Panthers ride late surge to victory vs. Colonials
PITTSBURGH — Eleven minutes to go, and No. 5 Pittsburgh leads a familiar opponent that’s never beaten the Panthers by only five points. Within a couple of minutes, it’s a rout.
Maybe that explains why the Panthers, unlike nearly every other major college team, usually win the games they’re supposed to win. As evidenced by their 100-1 record in their past 101 nonconference home games.
Ashton Gibbs scored 20 points and Gilbert Brown’s soaring dunk started No. 5 Pittsburgh on a 14-2 run, allowing the Panthers to pull away from Robert Morris for a 74-53 victory Tuesday night.
Brad Wanamaker scored 17 points and Gary McGhee had 11 points and 12 rebounds for the Panthers (6-0), who are 29-0 against their suburban Pittsburgh rival. Brown added 11 points and Nasir Robinson had 11 rebounds in 23 minutes as Pitt held a 51-36 edge on the boards.
“I saw doubt in my guys’ eyes and that’s scary as a coach,” Robert Morris coach Andy Toole said.
It’s not an uncommon sight for opponents at the Petersen Events Center, where Pitt is 136-11.
“We’ve had good players, and we’ve got good players,” Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said when asked about Pitt’s ability to dodge the home-court upsets that occur nightly in major college basketball. “It’s kind of what we do. It’s like, ‘We’ve seen this before.’”
Robert Morris (2-2) has seen this many times before in a series in which it has been outscored by an average of 23 points in the past 11 games.
Russell Johnson scored 15 points on 6 of 20 shooting, but the Colonials shot only 30.9 percent without leading scorer Karon Abraham. He was held out for disciplinary reasons.
The Panthers opened leads of 14-7 and 24-11, but eight consecutive points by Johnson that included a pair of 3-pointers cut it to 24-19. Pitt made it 33-23 before the Colonials scored the final five points of the half.
Last season, the Panthers took control during their 77-53 victory against the Colonials by starting the second half with a 20-4 run. They tried repeating that by scoring nine of the first 11 points after halftime, but a 9-2 surge by the Colonials made it 44-39.
Robert Morris then had a chance to get within 3, but couldn’t score — and it wasn’t in the game again. After that, 3-pointers by Brown, Gibbs and Wanamaker allowed Pitt to start building its lead in a hurry.
The Panthers effectively sealed it when Brown was fouled while dunking, taking off from the low block along the foul lane. He missed the free throw, but McGhee scored on a putback, was fouled and completed a three-point play that made it 58-41 with 7:07 remaining.
“That was the start of the end for us,” said Toole, who felt his players got out of their offense by trying to beat defenders one-on-one. “They defend, rebound, and for the most part take care of the basketball. They don’t beat themselves.”
The Colonials, best known nationally for nearly upsetting second-seeded Villanova in last season’s NCAA tournament, regularly compete with and against the Panthers in Pittsburgh’s summer college league. As a result, the Panthers weren’t surprised by the Colonials’ ability to play tight defense, force turnovers — Pitt had 15 to Robert Morris’ eight — and get a team out of what it does best.
Only the Colonials couldn’t do it for 40 minutes.
“We always seem to play better in the second half,” Robinson said.
