Pittsburgh coach Jamie Dixon signals to his team during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game against Florida State, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2015, in Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh won 73-64, giving Dixon his 300th career win.

PITTSBURGH — Pittsburgh coach Jamie Dixon can tolerate losing. Barely. Dixon can’t abide his team getting outworked. After watching the Panthers get crushed on the glass by Clemson on Saturday, Dixon challenged his players to get tougher.

He found an unlikely candidate to pick up the slack: walk-on forward Aron Phillips-Nwankwo. The fifth-year senior scored seven points in 12 energetic minutes off the bench and keyed the decisive run in a 73-64 win over Florida State on Wednesday night.

Dixon picked up his 300th career victory since taking over the program in 2003. He is the 19th-fastest coach to reach 300 victories, doing it in 401 games.

Phillips-Nwankwo, a neuroscience major on an academic scholarship, began the night having scored all of 15 points during his entire career. He hit two of the three shots he took and added two rebounds and a steal. Just as importantly, he infused the Panthers with a sense of urgency.

“I figured he’d give us energy,” Dixon said. “I don’t know I could have predicted he would play that well but I knew he would help us. No kid has worked harder, no kid has improved more than he has in five years.”

Michael Young scored 16 points to go with 12 rebounds. Four days after Clemson pushed Pitt (12-5, 2-2 Atlantic Coast Conference) around in the lane, the Panthers did the same to the Seminoles.

“Getting outrebounded by 17 in last game was an embarrassment,” Young said. “That’s an attack on everybody’s pride.”