Men’s Basketball: Gibbs, Dixon lead Pitt in upset against No. 5 Syracuse

SYRACUSE, N.Y. – Backed by a combined 45 points from Ashton Gibbs and Jermaine Dixon, the Pitt… SYRACUSE, N.Y. – Backed by a combined 45 points from Ashton Gibbs and Jermaine Dixon, the Pitt men’s basketball team upset No. 5 Syracuse today at the Carrier Dome.

Dixon scored a career-high 21 points and Gibbs tied a career high hitting six 3-pointers and scored 24 points in Pitt’s 82-72 win.

“I just take what the defense gives me,” Gibbs said. “My teammates did a good job finding me when I was open.”

Besides the starting backcourt, a big reason Pitt (12-2, 2-0 Big East) pulled out the upset was because of its tough defense.

“Their defense was the difference in this game,” Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim said.

Coming into the game, Syracuse led the Big East averaging 87.7 points a game and shooting 55 percent from the field. The Orange (13-1, 1-1 Big East) were also shooting 41 percent from 3-point range. The Panthers held Syracuse to just 42 percent from the field, and 8 percent from beyond the arc allowing the Orange to connect on just 1-of-13 attempts.

“This was the first tough defensive team we’ve seen,” Boeheim said. “You have to match the physical nature of how they play.”

The 72 points are a season low for the Orange, beating out the 75 points they scored in a win against St. Francis on Dec. 13. The Panthers also out-rebounded Syracuse 38-36.

“We just weren’t as physical as we had to be,” Boeheim said.

The Panthers forced 14 Syracuse turnovers, five of which were steals by Dixon, who was given the task of guarding Syracuse’s Wesley Johnson for most of the game. The junior came into today averaging 17 points a game, placing him 10th in the conference.

“He’s as good as any player in the league,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said.

He scored 19 points on 7-of-14 shooting.

“He’s the best player I’ve played against in my two years here,” Jermaine Dixon said.

Along with Gibbs and Dixon, the Panther were led on the offensive end by junior Brad Wanamaker and freshman Dante Taylor.

Wanamaker scored 12 points, shooting 10-14 from the free throw line and 1-of-7 from the field. He also pulled down five rebounds and had a team-high six assists.

Taylor scored 10 points and had eight rebounds, which tied him with Gibbs for the team lead.

“We’ve really emphasized [rebounding] with [Ashton] since the start of the year,” Jamie Dixon said.

This wasn’t Pitt’s first game this year against a top-5 team. On Nov. 24 the Panthers lost 78-62 to then-No. 3 Texas, although the final score didn’t show how close the game was. Pitt only trailed 34-32 at the half before Texas took over, out-scoring the Panthers 46-28 in the second half.

The first half of today’s game played out similarly with Pitt trailing 30-27 at the break. The Panthers didn’t let their ranked opponent dominate the second half this time, though, out-scoring Syracuse 55-42.

“Our attack got much better as the game went on,” Jamie Dixon said. “We were getting to the basket more.”

The Panthers kept up with Syracuse in the first half thanks to Gibbs and Jermaine Dixon. The two guards combined for 23 of Pitt’s 27 points with the other four coming from Taylor.

In the first half, Gibbs, Dixon and Taylor shot a combined 10-19. The rest of the Panthers went 0-11 from the field.

The schedule doesn’t ease up for the Panthers after today. They go to Cincinnati on Monday to play a Bearcat team that was ranked earlier in the year and just beat No. 10 Connecticut.

“[The win] definitely builds our confidence, but we’ve got to move on,” Gibbs said.

After that they go to Connecticut before returning home to play Louisville and Georgetown.

“We’ve got like 15 minutes to celebrate the win,” Jermaine Dixon said.

Notes: With two free throws in the first half, Gibbs set the school record for most consecutive free throws with 35. The previous record of 34 was held by Don Hennon in 1957-1958, Sean Miller in 1987-1988 and Jason Matthews in 1988-1999. Gibbs added two more free throws in the second half to bring the new record, and his current streak, up to 37 in a row.