A lot of people bout to get drunk on Pitt kool aid---same team that Rutgers out played for 30+ minutes..
if anything, what everyone learned the past week is take things one game at a time. From Arizona State and Stanford to UNC and Uconn, etc.
Matchups, Matchups, Matchups
oh yeah...most likely 9 Big East teams will be ranked tomorrow. This aint cute anymore.
. To hell with conference pride.
...
PANTHERS PROVE POINT
My bad.
Now I'm sold on The Big Bad Pittsburgh Panthers.
Sometimes it's difficult to get a true read on teams in the preseason when they aren't going up against other Top 25 clubs - as Jamie Dixon's teamfailed to do.
I knew Pittsburgh once again had toughness with three guys - Levance Fields, DeJuan Blair and Sam Young - that are about as blue-collar as it gets. They alsoadded Jermaine Dixon, a lock-down defender.
But it was difficult to tell where they stacked up against the upper-tier teams because, well, the Panthers had yet to measure themselves against any of them.Their best victory was at Florida State - a team that will likely be on the bubble come March.
But Dixon made a valid point.
``They're all in our league," he laughed. "It's hard to play ranked teams when one-third of them are in the Big East."
In Dixon's defense, Pittsburgh did have an open date for a game against a BCS team at Madison Square Garden. However, no one stepped up, so the Panthersinstead grabbed a non-conference home game against Siena.
It wasn't that I didn't feel as though the Panthers were capable of taking the mantle (for now) as
The Team Behind NorthCarolina. However, they hadn't been battled-tested by a legitimate Final Four contender.
Dixon's team absolutely ran away from a Georgetown club that drilled former No. 2 UConn in Hartford.
What does this, along with St. John's win against Notre Dame, about the Big East?
It'll be filled with unpredictability.
Pittsburgh controlled the glass against a Hoyas team that needs to find a way to get more out of their bench - especially either Julian Vaughn or Henry Sims.Georgetown's reserves scored a total of two points and the quartet of Vaughn, Sims and guards Jason Clark and Omar Wattad logged 25 total minutes in theloss.
The Panthers also managed to win fairly easily despite being ineffective from long distance (3-of-19 from beyond the arc).
``I feel good about this team," Dixon said while out recruiting in New Jersey after the game. ``This team is getting better. They do the right thing andexecute."
The Panthers, and in particular Levance Fields, are doing a nice job taking care of the ball. Dixon said that he's seen improvement with Fields, who misseda good chunk of last season and all of the preseason with a foot injury.
``We kept trying to see if he wanted to come out today, but he played 36 minutes and played the entire second half without coming off the floor," Dixonsaid. "It's almost like playing him into shape."
VOLS BATTLE TESTED
One guy you can't ever question as far as a non-conference slate is concerned is Tennessee's Bruce Pearl.
After losing at Kansas, Pearl's team still has to play Gonzaga and Memphis prior to SEC play.
``I'm OK with where we're at right now," he said.
Pearl was obviously disappointed with his players lack of a sense of urgency - especially early in the game - and their overall lack of toughness.
While he praised Bobby Maze and admitted that there is no way the Vols are a Top 25 team without him, he also said the junior college point guard needs to takemore pride in his defense.
``He's had a couple of pretty good defensive efforts," Pearl said. "But this wasn't one of them."
The Vols look like a team you'd hate to meet up with in a dark alley in layup lines, but just don't play with the physical toughness.
``People forget that we lost five guys from last year and this is supposed to be a rebuilding year," Pearl said.
True, but with success comes expectations.
RANDOM NOTES: Here's how smart Bill Self is: When he walked out of the tunnel just minutes prior to the start of Kansas' game againstTennessee, he shook one person's hand: Elite junior Harrison Barnes, who was sitting in the front row behind the Jayhawks bench on an unofficial visit.Self really is one of those guys who just "gets it". While many coaches appear uncomfortable mixing with fans, Self is basically a fan at heart -other than the fact that his bank account is much larger than most these days. … If I'm a low or mid-major athletic director in the Midwest, I'm allover bringing former Missouri State coach Barry Hinson aboard. The guy is a proven coach and is what college basketball is all about. … There's aperception that former NBA guys aren't cut out to be college assistant coaches because they don't have the work ethic. Well, Kansas assistant DannyManning was the last one to leave the office about 4 ½ hours after the game ended. … The Morris Twins - Marcus and Markieff - have plenty of natural ability -but it's apparent they haven't really been coached yet and the fact they weren't cleared to practice with the team until late in the preseason hasset them back significantly. … I have to admit that I never thought Brady Morningstar would be starting for Kansas, but he's done a terrific job makingopen shots and has been tremendous defensively despite his somewhat limited athleticism. … I thought the key play of the game was when Vols big man Wayne Chismthrew up an ill-advised 3-pointer with four minutes left after Tyler Smith's block and Cameron Tatum's subsequent 3-pointer had trimmed Kansas'lead to 77-70.
....
[h2]
Did I say UNC could go undefeated? Really?[/h2]
The flaw in my opinion that North Carolina
could go undefeated wasn't that the achievement is impossible.
The flaw was that I failed to recognize that UNC
always loses home games it shouldn't.
There was a home loss to unranked Miami three seasons ago; a home loss to unranked Virginia Tech two seasons ago; a home loss to unranked Maryland last season; and now there's a home loss to unranked Boston College
this season -- an
85-78 home loss Sunday night in which the Tar Heels were 23-point favorites.
So long, perfection.
So long, No. 1 ranking.
So what the hell are we to make of this?
Answer: A lot
and nothing, if that makes much sense.
It means a lot because it shows the Tar Heels are fully capable of screwing this up in the win-or-go home format that is the NCAA tournament. On various nights they have to
outscore their opponents because their defense can be suspect, and that's always going to be a concern, whether they can beat a quality opponent when they need 85 points to do it. On the other hand, it means nothing because you can check with any Las Vegas bookmaker and I assure you he'll still have the Tar Heels as the favorites to win the ACC and national title even if they no longer have the nation's best resume or body of work. So in the grand scheme of things, it's not a big deal except for that it ensures UNC won't be the first team to go undefeated since Bob Knight's 1976 Indiana Hoosiers, and it probably takes the Tar Heels out of the running for
Team of the Decade or
Team of the Century or whatever.
And that's too bad.
Because that's what I thought they
could be.
But now they look more like Ivan Drago with a cut over his eye against Rocky Balboa than Ivan Drago with a smirk on his face against Apollo Creed, and if you don't know what I'm talking about you should really watch
Rocky IV. To
quote Duke the Trainer, the Tar Heels have been hurt, which proves they're not machines; they're men. And now they're hurt men with a questionable home loss to an inferior opponent, just like they were at some point in each of the past three seasons, too.
