3 straight road games - Duke, GT, and Ville. If we go 2-1 or 3-0, then we will keep the positive momentum going and the energy in The Pete will continue. If we go 1-2 or 0-3, then we could see the negativity return quickly.

Pitt finishes 24th in the final AP rankings. Head coach Pat narduzzi has done wonders for this great program.

Funny enough, main person to not put pitt in the top 25? THAT D*CK JAMES FRAUDLIN. God I wish those pansies would restart the series so we can kick there butts year in and year out (btw, we would be 4-0 from 20-22 if those p words didn’t end the series in 19).

Anyways, hail to pitt and hail to DUZZ!

Brutal loss considering Pitt was leading comfortably for 25 minutes and were playing a great brand of basketball. There are a couple really deep issues with this team moving forward that I’m starting to see become a deep trend.

1.) Pitt has no answer underneath without Hugley and it’s becoming a MAJOR problem. Game in and game out Fede is getting in foul trouble and the Diaz Graham gets bullied in the paint.

2.) Capel’s offensive philosophy is insanely bizarre to me. The big knack on him has always been they are such an ISO team that thrives on 1 v 1’s and that’s great when Burton is beating his man off the bounce. But woooooof it looks ugly when they can’t.

3.) Pitt is in a must win situation these next 3 games. @ GT, @ Louisville, vs. FSU all have to be wins. If they slip up in any of those they’re going to damn near win out to make the tournament

This team has more talent and experience than Capel's others. Having said that, a one point home loss followed by a 2nd half collapse at Duke is giving me a bit of deja vu. We may be headed for a streak in the wrong direction. We have been exposed by size and have shown We cannot rebound our defensive glass. Even worse, Duke with its length and athletes that can keep our guards out of the lane, has shown other teams how to shut us down. We have been a good jump shooting team, but we can't rely on it solely, like in the 2nd half.
I can't help but think the refs horrible call on an inadvertent elbow from Burton took the game away from us right at the point it was up for grabs. This team is going to need to show some resilience coming back from this. I am not at all sure that we have what it takes to bounce back.

We'll be live after the Pitt-Duke game for the Panther-Lair Post-Game Show on YouTube. Tune in after the game with your comments and reactions.

Man, you would have taken that for sure

Or defensive rebound percentage? This is the worst I can remember in my lifetime. However, I cant trash this team. I still think its an NCAAT-quality team. Need to win the next 2 on the road.

Pickens is legit. Johnson isnt good enough.

Any word on Hugley’s status for today?

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New video, which specifically tells fans how they can donate to NIL efforts - which I think is a new step for the department.

Also, this might be bigger news - it appears that you can now donate individually to Alliance 412. I think that’s new, too?

Also interestingly PITT ended up with the same ranking that they had in this particular preseason poll. #22

Behind a paywall.

This line is very telling of the way the game may go this evening.... Hoping I am dead wrong but my guess is Pitt is going to be on the wrong side of this one tonight. Duke has way too much size in the paint that Pitt simply cannot defend right now without Hugley. If Hinson or Fede get in any sort of foul trouble, the twins will be eaten alive inside and on the glass.

This speaks to the bigger issue Pitt currently has. I firmly believe this is an NCAA tournament team with Hugley back - but there is no indication that he's going to suit up the rest of the year and seems like he's headed to a redshirt. Fede has been a pleasant surprise to be sure, but he is not the offensive threat this team needs to reach their full potential. Pitt is taking a lot of contested three pt shots because teams know Pitt will not dump it into the post to work inside out.

This team will surely live by the three and die by the three... we will see how it shakes out tonight, but Duke's size gives me plenty of concern tonight's game could go south in a hurry.

New one out today. 6 ACC teams in(Duke, UVA, UNC, NC State, Miami, and Clemson as a 10 seed) and not us, we also aren’t in the first 4 out or next 4 out, though VT is. So according to Lundari we aren’t in the Top 7 ACC teams

Who wins it all next year?

Condensed highlights from their recent game where the played and almost lost to BC.
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He's on the short-list. Not good enough for Pitt fans, just like Jamie Dixon as they prefer unproven lottery tickets....but good enough to be considered by a near-blue blood.

I don't think he gets a job that good that fast though. If, however, we hire some mid-major guys over a proud Pitt alum next March, there should be an investigation.

Wow, just realized UGA-TCU is coming up tonight. Was too wrapped up in Pitt MBB vs Clemson, Steelers and other NFL end of regular season activities this past weekend.

Here’s hoping TCU can hang with UGA and make it an interesting game tonight.

Despite their recent success, the first player I think of when someone mentions Georgia football is Herschel Walker. And if you mention TCU, I’d think of LaDainian Tomlinson. I realize I’m showing my age, but those are the players I think of.

Now for my question, who’s the player that non-Panther fans would think of if you mention Pitt?

While you’re at it, what about PSU, WVU, and Notre Dame? Who do you think of first?

Feel free to add other schools as well. It’s officially the off-season, so we’ve got time to kill….

1 FG in the final 12 minutes against BC. They are not a top 25 team. Very, very beatable.