Men’s Basketball: Pitt to take on Cincinnati

The Pitt men’s basketball team rarely loses at the Petersen Events Center. In fact, it… The Pitt men’s basketball team rarely loses at the Petersen Events Center. In fact, it hasn’t lost two in a row at home since 2005.

But in order to avoid a second-consecutive home loss when the Cincinnati Bearcats visit tomorrow at 6 p.m., the No. 4 Panthers (20-2, 8-1 Big East) will have to snap out of the miniature offensive slump that caused them to fall to No. 15 Notre Dame last Monday and almost lose to Rutgers on the road Saturday.

Breaking out of their funk might be tough against the Bearcats. Cincinnati (18-4, 5-4 Big East) has the best scoring defense in the conference, allowing 56.9 points per game.

Much of that stellar defensive play comes from the Bearcats’ experienced group of forwards. Junior Yancy Gates leads the trio with 11.4 points and 6.9 rebounds per game. Ibrahima Thomas, a 6-foot-11 senior, makes scoring in the paint difficult, and the versatile Rashad Bishop chips in at both ends.

“[Gates] is a really good post player. Last year he had a really good game against us,” Pitt center Gary McGhee said. “He’s going to be a load inside, so I’ll have to bring my A-game.”

In the Bearcats’ home loss to West Virginia last Saturday, though, the Mountaineers double-teamed Gates and held him to seven points. Sophomore guard Cashmere Wright had a career-high 24 points, but no other Bearcat had double digits in the 66-55 defeat.

“You have to try and stop [Gates] inside,” West Virginia head coach Bob Huggins said after the win. “And Bishop does everything for them. He’s a terrific defender and can shoot the three.”

Huggins’ Mountaineers also frustrated Dion Dixon, Cincinnati’s leading scorer. Dixon averages 12 points per game to complement Gates down low, but he scored only seven in the Bearcats’ first home loss of the season.

The Panthers also struggled offensively in their last game but gained a more fortunate result. Ashton Gibbs finished with 24 points, but the rest of the team went 7 of 31 from the floor in a 65-62 win over the Scarlet Knights.

“We have to do some things a little bit better,” Pitt head coach Jamie Dixon said. “Shot selection-wise we’re always challenging ourselves to get the best shots available with either passing, penetration, movement, screening and those types of things, so we worked on our offense a lot this week.”

Gibbs leads Pitt with 15.9 points per game, the seventh-best average in the Big East. No player in the conference makes more 3-pointers per game than him.

As a team, the Panthers have the Big East’s best shooting percentage behind the arc. Pitt also out-rebounds the rest of the conference, causing all sorts of problems for its opponents. Jamie Dixon’s patient, defense-first style of play has translated to a two-game lead in the Big East, despite the recent scare at Rutgers and loss to Notre Dame.

Cincinnati started the season as hot as Pitt, as the Bearcats won their first 15 games to become one of the nation’s last unbeaten teams. Conference play brought them down to earth, though — they lost to No. 7 Villanova, No. 4 Syracuse and No. 16 Notre Dame in a 10-day span.

And despite falling to West Virginia last week, Bearcats head coach Mick Cronin kept a level head and noted the toughness of every Big East matchup.

“In our league, you are only as good as your next game,” Cronin said.

The Bearcats and Panthers have each had a full week to prepare for the game. But Saturday’s game kicks off a busy portion of each team’s schedule. The Panthers play at West Virginia Monday evening, and the Bearcats are in Chicago to face DePaul on Tuesday.