Zellous leads Panthers to win No. 20

The Cincinnati Bearcats just happened to get in Shavonte Zellous’ way last night.

The… The Cincinnati Bearcats just happened to get in Shavonte Zellous’ way last night.

The 5-foot-10 sophomore scored a game-high 25 points to lead Pitt (20-5, 8-4) to a 55-44 victory over the Bearcats inside a tranquil Petersen Events Center.

“That’s a role that all the coaches stressed upon me – to take over the game, to help the team, to come in and do all the scoring,” Zellous casually said after the game. “By scoring that’s just my role on the team.”

“I think it’s because [our assistant coaches] called plays for her,” head coach Agnus Berenato said. “We knew, go to [Zellous]. I just wished she wanted it more. I want her to be more greedy.”

The win marks only the third time in school history the Panthers have won 20 games in the regular season and just the first time since the 1980-81 season.

“I’m just really happy that we got 20 wins,” Berenato said. “I think that’s huge to have 20 wins. We’ve come along way in three years.”

The evidence of that progress was undeniable against Cincinnati. Despite an unusually low attendance of 1,720 because of the weather, the Pitt offense still moved like clockwork in the early minutes. The Panthers opened the game on an 8-2 run before Cincinnati head coach Laurie Pirtle called a timeout. The breather didn’t help the Bearcats, who eventually fell behind, 22-8.

“It was really hard,” Zellous said. “From game one, the crowd has motivated us, so we had to build our own emotion.”

Throughout the beginning of the first half, the Panthers distributed the ball freely inside and out, several players contributing uniformly.

Around the 14-minute mark, sophomore guard Xenia Stewart found Zellous, Pitt’s leading scorer, open on the left baseline. Stewart zipped the ball to Zellous, who missed the 12-footer, but junior Marcedes Walker was there to pick up the rebound and an easy two points.

As the half progressed, though, Zellous, as always, began to steal the show, finishing the half leading all scorers with 12 points. Freshman guard Jania Sims and Stewart each chipped in six. Overall, Pitt converted 13 of 26 shots – good for an even 50 percent.

To help stop the onslaught, Pirtle and the Bearcats reverted to a 2-3 zone with three-quarter-court pressure, but only ended up falling behind 28-14 at the half.

“I thought Cincinnati had a great game plan – they threw some pressure at us, but I thought we were well scouted,” Berenato said. “We knew all their play calls, so I felt we were really prepared.”

As porous as Pitt made Cincinnati’s defense appear in the first, that’s how stingy the Panthers were on the other end. The Panthers frazzled the Bearcats enough to force them into shooting an abysmal five for 21 from the field to complement nine turnovers.

“Defensively, you saw a great performance by the Pitt women’s basketball team,” Berenato said.

Nothing changed with the start of the second half but who was scoring at will for Pitt. Although Zellous gracefully drove baseline and smoothly dumped in two