, and Syracuse isn’t one of them, so maybe Saturday’s one of the four or five times that probably happens this season.
But I haven’t believed in this team once this season and I’m not gonna start now. Syracuse 70, Pitt 62.
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We thank Pitt Basketball Shouting for not yelling the entire time, but we know a reverse jinx attempt when we see it.
