Panthers look for win, revenge against Cincy

Pitt’s game against Cincinnati tonight has a whole new meaning.

In fact, after a 75-73 loss… Pitt’s game against Cincinnati tonight has a whole new meaning.

In fact, after a 75-73 loss to Louisville Sunday it could even be considered a must-win.

The Panthers, who have dropped three straight games for only the second time in the Jamie Dixon era, are struggling to recover their identity since point guard Levance Fields has returned from his foot injury. There’s even some talk about Pitt being on the bubble of making the NCAA Tournament.

Dixon, however, isn’t feeling the pressure just yet.

“It’s the first time we’ve lost three in a row in a long time,” said Dixon. “But we’re still No. 25 in the RPI, and given everything we’ve gone through some people would find that to be amazing.

“Our best basketball is still ahead of us for obvious reasons – we seem to be as healthy as we have been all year.” Pressure or not, the Panthers aren’t used to losing, and it’s a trend that they’d like to abolish. Tonight would be a good place to start by avenging a 62-59 loss at Cincinnati earlier this season.

“It’s time to strap it up,” senior guard Keith Benjamin said. “This is a game we want to get back. They got us at their place, now we’re looking to get them here.”

It’s not just personal vengeance that the Panthers (19-8, 7-7 Big East) will be playing for tonight. Cincinnati (13-13, 8-6 Big East) currently sits one game ahead of Pitt in the Big East standings in what is a tight conference race.

Pitt’s recent slide puts it in a seemingly tough position heading into the Big East Tournament. Regardless of how they finish out, the Panthers aren’t going to get a first-round bye, which means if they advance past the first round, they’ll have to play one of the top four seeds in the second round of the tournament.

That doesn’t bother Benjamin, who along with Fields and Ronald Ramon is from New York City, where the tournament is perennially held.

“It doesn’t matter who we play in [Madison Square] Garden,” Benjamin said. “We always feel like the Garden is ours. Where we fall, it doesn’t matter. We’re going to show up when it’s time to go there.”

First thing’s first – the Panthers have to take care of the regular season. The NCAA Tournament selection committee now weighs heavily on a team’s last 12 games, and with four games remaining on its schedule, Pitt is already guaranteed to have at least five losses in that span.

So why have the Panthers struggled of late? It’s pretty clear that the Panthers just haven’t been playing Pitt-style basketball. During its three-game losing streak, Pitt’s opponents have averaged 76 points per game, and in that stretch the Panthers were out-rebounded by a combined 109-92.

“Right now we’re struggling bad on the defensive end,” Benjamin said. “I guess it’s just focus and really digging deep and wanting to get a stop. We want to get back to what we know: tough, physical, winning basketball.”

A staple of the Panthers’ mantra is their man-to-man defense, but lately Dixon has been experimenting with some zone.

“Its something we’ve worked on all year long,” Dixon said. “We’ve used it at times. It’s been helpful, but we need to get better at man-to-man first.”

Tonight could be a good tune-up for Pitt’s defense against a Bearcat team that has struggled on the offensive end.

While Cincinnati has vastly improved in the win column this year – it only won two conference games last year – its offense has made little progress. Last year, the Bearcats averaged 64.6 points per game and have improved to just 64.8 this year.

Cincinnati ranks last in the Big East in forcing turnovers, which doesn’t afford the Bearcats many fast-break points. And when they get into their half-court set, a lack of viable scoring options has often made the Bearcats one-dimensional.

Too frequently Cincinnati has relied on sophomore guard Deonta Vaughn, who ranks fourth in the conference in scoring with 17.2 points per game.

“Vaughn shoots the ball really well,” Dixon said. “When he gets it going they’re really dangerous.”

It was on the interior, though, where Cincinnati did its damage against Pitt in the teams’ earlier meeting.

“We really thought we guarded Vaughn well last time, but they really hurt is with some inside scoring that they hadn’t shown a lot beforehand,” Dixon said.

Regardless of Pitt’s recent inefficiency to defend the post, Benjamin feels it’s the guards that need to step up.

“We can’t put it on the big men,” Benjamin said. “The perimeter has to step up. Period. Guards win games, and guards win championships. We only can go as far as [our guards] take us.”

If the guards can lock down Vaughn, Cincinnati could have a real tough time scoring. Other than Vaughn, only senior small forward John Williamson averages double figures in scoring.

But the most important key to victory for the Panthers could be staying out of foul trouble. When they lost at Cincinnati, DeJuan Blair was saddled on the bench in foul trouble for a large portion of the game.