Gray doing big things for Panthers this season

Pitt junior center Aaron Gray doesn’t want to look down on his teammates.

Problem is, he… Pitt junior center Aaron Gray doesn’t want to look down on his teammates.

Problem is, he doesn’t have much choice.

Standing at a mammoth 7-feet tall, two inches taller than his next-highest teammate, forward Levon Kendall, the Emmaus, Pa., native sports one of the largest frames on which to build a dominant basketball player in Division I college basketball.

As a matter of fact, Gray is only the second player in the University of Pittsburgh’s 100-year basketball history to eclipse 7-feet. The other, Mark Blount of the Minnesota Timberwolves, is one of two Pitt alumni currently active in the NBA.

And, as many believe, Gray could be joining him and Golden State Warrior Chris Taft among the ranks of Panther professionals in the not-so-distant future.

Gray’s numbers in his first year as a starter won’t say anything different. Gray is the only player in the Big East to average a double-double, scoring 14 points and hauling in 10.5 rebounds per game en route to establishing himself as one of the governing paint players in the Big East Conference, let alone the country.

However, Gray isn’t using his vantage point to look above and beyond his current competition to the pros just yet.

“I’m just worrying about being a great college player,” he said after tallying 17 points on 7-for-10 shooting from the field against Providence last Saturday. “I’m not worried about [the NBA].”

Gray doesn’t have to worry at this point, seeing that some sources such as NBADraft.net are projecting him to be drafted as high as 13th, should he decide to forego his senior year.

But Gray has an agenda as a Panther to accomplish before he wants hear anything about the NBA.

“My freshman year we got a Big East Championship and I really didn’t feel like I was a part of it,” Gray said. “That’s one thing I want to do. I want to get a championship, whether it’s a Big East or an NCAA, and I want to be one of the major factors because of it.”

The main reason Gray didn’t feel like part of the 2003 Big East Tournament Championship team was because of the breakout freshman year of Taft and returning prowess of Chevon Troutman. The pair would remain the frontcourt duo that roamed the paint for another season before Troutman left for graduation and Taft for the NBA.

“I knew right away Chris Taft and Chevy Troutman were going to be leaving, so obviously one of the biggest questions of this team was where our low post offense and defense were going to come from,” Gray said.

“I took that as a challenge.”

Gray also had the challenge of proving himself both to the Panther basketball community and the nation. Seeing only a little more than 11 minutes per game as a sophomore, nobody really knew what he could do.

They do now.

Gray burst onto the scene in Big East play this year netting a career-high 25 points to complement 11 rebounds in Pitt’s overtime win against Notre Dame.

Things only got better as the national recognition arrived when the 7-footer put up a similar performance in the house of the No. 1 team in the country with 23 and 12 at Connecticut.

So what happened in the off-season that transformed the center from role player to game-changer?

“A lot of hard work with my teammates,” Gray said. “We really did a good job this off-season working together getting better as a unit.”

“Those guys deserve as much of the credit for me getting better as I do.”

Gray is now considered one of the most improved players in the country, and can take a basketball game over. When he’s in, that is.

There are still some blemishes on the physical play that Gray has adopted. Foul trouble can often make or break a night for Gray, as well as the Panthers.

“You want to not always have to take it,” Gray said about his tendency to draw extra attention from officials. “You just have to stay focused, and my teammates and coaches do a great job of saying, ‘We’re going to need you the rest of the game.'”

But his teammates and coaches need him as much as Gray believes he needs them.

“Nobody’s playing for themselves. They’re playing for the team, and I think when we do that there’s not a team in the country that we can’t play with.”