Men’s Basketball: Patterson carries Panthers to another Big East road victory

Lamar Patterson carried the Pitt men’s basketball team to its third consecutive victory on Tuesday night.

The redshirt junior small forward scored 17 points and grabbed seven rebounds as the Panthers (16-4, 4-3 Big East) survived a late rally at Providence College to defeat the Friars (10-9, 2-5 Big East) by a score of 68-64 in the last conference matchup between the Big East foes.

Pitt never trailed, but it wasn’t an easy triumph for Coach Jamie Dixon’s team. The Friars cut a late double-digit deficit to just two points before freshman point guard James Robinson iced the game by hitting two clutch free throws with nine seconds to play.

The Panthers jumped out to an early 5-0 lead after center Steven Adams scored the game’s first five points, but the freshman then picked up two quick fouls and sat for the remainder of the first period.

Losing Adams didn’t slow Pitt down, though. The visitors led by as many as 12 points in the first half, in which they shot 52 percent, largely thanks to Patterson’s 11 points on 4-for-5 shooting.

Providence didn’t go away, however, and the Friars found themselves down just seven at the break. Coach Ed Cooley’s team has been improving steadily the past few seasons and had won two of its last three Big East games. The Friars had the momentum after they cut the Pitt lead to just two points with 7:27 remaining.

But Patterson and senior point guard Tray Woodall helped extend the lead back to 10 with 2:24 left before the Panthers held off the Friars’ final surge.

Pitt will look to extend its winning streak to four games against DePaul at home on Saturday at 4 p.m. The Panthers have never lost to the Blue Demons at the Petersen Events Center since DePaul joined the Big East in 2005.