Analysis: There's time to fix what ails Pitt, but it starts now with Virginia in town

If you’re one of those college basketball fans into analytics and asking numbers to tell a story, they won’t paint an impressive picture of Pitt.

At the halfway point of its ACC schedule (10 down, 10 to go), Pitt is:

• 5-5 against conference foes.

• 4-4 in games decided by single-digit margins.

• 3-4 on the road.

• 6-7 vs. Quad 1 and 2 teams.

• 8-7 when confronting a power conference foe.

Does that scream mediocrity to you, too?

That’s where the Panthers (14-7 overall, thanks to a 6-0 record against mid-majors) stand six weeks from the end of coach Jeff Capel’s seventh season. Kevin Stallings’ “dumpster fire” that Capel inherited in March 2018, long has been extinguished. It’s fair to say expectations for February 2025, were higher than eighth place in the ACC.

It’s also fair to say that the story of the 2024-25 Panthers is an unfinished work. There is time and opportunity to fix the record and, perhaps, even impress the NCAA Tournament committee when it sits down at the long conference table to decide Pitt’s fate.

The second half of the conference season begins Monday at Petersen Events Center against Virginia. The Cavaliers (10-12, 3-8 ACC) have been struggling since former coach Tony Bennett abruptly retired 19 days before the first game. They have lost seven of their past nine, including a tough 75-74 decision at home to Virginia Tech (10-12, 5-6) on Saturday.

Long known for its stingy defense under Bennett, Virginia lost to Stanford, 88-65, last month, the most points allowed by the Cavaliers in an ACC game that ended in regulation since 2013.

It looks like a game Pitt can win. But is Virginia looking at Pitt the same way now that the Panthers have lost five of seven and are sinking in the ACC standings?

Nonetheless, Pitt’s remaining schedule is not daunting. Seven of the 10 opponents stand 11th or lower in the 18-team ACC. Virginia is 15th.

Let’s assume Pitt wins all seven of those games (a bold assumption, even considering Pitt’s 8-0 record against Quad 3 and 4 teams). If they lose the others — games at North Carolina, SMU and Louisville — that would place the Panthers in Charlotte, N.C., for their first ACC Tournament game with a 21-10 record.

Would two more victories in the tournament satisfy the committee? To leave no doubt, Pitt needs to do better than 7-3 in those 10 games.

That won’t be easy, but you can bet Capel and his staff went right to work Saturday night after returning from Winston-Salem, N.C., and the loss to Wake Forest.

“There are going to be a lot of things to learn,” associate coach Tim O’Toole said on the 93.7 FM postgame show. “But a lot of guys played hard. We did a lot of good things. Wake Forest is good. It’s just this league. It’s going to come down to this, night-in and night-out. You have to just keep fighting and swinging.”

O’Toole said players stayed poised and “did a lot of things where we didn’t beat ourselves.”

Yet he conceded (without naming names) that “We had to be a little bit better. We had to move the ball better.”

Capel has steadfastly stayed with his core group of six players through most of Pitt’s recent games.

• Freshmen Papa Kante and Brandin Cummings are averaging 5.2 and 4.6 minutes over the past five.

• Junior Jorge Diaz Graham has logged 6.0 in the most recent four.

• Freshman Amsal Delalic has played a total of 11 minutes in the past eight, including six in which he never got off the bench.

The games are close, and Capel is not wrong to stick with his best players. But it will be interesting to see how he uses his bench Monday night with only 53 hours between games.

Meanwhile, it might be time to get more efficiency from point guard Jaland Lowe, perhaps Pitt’s most talented player with the ball in his hands.

With Blake Hinson and Bub Carrington gone, Lowe has shouldered a much bigger workload, already attempting 13 more shots than he did through 33 games last season when he started only 19. Yet he hasn’t improved his shooting percentage that stands at 38.2% (335th in Division I), virtually the same as a year ago (38.8%).

Despite the way it looks, the season isn’t lost by any stretch, and Lowe has the ability to carry the team through these tough times. He’s done it before. He needs do it again.