In the Pitt men’s basketball team’s Big East opener, No. 24 Pitt fell to No. 14 Cincinnati, 70-61, as the Bearcats used a second-half surge to overtake the Panthers.

Pitt head coach Jamie Dixon called Monday’s New Year’s Eve contest at the Petersen Events Center “a tale of two halves.”

At halftime, Pitt (12-2, 0-1 Big East) led Cincinnati 34-26 with a dominant defensive performance that pleased the raucous crowd of 12,510, which included a rowdy and nearly full Oakland Zoo. The Panthers kept the Bearcats offense in check by holding it to 29.6 percent shooting, while Pitt shot 48 percent in the opening half.

But Cincinnati (13-1, 1-0 Big East) came back strong in the second half, shooting 13-for-24 from the field — 54.2 percent — en route to scoring 44 second-half points in comparison to Pitt’s 27. Cincinnati started the second half with a six-nothing run on the Panthers and carried its hot second-half start all the way through to the end of the game.

Cincinnati gained its first lead of the game when Titus Rubles converted a layup over freshman center Steven Adams while drawing a foul on him. After converting the plus-one try, Cincinnati led 45-43, and the game never became any closer. The Bearcats lead by as much as 10 points in the second half.

Redshirt junior small forward Lamar Patterson was one of three Panthers to reach double-figure scoring, recording 13 points with four rebounds and four assists. Patterson summed up the game, noting that Pitt did not match Cincinnati’s intensity and toughness at the start of the second half.

“They just got after it. We didn’t come out the way we should have,” Patterson said. “I’m not going to doubt our toughness ever, but I felt like they were the tougher team today.”

In addition to Patterson, redshirt junior forward Talib Zanna led the Panthers with 16 points and redshirt sophomore guard Cameron Wright contributed 10 points of his own off the bench. A trio of Bearcats also put up double digits, with point guard Cashmere Wright notching a game-high 18 points, Sean Kilpatrick coming up short of his 18.8-points-per-game average with 16 and JaQuon Parker chipping in 13.

Although the scoreboard reflected impressive scoring performances, the theme of Pitt’s Big East opener lies within the willingness to fight on both sides and the ability to rebound the basketball — both of which Cincinnati proved to be superior at on Monday.

“It was a hard-fought game on both sides. They got to some of the loose balls quicker than us, and got some of the rebounds,” redshirt senior point guard Tray Woodall said.

Overall, Cincinnati out-rebounded Pitt by seven — 43 rebounds for Cincinnati to Pitt’s 36 — causing Dixon to once again cite the Panthers’ need to improve in that aspect of the game. For Dixon, rebounding was one part of how he broke down the Panthers’ second half collapse, something very uncharacteristic of a Pitt team.

“I don’t know how [getting outplayed in the second half] can happen. That’s usually something we don’t do. Year after year, we’ve seemed to come out in the second half and finish what we started,” Dixon said. “But give credit to Cincinnati — they played hard, they out-rebounded us by nine in the second half, made their free throws, knocked down shots, and really beat us off the dribble.”

As Dixon said, Cincinnati head coach Mick Cronin also believed rebounding played a large part in the game as well as defense overall. But offensively was where the Bearcats made their largest strides in the second half, shooting nearly double their rate from the field in the second when compared to the first half, which came as a result of Cincinnati spacing the floor better.

“[Pitt] is a great defensive team. Their help is always where it’s supposed to be,” Cronin said. “Once we slowed down — obviously we try to run — but once we slowed down and got the matchup we wanted and the spacing we wanted, you know we try to attack them one-on-one more than with set plays because they’ve always been this way under Jamie — they are the best at defending set offenses.”

Those one-on-one matchups paid large dividends for the Bearcats late, with Cashmere Wright knocking down a number of jumpers from the perimeter to prevent the Panthers from clawing back into the game.

Pitt’s next game will take place on Saturday against the Rutgers Scarlet Knights at the Louis Brown Athletic Center for the Panthers’ first true road game.

As a result of his team’s second defeat of the season, Dixon said Pitt will need to learn from it and play the way he knows these Panthers can play.

“I think we’re a better team than what we played in the second half, so we’re going to have to get to work and get back to work and figure it out,” Dixon said.