BROOKLYN, N.Y. — The overriding question after Pitt’s 31-point loss to Penn State Monday night was how it had gotten to this dire point for the Panthers, how a once-proud program, even with seven freshmen, could be so thoroughly outworked and overmatched.
Somewhere down that list of inquiries was a natural follow-up — what would happen next? How would such an inexperienced team respond fewer than 24 hours later?
“Honestly, we forgot about it pretty quick,” Pitt freshman forward Shamiel Stevenson said. “We obviously weren’t happy about it, but you kind of knew you didn’t want it to happen again. We had to move on.”
The answer to those questions was a 73-67 loss to Oklahoma State at Barclays Center, one in which Pitt played with a competitive zeal, particularly defensively, that allowed it to remain within one possession of a victory until the final 15 seconds.
That answer, however, doesn’t come without a question that’s going to define the Panthers season — is it acceptable to endure loss after loss so long as the team improves or are the team’s efforts a failure unless it reaches a certain win threshold? No game this season has gotten to the heart of the query more than the loss to the Cowboys, leaving coach Kevin Stallings to wrestle with it after the game, as he may have to often this season.
There’s a sense of reassurance, sure, but not without the unshakable feeling of disappointment.
“We play to get results. I don’t think there’s any question about that,” Stallings said. “But I have to be mindful of what my job is and my job is to help bring these guys along and help them to get better. We pointed some things out to them about yesterday we didn’t think was sufficient and they tried to do something about it today. Now, we shouldn’t have to learn that lesson like we did yesterday, but we competed really hard today.”
Though they only had so much time to process the enormity of the Penn State loss, the prevailing message following it was as simple as it was cryptic — whatever changes there may be, just make sure that doesn’t happen again.
‘That’ didn’t, a result shaped in some part by a player who embodied the Panthers’ resilient spirit.
Marcus Carr, the highest-rated recruit of Pitt’s seven freshmen, largely struggled in his team’s first four games, shooting just 28.6 percent, showing bouts of carelessness with the ball and, because of those two factors, seeing his playing time gradually dwindle. Against Oklahoma State, he was a revelation, playing with an aggression he had yet to show to that point and orchestrating an offense that looked, by its own standards, uncommonly fluid and efficient. Carr finished the game with a career-high 12 points and 10 assists.
“With their defense being so overextended, I just feel like it was a little bit easier for me to penetrate the defense,” Carr said. “Because they were overextended, my teammates were able to make cuts and find open spaces. I was just doing my best to find them and get easy baskets.”
Stevenson, his Canadian countryman, rebounded in his own way, finishing with a team-high 16 points on 8-of-9 shooting one day after the worst showing of his young career, a 2-point,0-rebound performance against Penn State.
The Panthers offensive success, though, had its limitations. Without a bevy of skilled or experienced big men, they made only four of their 20 3-pointers, neutralizing an offense that made 23 of its 33 attempts (69.7 percent) from inside the arc. Their noticeable lack of size against the Cowboys — who started a 7-foot center and a 6-foot-9 power forward — cost them dearly, as Oklahoma State corralled 20 offensive rebounds in a game in which it missed 41 points. From those, it got 17 second-chance points.
The loss, in some respects, was a missed opportunity for Pitt, a chance to more emphatically rebound from the carnage of the Penn State loss. There’s merit to that idea, as it’s rare that a team shoots 13 percent better from the field than its opponent — 50.9 percent to 37.9 percent — and has only one more turnover — against a defense designed to create them, no less — only to lose.
“We played well defensively and we fought hard,” Stallings said. “That’s all I can ask.”
Craig Meyer: cmeyer@post-gazette.com and Twitter @CraigMeyerPG.
First Published: November 21, 2017, 10:51 p.m.
Updated: November 22, 2017, 3:44 a.m.