True grit gets Pitt the crown
NEW YORK - All hail Pitt. Rhymes with grit.
Gotta love these Panthers. There aren't many teams that can win a game against quality competition while missing 17 free throws.
In the second half.
It's true. I wouldn't lie to you. The Pittsburgh Panthers won the Big East championship last night, 74-65, over Georgetown despite missing 22 free throws, 17 coming in the second half, when they were in reasonable control of the game. So, yes, this was more than a mere 9-point conquest. This was a strangely wonderful show of Pitt Panther domination. Never mind all those boings on the foul shots.
Pitt entered the tournament as the seventh seed, but in the amazingly deep Big East that was no big deal. Mike Tranghese's league will get at least seven in the tournament when the selection committee announces its field of 65 this evening. The Panthers simply shrugged their shoulders and went to work, dispatching Cincinnati, Louisville, and Marquette to get their shot at top-seeded Georgetown, which had looked so good in its own march to the championship game that many of us were thinking they had an outside chance for a No. 1 seed, assuming the Hoyas could get by Pitt.
Well, they couldn't. Georgetown is good and Georgetown is tough, but last night Pitt was better, and there is no doubt Pitt was tougher.
Now, you might say it's about time Pitt won this thing. For this was Pitt's seventh trip to the Big East final in the last eight years. But only once in that time, in 2003, did they come away with the coveted W. Pitt lost to Boston College in 2001, UConn (in double OT) in 2002, UConn again in 2004, Syracuse in 2006, and Georgetown a year ago. For seniors like Ronald Ramon and Keith Benjamin, this losing in the championship thing was getting old.
"It would mean a lot to win," Ramon had said after Friday night's victory over Marquette. "Every player on the team is talking about doing it for the seniors. It's, 'Let's go out there and play the best basketball.' "
This might not necessarily have been Pitt's "best" basketball. Coach Jamie Dixon would probably like his team to work on its free throw shooting before the tournament begins. I would think that's a reasonable assumption. But it was plenty good enough in just about every other department, starting with the work on the glass. Pitt was extremely aggressive against a Georgetown team that can be very intimidating inside.
After spotting the Hoyas a 6-0 lead, Pitt settled down and went to work. Now, it is a given that a Pitt team will defend. It's really a tribute to Georgetown that the Hoyas were able to shoot 46 percent in defeat against a team that works as hard on defense as the Panthers. But once Tyrell Biggs spun into the lane for a jumper that gave Pitt a 23-22 lead with 6:47 remaining in the first half, Georgetown was doomed to a catch-up role for the game's remaining 26-plus minutes.
Georgetown did manage to tie the game at 26, but Levance Fields hit a three to break that tie, and Pitt never trailed again.
It was 31-28 at the half, and only once (35-33, on a Jessie Sapp 3-pointer) did the Hoyas come any closer. The lead got as high as 13 (55-42 on a Benjamin lane spinner with 6:24 left), but the Panthers were able to hold off a furious Georgetown challenge, doing so despite missing so many free throws.
The good news for the Panthers, of course, was that by placing Georgetown in a frantic fouling mode they had so many opportunities that shooting 50 percent was an adequate percentage. They did, after all, finish 22 for 44.
The aforementioned Mr. Fields is a good place to start when discussing this Pitt team. Sam Young, the splendid 6-foot-6-inch, do-everything forward, was rightfully named the tournament MVP, but the engine on this team is Fields, the rugged (5-10, 190 pounds) Brooklyn native who manages to combine the best attributes of a linebacker, catcher, and hockey goalie into a very effective point guard.
Fields is just returning to action after missing a bunch of games with a foot fracture, and after watching him play you wonder how he has managed to get this far in his career without breaking half the bones in his body, plus a few of his opponents'. He comes at you hard on every possession. You can feel his presence on the floor, even if you're sitting in the cheapest of the cheap seats.
Pitt just loves to play in Madison Square Garden, and if you don't believe me, you can look it up. With this victory, the Panthers are 23-8 in the Garden since the 2000-01 season, including 6-0 this season. True, Pitt loves to load up with as many New York-area kids as it can (there are three in addition to Fields), but there must be something more to it. Whatever it is, it's certainly all right with the coach.
"We love playing in New York," says Dixon. "We have New York guys. We'll do anything we can to play in the Garden. We'll change schedules around. We'll change events around. We want to get our kids back here. We've told Joel Fisher, who runs the events here, that we'll play in any of the events that they have. We do enjoy playing here. They take very good care of us. I guess that helps, too." Get all that?
This was a win/no-lose situation. Pitt gets a very deserved Big East championship. Georgetown probably was only a long shot No. 1 seed prospect. The Hoyas will still be a No. 2. They'll get over this quickly. And the 19,000-plus in attendance saw a nice college game played with passion until the inevitable foularama in the final three minutes.
But I would advise the Panthers to shoot better than 50 percent from the line when the tournament starts. Who do they think they are, Memphis?
Bob Ryan is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at ryan@globe.com.
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