Panther Expectations

Does anyone really know what to think of the Pittsburgh Panthers men’s basketball team come the month of March?

Come that fateful tournament that every team aspires to conquer, the Pitt squad always seems to disappoint the fans, the spectators-heck pretty much any expectations facing the team.

Last year is undoubtedly the first instance to come to mind for most fans, given the proximity of the disappointment in their minds, and also the perfect example it serves to make. That Panther team had all the components to claim itself the best team to ever prowl the Oakland streets. It had the post presence in All-American Dejuan Blair and old man Sam Young. It had the clutch shooting and veteran ball-handling of Levance Fields and it had the spunky bench play of swisher Ashton Gibbs and headband-man Gilbert Brown. Don’t forget Tyrell Biggs baseline jumpers and drives. It’s not like the players were flukes. Young and Blair have moved on to successful rookie seasons in the NBA, playing the roles of “draft steals” as they surprise their teammates and opponents. It’s not like Jermaine Dixon, Brown and Gibbs aren’t continuing to play at a high level on the current Pitt Team. It just seems like when faced with high expectations, this Pitt team cannot live up.

But this year is a different story. I know what you’re thinking, Pitt Fans say this every year. Every year we, the zoo, pick the Panthers as the dark horse that will live up to the hype. Well this year, there is no hype. No one is talking about Pitt competing beyond the sweet sixteen in the big dance, and why should they deserve that talk? If last year’s team couldn’t get it done, then why this team?

Wait. Hold on. Isn’t that what everyone believed at the beginning of this year? When Pitt was out of the top 25 with only one remaining starter on its team, was anyone really expecting them to break into the AP rankings, or even reach the tourney.

Here we are, with the Panthers in the top tier of the tourney with a deserved three-seed. After all, these cats beat three teams in the top five this year, going 13-5 and finishing 2^nd overall in the conference. Now they did have some flukes along the way, but don’t discount the injuries that they suffered. Losing Jermaine Dixon (the only returning starter), at the beginning of the year and in the middle of the season, was a big blow to the Panthers. When Dixon was fully healthy and played his needed minutes, Pitt lost only four games including the Notre Dame Conference Tournament game.

And yet now we seem more comfortable giving Pitt no expectations, predicting that Pitt won’t even reach the elite eight. They proved us all wrong earlier in the season, but that too was without expectation from any Pitt fan.

Ron Cook wrote a great article saying he will be disappointed if Pitt doesn’t win a game in this year’s dance, and I don’t disagree at all. In fact, I’ll be disappointed if the Panthers don’t reach the elite eight. But please, don’t spread this thought around. After all, it seems that the quieter the Zoo is, the better this team has and will play. The less expectation that Dixon and his squad faces from the fans and media, the more likely this group will go further than any other Pitt team has gone in the dance. What a crazy thought, the team with the least post presence in stubborn Gary McGhee and freshman Dante Taylor, least experience with only one returning starter and possibly least amount of overall talent, could take the trophy home.

That doesn’t mean they’re going to get past the first round against Oakland. In the end, we might be looking at the same old Panthers.