WVU Readies For Pitt

WVU Readies For Pitt

By John Antonik for MSNsportsNET.com March 9, 2006 DOWNLOAD TONY CARIDI'S PREGAME PODCAST (1:39) MORGANTOWN, W.Va. -- The Backyard Brawl has moved to New York City’s Madison Square Garden. No. 3-seeded West Virginia will take on No. 6 seed Pittsburgh in the final Big East tournament quarterfinal game Thursday night at 9 pm. Pittsburgh coach Jamie Dixon shouts instructions to his players late in the game against Louisville during the first round of the Big East Conference basketball tournament Wednesday, March 8, 2006 at Madison Square Garden in New York. Pittsburgh won 61-56. AP photo/Julie Jacobson Earlier games will pit No. 1-seeded Connecticut against 9-seed Syracuse at noon, No. 4-seeded Marquette against fifth-seeded Georgetown at 2, and No. 2-seeded Villanova playing 10th-seeded Rutgers at 7 pm. The Scarlet Knights pulled off the only upset Wednesday, downing 7th-seeded Seton Hall 61-48. The Panthers (22-6) advanced to tonight’s quarterfinals by beating Louisville 61-56 in a peculiar game in which Pitt came uncomfortably close to blowing a huge 28-point lead. Pitt used a smothering defense and the big-time atmosphere of Madison Square Garden to its advantage in the first half against a young Louisville team, jumping out to a 33-5 lead. The Cardinals missed its first 13 field goal attempts and finished the first half shooting just 20.8 percent to help the Panthers build a 39-16 lead at intermission. In the second half, Pitt got conservative with its big lead and nearly squandered it. The Panthers did not make a single field goal over the remaining 13:40 and connected on only four field goal attempts in the second half. Louisville was able to get to within three points, 57-54, with 24 seconds remaining. “When you’re up by that much you have to understand that you have to keep playing,” said Pitt guard Carl Krauser, who finished with a game-high 19 points. “There is still a lot of time left and you don’t want to go out there and just think the game is over because every team in this Big East Conference is competitive.” Pitt dominated the backboards 43-30 and held Louisville to just 34 percent from the floor for the game. “We just got destroyed on the backboard and then panicked a little bit and took bad shots and got weighed down because of it,” said Louisville coach Rick Pitino. Panther coach Jamie Dixon was happy with his team’s defensive effort, particularly in the first half. “I thought obviously first half we played very well; defended very well which got our offense going and got a lot of good performances from a number of guys,” he said. Dixon made one slight adjustment to his starting lineup, inserting a third guard Keith Benjamin into the lineup in place of senior John DeGroat, who did not play against the Cardinals. “Keith has just been playing well,” Dixon said. “We saw something in Keith and he’s constantly improving and working hard and doing a good job as are all of our guys.” Tonight, Pitt is facing a well-rested West Virginia team earning its first ever bye in the Big East tournament after 11 years in the league. Dixon doesn’t think fatigue will be a factor having to make a quick 24-hour turnaround. “The most minutes anybody played was 31 for us so I think that was a good sign,” he said. “We would have been practicing anyway. These guys love to play and they’ve been playing anyway.” The Mountaineers (20-9) are coming off a season-ending 78-75 loss at Cincinnati last Saturday. West Virginia and Pitt met twice this year with the Panthers earning a 57-53 victory in Pittsburgh and West Virginia claiming a 67-62 win in Morgantown. “We should have done a better job in Morgantown, especially on the offensive end, because our team feeds so much on not only getting one shot on each possession, but two or three shots,” said 7-foot Pitt center Aaron Gray. “If we can do that we’ll be fine.” Dixon believes in order for his team to beat West Virginia it is going to be a matter of covering WVU’s 3-point shooters. “We got to defend and guard the perimeter as everybody knows -- there are no secrets there,” Dixon said. “Rebounding, we’ve got to beat them on the boards and do a great job just getting out on their shooters and doing it for 40 minutes. You can’t have any breakdowns because they’re so dangerous.” In the second game in Morgantown, 6-11 center Kevin Pittsnogle scored a game-high 26 points after going scoreless in the loss at Pittsburgh. Other than that scoreless performance in Pittsburgh, the center has played reasonably well in games against Pitt, scoring 49 points in a pair of victories his junior season. Gray says got to stick to Pittsnogle a little closer this time. “He got a lot of good looks early and just started feeling it,” Gray said. “He did a great job of getting his teammates involved and he just got hot.” These two teams have never met in Big East tournament play, but do have a history playing each other in the post-season. The Panthers upset No. 9-rated West Virginia 79-72 in the Eastern Eight championship game in Pittsburgh in 1982, and West Virginia beat Pitt twice: once in an ECAC tournament game in Morgantown in 1975 (75-73) and once in an Eastern Collegiate Basketball League (ECBL) tournament game in Philadelphia (66-54) in 1977. The two teams will be meeting for the 171st time in series play. West Virginia has a 92-78 overall advantage and has won three of the last four, but Pitt leads the series 10-8 since West Virginia joined the Big East. Pitt is ranked 15th this week and West Virginia is 19th. Both teams are expected to play in the NCAA tournament. ESPN will televise the game nationally.