Pitt/Davidson 12/20/15
- Thread starter sck1025
- Start date
Well, that's your Gotham Classic game, more than likely. Look, Davidson is a respectable program and in the A10 now but if THIS is our marquee OOC game besides the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, oh geez. Pitt/Davidson simply isnt a big enough deal to go to MSG to play it. I'm afraid of what attendance might be like for that.
Pitt needs more games against teams that will get fans excited. A game against Davidson in front of 3,000 people on an NFL Sunday probably isnt the way to do it. Hopefully Barnes can get us some better games next year.
Its frustrating how that team 70 miles to the south is always able to get better OOC games and tournaments than we do. They're in the Las Vegas Invitational with Cal (who had an excellent recruiting class), San Diego State, and Richmond. They play 3 P5 schools (UVa, VT, Florida) and have a rivalry game against Marshall which is roughly the equivalent of our game against Duquesne though Marshall is probably the better program. If they can get these games, we probably can also.
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We know Dixon like to play at MSG so it is kinda sad that Davidson (not knocking Davidson) is the best they could come up with.
Pitt/UConn or Pitt/Georgetown would have been way cooler.... What, FIVE BET championships between us and those two? Would have brought back a lot of memories of the old BE.
Pitt/UConn or Pitt/Georgetown would have been way cooler.... What, FIVE BET championships between us and those two? Would have brought back a lot of memories of the old BE.
I know that most of this is not up to Pitt but the neutral site events we get into are never anything to write home about, nothing really to get excited about. There's never any buzz generated. Even in Maui, we draw Chaminade in the first round, a game that doesn't even count for NCAA Tourney and RPI purposes, then get blitzed by SDSU and beat a KST team that didnt make the NIT.
We were in 2 Legends Classics with terrible fields. Texas Tech was in both for crying out louds. I mean this year, Duke and Wisky are in it. A few years ago, Legends had Gtown, Indiana, and UCLA in the same field.
In the NIT, we had to play Delaware at MSG. And besides playing Duke at MSG, our other MSG games have been against a down and out Indiana program at the time, OK ST, Washington, Cincy, and now Davidson. Its just amazing that we cant get better games than this. I'm not asking for blue bloods. We're not going to get Kansas or Kentucky but I just can't believe that we can't get neutral site games, tournaments, or home and homes with programs like Ohio State, Michigan State, Michigan, Nova, Gtown, UConn, Temple, Florida, Memphis, etc.
Pitt just played Michigan at MSG two years ago when they were ranked #4. I guess that one didn't count.
Part of the problem is that Dixon makes it obvious that he'll play any game in NYC that he can. They have no leverage in these deals. Is Pitt going to go play in Orlando or LA because Gotham didn't give them a better opponent? No. You're also limited in how often you can play these events, so it isn't like Dixon can even play these NYC events off of each other. He's got 1-2 options to play there in a given year. He really needs to strive to be making tournaments like Maui and Atlantis every 6-8 years each and then fill in with better NYC events when possible.
One thing that I think hurt Pitt about the move to the ACC is the invitations to top events. If Maui gets only one ACC team per year and have a 4-year cycle, 2 of those years are going to be Duke and UNC, then you have other options like Louisville and Syracuse. It just isn't realistic for Pitt to be a candidate all that often. Honestly, that might be why he agrees to these dregs in NYC events, because he doesn't think he can risk pissing them off and no longer being one of their top choices out of the ACC.
last year was Richmond vs. Pepperdine and NC State vs. West Virginia in MSG
Also, Nova just inked a home/home deal with Va.
Also, Nova just inked a home/home deal with Va.
UVa is upgrading their OOC. They have signed on for an annual in-state series with VCU which makes a lot of sense and now have the Nova series. These home and homes are becoming more and more commonplace. Just about every team has one outside of their conference challenge. Good for Nova and UVa.
Davidson would be a better game if they had been doing their winning in the A10 all along. The bad thing is, they're a team that very well could beat Pitt. This is by no means a cupcake game. People thought they would take some lumps moving to the A10 last year. Didn't happen. The difference between Davidson, and say, Butler, Xavier, or Gonzaga, is that the other three have been able to build a higher profile. Xavier did it playing in one of the top non P5 leagues over an extended period. Butler played in 2 title games. Gonzaga has been at it for nearly 2 decades. Davidson is still building their brand. If they can maintain this level as an A10 team, then they would become the type of team I'd want to play home and home. At this point, they offer a high risk, low reward encounter. Would be sort of like Kentucky coming to play Pitt at the Pete. Pitt could win that game, and UK would be slammed for losing to Pitt.
What you said is true and I dont know what Davidson will be like next season but if we beat them and their final RPI is like 35, that's a big-time W in the committee's eyes. I dont necessarily the game in and of itself, just wished Pitt could "luck" into more higher profile games, games that the average fan would get more excited about.
What will be interesting here is if Barnes changes the strategy on this practiced by Pederson. The thing that you want is to schedule long term home and away games with the likes of UConn, Georgetown, etc... with one such game away and one home each year... and the problem was Pederson was too much if a wimp to do that and seems like EVERYONE ELSE (like Syracuse) is going in this direction.
Again, will be interesting to see if Barnes changes things here but a problem he is gonna have... is a lot of schools may have already made their deals and there won't be much left.
Again, will be interesting to see if Barnes changes things here but a problem he is gonna have... is a lot of schools may have already made their deals and there won't be much left.
So I guess playing Gonzaga in a neutral site game isn't something to get excited about either--or did you forget who we're opening the season with this Fall?
I am not excited about it because it is in Japan and that is a long plane ride for a west coast team and a REALLY long ways to go for an east coast team.
And.... first game of the season teams are usually not up to speed so it doesn't really mean that much.
Lastly... I see Gonzaga as a school that does not have a challenging conference schedule so they put their major effort into their OOC schedule and thus are a dangerous opponent to play OOC.
So, yeah, lets go out there and take them out.
