Pitt’s 6-game winning streak ends in loss to Virginia Tech
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After Pitt won six games in a row, no one expected the Panthers to maintain such a pace for the rest of the season.
Bad stuff can happen, and Pitt’s 79-72 loss Saturday to Virginia Tech before a crowd of 8,925 at Cassell Coliseum in Blacksburg, Va., should not have been totally unexpected.
“Life on the road is tough,” assistant coach Milan Brown said on the 93.7 FM postgame show.
Yet, the tone of Pitt’s first loss since Jan. 21 sent up warning signals with four games left in the regular season.
The Panthers trailed for more than 33 of the game’s 40 minutes, were lacking in back-to-back defensive stops and — this one really hurt — suddenly lost their touch from beyond the 3-point arc.
They traded punches in the second half with the Hokies, who had lost 10 of their previous 14 games, but never were a serious threat to the ACC’s 11th-place team.
Virginia Tech (16-11, 6-10) put together an 18-2 run in the first half, was up 11 at halftime and was in control for most of the game.
What it means for the moment is Pitt (19-8, 12-4) has fallen from a first-place tie in the ACC to third behind Virginia and Miami, one-half game ahead of fourth-place Clemson.
Coach Jeff Capel was careful not to criticize his team, but he had plenty of praise for the Hokies in the areas that normally decide outcomes late in the season and in postseason tournaments.
“They played with a sense of urgency, and they played with a physicality and knocked us off a little bit and we weren’t able to get into the rhythm,” Capel said.
“They played like a team that was desperate, and they played terrific basketball.”
Pitt was thrown off its game by foul trouble, with four starters either fouling out or finishing with four. Virginia Tech shot 28 foul shots — a season high for a Pitt opponent — and made 20.
Blake Hinson, whose 3-point shooting skill could have helped rally his team, fouled out with six minutes to play after scoring four points, his second-lowest output of the season.
“We played with some odd lineups,” Capel said. “We have to do a better job of defending without fouling.”
For the game, Pitt made a season-low three 3-pointers in 18 attempts. In fact, they tried only six from long range — and made one — in the first half.
“They did a good job of taking us off the 3-point line, being there on the catch,” Capel said. “They were sticking with our shooters more, not helping (in other areas).
“They were more physical live than I’ve seen them on tape all year. You can tell (coach) Mike (Young) had them ready, really ready.”
Several times when Pitt made a modest push to overtake its host, the Hokies answered with points.
“They shot the heck out of it. They executed the heck out of it,” Capel said.
For the most part, Pitt had no real answers for Virginia Tech’s big men, especially with Federiko Federiko in foul trouble.
Grant Basile (6-foot-9) scored 22 points, his fourth game in a row with 20 or more. Mylyjael Poteat, a 6-9 transfer from Rice, came off the bench to score a season-high 15 points in 19 minutes.
“What really hurt us were the backdoor layups, the cross screen where sometimes we didn’t communicate,” Brown said. “They run their offense too efficiently to give them layups.”
Added Capel: “They had us chasing all evening.”
The result was a defensive effort that didn’t match previous games and the most points allowed by the Panthers in a loss since West Virginia and Michigan scored 81 and 91 in November.
Capel credited the Hokies’ “speed and the manner in which they came off of things, screening.”
“We had some breakdowns, but they made us have those breakdowns,” he said.
With Hinson struggling from the field (1 for 8), Jamarius Burton took up the mantle on offense and led Pitt with 15 points. Federiko added 12 and Greg Elliott and Nelly Cummings 11 each.
Offense wasn’t always the problem, but Pitt usually wins with defense and communication. The Panthers were lacking in both areas.
“(The Hokies) did a really good job on the scouting report,” Burton said. “For us, we just have to play smarter, understand the scouting report a little bit, communicate more on the defensive end, call out switches, be more demanding with it.”
With the end of the season in sight, those areas grow in importance.