Pitt just finds ways to lose even when it out plays an opponent for most of the game. That's what happened for most of the night, until the Panthers collapsed in the final minute in a 54-53 loss to Minnesota at the Petersen Events Center.
After Femi Odukale made two free throws to put Pitt up 53-50 with 2:56 to go, Pitt went scoreless for the rest of the game, missing three contested shots on poor possessions while the Panthers maintained a lead in the final minutes.
Then with 7.5 seconds left, Minnesota had E.J. Stephens drive to the basket to take a layup he missed. But forward Luke Loewe followed the shot with a quick rebound and put-back score to give the Gophers a lead with 2.4 seconds left. Pitt would draw up a play for Odukale to take a half court shot at the buzzer, but he missed it as time expired.
As tough to swallow as Pitt's losses to The Citadel and UMBC were, to miss an opportunity for the team's first win over a power-five opponent this season is a different kind of pain.
"This one hurts," Capel said after the game. "All of them hurt, but this one really does. I'm proud of y guys for continuing to show up in this as we've not gotten off to the start this season that we anticipated, and certainly not the start we wanted."
Pitt outrebounded Minnesota 40-33 during the game, but allowed an offensive rebound in each of the Gophers' final two baskets that stole the win from the Panthers.
"This one is a gut punch," Capel continued. "If we get one defensive rebound on the last two possessions, maybe it's a little different. I thought we defended well enough to win, but we didn't win. I hurt for our guys, but I'm proud of the effort."
In addition to the collapse on rebounding late, the Panthers looked like they wasted their final three possessions. The Panthers made three big defensive stops late while up 53-50, but squandered away each possession that followed with Jamarius Burton missing a jump shot, Odukale turning the ball over on a drive, and then William Jeffress missing a shot. None of the possessions looked like solid, orchestrated plays for clean shot looks for a Pitt team that made 20 of 52 shots on the night for 38 percent from the floor.
"We didn't make shots," Capel said with Pitt's late struggles on offense. "It's as simple as that. John was having his way and they started packing it in to go way under on ball screens and flood everything down low. We got some good looks but we couldn't knock them down. We had some costly turnovers during that last part that really hurt us."
What truly hurt Pitt was the fact it got a complete, herculean effort from its leading scorer in John Hugley IV, who finished with 25 points and 14 rebounds in his third double-double of the season. The Panthers kept feeding him the ball throughout the game and got a solid defensive performance from him as well that helped Pitt outscore Minnesota in the paint 28-20.
This didn't look like the same Pitt team that was outclassed by mid-major UMBC Saturday, as it came out communicating on defense and looking organized and confident on offense.
The game started painfully slow with both teams combining to miss the first ten shots of the game before Minnesota got the first basket of the night with 16:04 to go in the first half.
Both team's shooting remained spotty throughout the first half, but the Panthers went to their top scorer inside to fix that in the form of Hugley. He scored 15 in the first half with six layups and hitting a three-pointer at the buzzer to give Pitt a 24-22 lead heading into the locker room.
It was the kind of start to a game Capel saw early in the season, but the difference was that this time, Hugley didn't tire out so easily. Pitt came out in the second half and made sure Hugley touched the ball on its first two second half possessions, each time with Hugley drawing shooting fouls.
Hugley averaged 19 points per game over Pitt's first three contests, but only scored eight across two games against Towson and Vanderbilt as teams adjusted to pack the paint against him. But it does seem like Hugley has gotten used to getting that kind of attention as he's now followed up his 21 point game against UMBC with 25 points against Minnesota.
"We look at John as a freshman because he only played seven games last year," Capel said. "We felt like he was coming along last year. But when you have some numbers like he did the first games this year, teams game plan for you. That's going to happen with these last two games. We're teaching him how to work harder, do his work earlier, play through contact, make good passes and let the game come to him. He's learning that."
Hugley was the only Panther to get score in the double digits as both Odukale and Burton each scored six points on the night, while William Jeffress and Onyebuchi Ezeakudo each scored five. Pitt shot 38 percent from the field, just higher than Minnesota's 37 percent. But the Gophers' hitting 7 of 19 three-pointers were a difference maker as Pitt only made 3 of 15 from beyond the arc on the night.
The loss increases Pitt's losing streak to three games, dropping the Panthers to 2-5 on the season while Minnesota advances to 6-0. What makes the loss more of a gut punch is how Pitt also coupled Hugley's strong performance with the kind of defense that Capel's been coaching Pitt to play.
"That's who we are," Hugley said after the game. "In order to win we have to play defense the whole game. If we don't play that kind of defense, we'll lose."
"We've got to play defense as one unit," Ezeakudo said after the game. "One person helps, then the other person helps. We all have to move on together like a stream."
The problem has been when Capel's Panthers have taken one step forward, they've accompanied it with two steps backwards.
Pitt forced Minnesota to take several tough shots this game with three blocks and four steals on the night. It was a better performance from a defense that allowed 87 points to UMBC, but it's an example of how Pitt continues to try to grow one step at a time. Pitt looked like it found its perimeter shooting abilities against the Retrievers Saturday, hitting a season-high eleven three-pointers.
But like how its defense faded during its best shooting game Saturday, Pitt's shooting dropped back down to 38 percent on a night when the Panthers' defense showed up to play.
"There's a lot of times we've seen growth in these games," Ezeakudo said. "Against UMBC our offense was really good, but our defense let us down. This game we fought the whole time, but we had to close it out and we didn't. It's good that we're right there, but we have to clean up things."
"We're frustrated man," Hugley said. "We can't hang our heads. We've got Virginia Friday. We've got to move on to that game."
Pitt has to channel that frustration into putting together a complete game soon. Pitt opens ACC play against Virginia in Charlottesville, Va. 8 p.m. Friday night before it plays its final four out-of-conference games of the season. It would take winning all four of those matchups for Pitt to finish with a winning record vs. out-of-conference opponents.
If the Panthers can't win out, it will be the first time since Pitt joined the Eastern Eight in the 1976-1977 season that the Panthers finished with a losing record against out-of-conference opponents.
