Patterson, Panthers come up short on Senior Night

Lamar Patterson wasn’t ready to walk off the court yet. In his eyes, the celebration of Senior Night on Sunday wasn’t finished.

After making just 3-of-16 shots through 37 minutes, Patterson was catching fire while the time and opportunities for a comeback against Florida State were dwindling.

Patterson, playing in the penultimate contest of his career at the Petersen Events Center, scored Pitt’s final 16 points in three minutes. He finished with 22, but his last hurrah fell short. 

The redshirt senior fouled out in a one-possession game with time still on the clock — the only way the Seminoles were going to stop his momentum and hang on for a 71-66 win.

“I’m not really sure you could hold a guy like that down,” Florida State coach Leonard Hamilton said, shaking his head as he replayed some of Patterson’s final shots. “You saw him at the end of the game, we doing everything we could to try and stop him, and he was knocking down threes from the parking lot.”

It took awhile for the shots to fall for Patterson and fellow redshirt senior Talib Zanna, who, as a 6-foot-9 center, was busy trying to work in the paint against a pair of 7-footers. He shot just one field goal in the first and three in the second.

But if there was one thing the undersized Panther could pull off against Boris Bojanovsky (7-foot-3, 240 pounds) and Michael Ojo (7-foot-1, 290 pounds), it was corralling missed shots. And the Panthers gave themselves plenty of opportunities.

Zanna grabbed 14 rebounds — including five offensively — as the Panthers shot just 20-of-54 from the field. He scored only seven points.

Pitt head coach Jamie Dixon thought the team’s issues were patience and shot selection, but credited the Seminoles for using their size to disrupt the offense.

“You get 14 offensive rebounds, and you only get nine second-chance points, that doesn’t add up,” he said. “[The big men] changed some shots, they had five blocks to our three.”

So the Panthers kept firing — and usually missing — from afar.

Like when they had the ball with three minutes to play, the shot clock slipping to zero and trailing, 55-50. Patterson had no choice but to hoist a challenged 3-pointer.

Florida State guard Aaron Thomas was right behind Patterson, though, and recorded an easy block. The ball went right back to Patterson with a second left, and he was forced to heave a prayer of a shot. Redshirt junior Cameron Wright snagged the rebound and fed to Patterson, who cut his way to the basket for a twisting layup.

“I did think that at least we made him work for his shots … our goal was to try to at least make him work a little harder to get good looks,” Hamilton said.

It didn’t seem like much at the time, but more like a continuation of his pedestrian evening. In one possession that was elongated by the offensive rebound, Patterson managed to make one shot on three tries. And by the end of it, Pitt was still behind.

But that seemingly innocent layup sparked a fire inside Patterson, leading him to sink two free throws. And then a 3-pointer from the right corner that cut the deficit to 60-57, despite a hand in his face.

Even though Patterson was going off from deep, the Seminoles kept a safe distance from the Panthers by hitting free throws that pushed their lead to two or three possessions. The trend continued: Patterson hits a 3-pointer, then Florida State sinks a foul shot or two.

After Patterson’s final 3-pointer, which brought the score to 69-66 with five seconds to play, Florida State quickly inbounded the ball to a free Ian Miller. Patterson had no choice but to foul, his fifth and disqualifying violation.

But he kept walking to the other end of the court to the free-throw line, waiting for Miller’s shots. An official approached Patterson, who was bent over with his hands on his knees, and held up five fingers. The referee brought him the bad news and patted him on his back three times. Maybe to hurry him off the court, maybe to show subtle appreciation for the effort.

Either way, Patterson had no choice but leave with a chance to complete the comeback and said walking away was tough.

“I didn’t think it was over until the horn sounded,” he said. “We just gotta get it done during the game.”