LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- Should we take this as it is, or should we take this with a grain of salt?
How about this: Let's chalk it up to a new form of "business as usual" for Pitt.
This Louisville team is not your father's Louisville team, with a mass exodus and rebuild underway under Kenny Payne pacing the Cardinals on a road to virtually nowhere this season.
A win at Louisville was not just imperative for the surging Panthers, which continue to forge a pathway back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2016; it was expected to come nearly with ease.
Some cobwebs had to be shaken off, but the Panthers were still able to showcase its dominance and prove its refusal to diminish from the top of the pack within the ACC in their 75-54 rout over the lowly Cardinals on Wednesday inside the KFC Yum! Center in Louisville, Ky.
"Really proud of my team," Jeff Capel said after the game. "Any win in this league is a really good win, especially a road win. I thought coming in Louisville had been battling. You look at the last four games, they've been in them. ... I thought it was a team that's been fighting and battling. I was really nervous for it because of their size and their ability to rebound the basketball."
There are 363 teams in Division I college basketball. Per the NCAA NET rankings, Pitt entered Wednesday 57th and Louisville 333rd.
As we discussed in detail on Tuesday, these types of games are the ones which Pitt simply has to win if it has aspirations to make the NCAA Tournament. Losses in these environments, especially against "Quadrant 4" teams like Louisville can be resume killers by the time Selection Sunday rolls around.
Pitt (13-6, 6-2 ACC) has not only surpassed last season's 11 overall wins. Its six victories within the ACC equal the program's total in each of the last three years. The difference here is that there are still 12 more ACC games to play in the regular season.
"I think the biggest thing is that these guys play for each other," Capel said. "They really care about each other. The last game we played at Georgia Tech, Greg Elliott struggled, and Nike Sibande was really, really good, and I pulled Nike aside tonight at the end of the game, I pulled him up to me and I told him, 'Greg played as well as he did tonight because of you. Because of the energy that you gave him and how positive and what a great teammate you were.' All I've talked about with my team this year is just being a really good teammate. Be a really good teammate and play hard, and this group has done that.
"They're genuinely happy for each other, and I think you see, and anyone that's seen us in the past and they watch this team this year, it's a big difference. Obviously I think we have more quality depth. We're obviously older. The transfer portal was good for us. But, to me, the biggest thing is it's a group of guys, young men, that really and truly care about each other. For me, it's fun to be around."
And, in case if you wondered if people nationally forgot about Pitt after the loss at Duke ...
MASSIVE win for Pitt against Louisville. Why is it a MASSIVE win?
— Jon Rothstein (@JonRothstein) January 19, 2023
The last thing that you need on an NCAA Tournament resume is a Quad 4 loss.
Pitt's resume stays at the top of the pile, though had to work for it in stretches.
The Panthers were not as sharp as they probably should have been on a consistent basis against the worst team in the ACC, but there were still plenty of moments where the Panthers simply showed how superior they were to the Cardinals, which at 2-17 overall and 0-8 within the conference are searching for their first overall win since Dec. 17 and their first ACC win since last season's ACC Tournament.
Pitt was especially superior in the second half, in which it thumped Louisville for a 38-26 margin behind a 51.9% shooting clip and by making 7 of 17 from 3.
Elliott turned some of his shooting woes around, as he posted a season-high 23 points for his highest total since his 20 on Dec. 7 at Vanderbilt. He had nine in the first half on 4 of 5 shooting. In his previous six games entering Wednesday, Elliott shot 26.8% from the field and 25.0% from 3. Elliott was a beneficiary of Jamarius Burton's 10-point, 11-rebound double-double in scoring 14 second-half points on 5 of 7 overall shooting and 4 of 6 from 3.
"Honestly, just, the shots went in," Elliott said. "I was getting good looks but they weren't falling. I just had to stick with it and continue to shoot my shot. ... It's just a fun brand of basketball. Knowing on any given night no matter who it is, anybody can take over the game, so I was excited that it was my turn tonight, but you never know who it's going to be, and I love playing on a team like that."
Burton assisted on six of Elliott's nine made field goals, and Elliott earned another bucket off of a Burton steal.
"It was big to have him back in his groove," Burton said of Elliott. "He's a lethal shooter, he's a specialist, and I told him earlier in the week that he's special when it comes to shooting that 3 ball. He's got to keep doing it regardless of it goes in or not."
MORE FROM THE GAME
• The Panthers were clearly more cognizant about sharing the basketball against the inferior Cardinals. After combining for 14 assists in their previous two games, the Panthers finished with 21 assists as a team Wednesday. Pitt recorded just five assists on Saturday at Georgia Tech, with zero coming in the second half. Pitt nearly eclipsed that two-game mark in Wednesday's first half with its 11 assists.
• We continued to see Burton take his next steps in his development as an All-ACC candidate. Game-by-game, Burton has looked as cool as a cucumber and has grown more comfortable by the possession with handling the ball, driving, and either kicking out or going up to the basket with it. Burton was hyper-efficient as a distributor with 11 assists to two turnovers and was a game-high plus-27 for the Panthers.
"For me I just read the defense, I check the vibes of how we're playing on the court, I see a lot of guys were coming in and making shots," Burton said. "Nike was off to a hot start. So for us we just like to feed the hot man, and we had a bunch of them tonight."
• Elsewhere in the first half, the Panthers' defense found ways to create 10 Louisville turnovers and score 16 of their 37 points off of them. Pitt turned it over six times in the opening 20, but Louisville posted just two points off of them.
Throughout the game, Pitt plastered Louisville for a 25-9 margin in points off of turnovers.
"That's something that we'd like to do more," Burton said. "Get out in transition and get downhill and find our shooters. We've been unfortunate in a couple of games to not be able to do that, whether that's rebounding, some foul trouble, those few things. Today we were able to get out and really capitalize."
We posted a thought earlier in the week about the Diaz Graham twins earning some more minutes, and on Wednesday, it was Guillermo Diaz Graham's turn. He was a standout off the bench for Pitt in posting five points and grabbing five rebounds while playing 11 minutes and logging a plus-11 in the first half while Federiko Federiko racked up two fouls and played just nine minutes in the opening 20. Diaz Graham even found his outside shot with a 3-pointer which put Pitt ahead 19-16 with 9:48 left in the half. That not only broke a tie, but it started what eventually turned out to be a 13-point Panthers lead at three separate junctions later in the half.
Diaz Graham ended the game with six points, eight rebounds, and a block, and was plus-20 in 19 minutes.
"Just being ready every day in practice, practice hard, super hard," Diaz Graham said. "We have a deep bench with really good players, and every one of us can step up and create plays. Just practice, competing, and if the game needs someone stepping off the bench for good plays, we've got this."
I asked Diaz Graham a simple question: How much fun is this run Pitt is on right now?
He gave a smile.
"It's fun every day," he said. "When we win, when we lose, it's fun every day. In practice, in shootarounds, outside practice, it's fun every day."
• After posting a season-high 21 points in Pitt's 71-60 victory on Saturday over Georgia Tech, Sibande was tremendous early Wednesday for the Panthers. He made his first four 3-pointers and posted 12 points, all in the first half. Pitt's bench outscored Louisville's 23-18, including a 20-9 margin in the first half.
Nate Santos chipped in five points and added two rebounds and two assists in 17 minutes.
"I'm really proud of my guys on the bench," Capel said. "They came in and gave us a huge, huge lift. Nike Sibande was scoring and then Guillermo and Nate Santos with their energy. I thought those three guys turned the game around for us. We were able to battle throughout."
• In case you were wondering ... Yes, there is, in fact, a (rather-large) KFC inside concourse of the KFC Yum! Center. Sadly, the famed fried chicken chain did not cater the event for us media folk.
THE HIGHLIGHTS
THE 5s
• Pitt: G Nelly Cummings, G Greg Elliott, F Jamarius Burton, F Blake Hinson, C Federiko Federiko.
• Louisville: G El Ellis, F Mike James, F Sydney Curry, F Kamari Lands, F Jae'Lyn Withers.
THE ESSENTIALS
THE INJURIES
• Out for the season: F Will Jeffress (foot), F John Hugley IV (personal).
THE SCHEDULE
• The Panthers return home for three games in a row, beginning Saturday with a 3 p.m. tip-off against Florida State inside the Petersen Events Center. The Seminoles beat Notre Dame 84-71 Tuesday in South Bend, Ind., to move to 6-13 overall and 4-4 in ACC play. Pitt will then host Wake Forest on Wednesday and Miami on Jan. 28.
THE CONTENT
• Visit the Pitt team page for more coverage from the KFC Yum! Center in Louisville. You can listen to the latest episode of the H2P Podcast below.