Men’s Basketball: Panthers take five-game winning streak to Notre Dame to face Harangody-less Irish

The Pitt men’s basketball team has endured a rollercoaster of a Big East schedule, and the… The Pitt men’s basketball team has endured a rollercoaster of a Big East schedule, and the final stretch is approaching. The Panthers travel to South Bend, Ind., to play Notre Dame tonight for the first of the regular season’s last four contests.

It’s been a journey for No. 12 Pitt (21-6, 10-4), as Big East play began with a five-game winning streak followed by losing four out of its next five. Now the Panthers are on another five-game tear.

The Panthers are ranked third in the Big East standings, one game behind Villanova and two games behind Syracuse. With all four of Pitt’s final opponents (Notre Dame, St. John’s, Providence and Rutgers) sporting losing conference records, a regular-season conference title is not out of reach.

While the Panthers are eyeing a regular season title and a double-bye in the Big East tournament, the Irish are trying to claw their way into the NCAA postseason. With four games to play, a victory against Pitt would help bolster the Tournament resumé of Notre Dame (17-10, 6-8).

If the Irish pull off an upset it will have to be without the assistance of All-American Luke Harangody. The South Bend Tribune reported Monday that Harangody will miss his third straight game because of a right knee injury.

Without Harangody, Notre Dame has lost to St. John’s and Louisville by a combined three-point margin. Harangody averages 24.1 points and 10 rebounds per game. His presence could have been the difference between the NCAA Tournament and the NIT.

With their senior star sidelined, the Irish will turn to junior forward Tim Abromaitis for a scoring threat. The 6-foot-8 Abromaitis is a sniper from behind the 3-point stripe. He makes 49 percent of his 3-point shots averages 17.3 points per game.

In the past two contests, with Harangody nursing his knee, Abromaitis has scored 24 and 29 points. Another player who will need to play well for Irish coach Mike Brey, is Mississippi State transfer Ben Hansbrough, who is shooting with a 45 percent success rate from beyond the arc and averaging 12.1 points per game.

As Notre Dame looks for someone to carry the offensive load, the Panthers will focus on continuing to spread the wealth.

At the beginning of the season, it looked as if Ashton Gibbs were the sole scoring threat for the Panthers. Now Gibbs, Brad Wanamaker, Gilbert Brown and Jermaine Dixon are all averaging double-figures points per game.

The success of those four, combined with the recent emergence of redshirt freshman Travon Woodall, makes it difficult for opponents to predict who the ball is going to on a given possession.

“That’s something that excites me about our team. We ran sets for four or five different guys down the stretch [of the Villanova game]. We really do have balance,” Pitt head coach Jamie Dixon said after Sunday’s 70-65 win over Villanova.

To Dixon, Pitt’s growing balance shows progression and improvement on the court.

“We’ve probably improved as much as any team in the country from November to February,” Dixon said. “But we still have plenty of room to improve and plenty of things that we can do better.”

The improved Panther bunch will face the bottom half of the Big East to close out the season, while conference leaders Syracuse and Villanova play each other Feb. 27. Since Pitt holds tiebreakers over both the Orange and the Wildcats, a regular-season conference is attainable if the Panthers beat the teams they should and get some help from the teams in front of them.

The Panthers have a 27-26 advantage over Notre Dame in the series history, but, when traveling to South Bend, Pitt is only 9-15. Only three of the Irish’s 10 losses this season have come at the Edmund P. Joyce Center.