Ahead of Syracuse’s (12-5, 3-1 Atlantic Coast) matchup with Pittsburgh (12-5, 2-2) on Saturday at the Carrier Dome, we connected with Craig Meyer. A Pitt beat writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Meyer addressed former Duke coach Jeff Capel III, the possibility of a Syracuse win and how Pittsburgh has gotten off to a surprising start so far.

The Daily Orange: What is the sense of first-year head coach Jeff Capel’s job so far? How has the team differed from a season ago?

Craig Meyer: I think it’s undeniably optimistic in a way it hasn’t been since maybe 2011, when Pitt was a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament before losing in the second round to Butler. Even in the years that followed, when they would win 20-25 games but lose early in the tournament, there was some bewilderment over why they weren’t quite as good as they once were. Capel’s hire was incredibly well-received, which was far from a guarantee. As thrilled as fans were that Kevin Stallings was fired, some of the candidates that were proposed or whose interviews were leaked during the coaching search were met with skepticism or outright anger. With Capel, there was jubilation. Though he was something of an unexpected choice, he filled two requirements Pitt desperately needed — a top recruiter who could immediately improve a diminished talent pool within the program and someone with an intimate knowledge of the ACC.

His first 10 months have gone better than basically anyone, myself included, thought they could have. In a brief period of time, he signed the program’s best recruiting class in five years, a trio of freshmen who have already emerged as the Panthers’ three best players. What was expected to be a transitional season in which Pitt would win a few more games than last season has turned into something else entirely, with the team already at 12-5 and 2-2 in ACC play. The squad itself is a lot different from the one last year, as five of Pitt’s top seven players this season either weren’t on the roster or weren’t eligible to play in 2017-18, with Jared Wilson-Frame and Terrell Brown being the lone holdovers. The atmosphere around the program is completely different, with thousands more fans showing up to games and there being a palpable sense of excitement that was so obviously absent during Stallings’ tenure. It’s a long way from what it was in the first decade of the new millennium, but it certainly seems to be on the way back in that direction.

The D.O.: Pittsburgh has played really well over the past three games. What’s fueled the Panthers?

C.M.: More than anything else, it’s their guard play. Trey McGowens came into Pitt as its highest-rated recruit in six years and has started to showcase that promise in a big way of late, scoring at least 30 points in two of the past three games (something no freshman had done in the history of Pitt men’s basketball prior to that point). Fellow freshman Xavier Johnson has been superb, as well, and more consistent, as he has scored in double figures in each of his first 17 college games. The two are quick, athletic players who have been able to get past almost any group of defenders they have faced this season, either finishing at the rim or drawing contact to send them to the foul line. Brown has been excellent during this stretch, as well. His play can be a little slow and robotic at times, particularly on offense, but he has been using his 7-foot-3 wingspan really effectively during conference play, with 26 blocks in Pitt’s past five games.

The D.O.: Which player has surprised you most?

C.M.: I’d have to say Johnson. He was the lowest-rated of Pitt’s three freshmen recruits — McGowens and Au’Diese Toney were both top-150 prospects — and because of that, he seemed to fly under the radar a bit. His shooting seemed to be the biggest concern of his game coming out of high school, and what prevented him from being a more highly touted player, but he’s shooting about 46 percent from the field and 39 percent from 3-point range more than halfway through the regular season, to say nothing of his 84.1 percent mark on free throws. People around the program I spoke with during the offseason raved about him, believing they were fortunate to land the player of the year from the prestigious Washington Catholic Athletic Conference at such a relatively late juncture in the recruiting calendar. It’s easy to see why now. He won’t win ACC freshman of the year — I hear that Zion kid at Duke is alright — but he looks like one of the best freshmen in one of the best conferences in the country.

The D.O.: How do you think Pitt matches up against the zone, specifically Syracuse’s 2-3?

C.M.: Not all that well. Capel is always quick to mention how his team has played well against the zone at certain points this season, but it seems like Pitt’s worst woes always seem to come against that kind of a look, and those aren’t even teams with the kind of length and athleticism (not to mention longstanding familiarity with the scheme) Syracuse has. It negates Pitt’s biggest offensive asset quite a bit, its dribble-drive game, and I think that should help keep the team’s guards off the free-throw line a bit, where they’ve feasted for so much of conference play. I’m also not sure Pitt has a bigger player it can comfortably and reliably have emerge at the top of the lane to pick apart the zone from within. If there’s one player to do that, I would think it would be Toney, a 6-foot-6 guard/forward who has performed admirably while being forced to play slightly out of position (he’s ideally a wing, but has been more of a de-facto power forward given his size and rebounding ability, as well as the Panthers’ overall lack of size). Then again, I also thought Florida State, with its size and athleticism, would be a really bad matchup for a smaller Pitt team and the Panthers ended up winning that game by 13, against a top-15 team, no less.

he D.O.: Syracuse has really struggled to score this season. How would you characterize Pitt’s defense this far?

C.M.: Perhaps more than anything aspect of Pitt’s improvement, I’ve been shocked by the team’s rapid defensive progress under Capel. Pitt’s the No. 29 team nationally in adjusted defensive efficiency, per KenPom.com, up from No. 166 at the end of last season, albeit with different personnel. It’s an aggressive, primarily man-to-man system that really prioritizes forcing turnovers and getting out in transition, where a sometimes-lethargic offense can get easier scoring opportunities. McGowens and Johnson are averaging a combined 3.5 steals per game, with the former accounting for 2.4 of those. That strategy can sometimes backfire, though, as Johnson has had a bad habit of late of getting two or more fouls in the first half, sometimes within the first five or 10 minutes. If the zone is frustrating them offensively, those kinds of mistakes may be more liable to happen on the other end. Since ACC play began, the rim protector Pitt so desperately lacked earlier has started to emerge in the form of Brown, who is among the top-10 Division I players in block percentage.

The D.O.: Who do you think wins Saturday and why?

C.M.: I’ve just about given up on predicting anything with this team. I came into the year thinking it would get four ACC wins at most, with two or three seeming much more likely. There’s only so far you can go after a winless ACC campaign, even with an influx of young talent. Now, an NIT berth that was floated out as a best-case scenario in October looks more likely than not. Syracuse is a weird team, too, following up a home loss against Georgia Tech with a win at Duke a couple of days later. I’ll go with the Orange by a few points on Saturday. I don’t think Pitt has faced a zone quite like the one Jim Boeheim will offer up and I can easily envision them struggling against it for long stretches. I offer that up with more than a few grains of salt.

The D.O.: Any other thoughts?

C.M.: I’ll be intrigued to see what, if anything, Capel can gather from Duke’s staff about what to do against Syracuse or what he can glean from watching film of the Orange against a team full of players he either coached or recruited.

Published on January 16, 2019 at 10:19 pm