2008 BIG EAST CHAMPIONS

• As some of you know, my record for Pitt games at the Garden (and the entire state of NY) is .000, so I stayed away from NYC. I’ve also worn the same clothes since Pitt-emblazoned clothes since Wednesday. In addition, I didn’t tape the game, because I think my record for taping games is equally depressing. You are all welcome.

• This has been an interesting rebuilding year hasn’t it? I’ll take more rebuilding years please.

• No lie, I had a great feeling about this game before it started. The players all said the right things. This team just seems really tight, and to have a camaraderie that was perhaps missing last year. A camaraderie I don’t think we’ve seen since Knight has been running the point.

• That said, my main concern was fatigue with memories of 2001 floating in my head

• I knew we had this game the moment I saw us diving for the lose balls early in the fist. Still, I was worried about our legs in the second, especially after Sam was short on some foul shots, and some open jumpers fell short, etc, but, there was an undeniable sense the whole time that this team just “wanted it” too badly. Reminded me of 2003 quite a bit.

• Lots have been said about this being Pitt’s Golden Era in hoops. No one can deny the successes of this era are the best that all of us internet-surfing fans have ever witnessed. But, lets give our great-grandfathers their due and indulge their memories with the following comparisons.

Let call Golden Era #1 the 16-year span from 1925-26 through the 1940-1941 seasons. The back-story for this era is that the legendary coach “Doc” Carlson had recently taken over the team in 1922. Carlson would coach Pitt for 30 straight seasons. He is sort of like our hoops version of JoePA in that while his early success was remarkable and completely innovative for the first half of his tenure (inventing the Figure 8 offense and experimenting with different training methods while playing a national schedule), he seemingly failed to adjust to the times and Pitt’s hoops program slipped in the later half of his career as coach. Unlike JoPa, the rosters of his later teams did not read like a police blotter and it is unclear if he chased officials across the court or soiled himself during games. That said, consider the results during that 16 year timeframe:

Record of 241-104 (.699)

13 winning seasons

1 undefeated season (1927-28)

2 Helms Foundation National Championships (1927-28 & 1929-30) Now before you scoff, yes even back then they were widely considered the best team in the nation and “National Champions” at the time (read the Owl student yearbooks at Pitt’s digital archive). Carlson was one of the first coaches to schedule “nationally”, annually taking his team on Midwest and West Coast road trips that included, for example, games against many Big Ten teams. Here’s a sampling from the 1927-28 schedule:
@ Michigan, @ Chicago, @ Northwestern, @ Iowa, Ohio State, Syracuse, WVU, @ Army, @ Colgate, PSU, Notre Dame, @ WVU, and @ PSU. That’s an impressive schedule even today, and Pitt went 21-0 that year.

The 1930 team even played in a “National Championship Game” at then defending national champ and assumed #1 team Montana State winning by one point. Other wins that year: @Indiana, @ Northwestern, @ Iowa, defending Eastern Collegiate champion Dartmouth, Ohio State, Nebraska, Georgetown, Notre Dame, Fordham, PSU, @ PSU, WVU, @ Temple, @ Army. These teams were named National Champions for a reason, and the record Carlson racked up in these years against the competition he played against was incredible. Consider some of the other teams (not listed above) that we played (often repeatedly and on the road) during this era: Michigan St., Marquette, Creighton, Purdue, NYU, CCNY, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Penn, Butler, Kansas, Colorado, Kansas, Stanford, USC, Xavier, Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Tulane, LSU, Navy, Bradley, Richmond, Illinois. We played anyone anywhere at anytime.

4 Eastern Intercollegiate Conference Championships (1933, 1934, 1935, and 1937) out of the 7 years of its existence (1933-1939) with combined record of 45-19 (.703) in non-playoff conference play. In two of those seasons (1935 and 1937) Pitt finished tied for the regular season title and the champion was determine by a one game playoff. In 1935 this game was played at WVU and in 1937 at Temple. Pitt won both. Indefensibly, the Pitt media guide fails to even mention the 1937 EIC Championship. Members of this conference included Georgetown, Penn State, Duquesne, Temple, West Virginia, and Carnegie Tech.

1 Final Four. The NCAA tournament began in 1939 and Pitt got its first bid in 1941. Back then, it was only an 8-team tournament, selecting mostly conference champions, but it is true the NIT was just as if not more prestigious to play in. However, the NCAA was a truly “national” tournament with an East and West region. Pitt went to the East regional in Madison, Wisconsin where it defeated North Carolina (Pitt’s only win ever over the Heels), but then lost to host Wisconsin after blowing a sizable second half lead. Wisconsin went on to Kansas City to beat the West Regional champ Washington State for the NCAA championship and is considered that year’s National Champion by both the NCAA (not surprisingly) and the Helms Foundation (which should be trusted to look at these things more objectively), suggesting, perhaps a no less than equivalent value of the playing in that season’s NCAA tournament.

7 All-American selections: Charley Hyatt (3X and 2X consensus 1st team 1928, 29 & 30; one of only 18 players in history to have 3 selections), Sykes Reed (Helms 1928), Don Smith (consensus 1st team 1933), and Claire Cribbs (2X consensus 1st team 1934 & 35).

2 National Scoring champions (Hyatt 1928 and 1930)

1 National Player of the Year (Hyatt 1930)

2 Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame Inductees: Hyatt and Coach Carlson (both ’59)

Also in 1940, Pitt played in the first ever television broadcast of a basketball game in a 57-37 win over Fordham at, you guessed it, Madison Square Garden. We just love that place.

We are all more familiar with the Current Golden Era. Let’s look at the 8-year span (half the timeframe of Carlson’s Golden Era #1 examine above) starting in 2000-2001 and take it through this year including our current 26-9 record.

207-64 (.764)

8 winning seasons

1 30 win season

7 NCAA appearances, 1 NIT appearance

4 Sweet 16s

7 Big East Title game appearances

2 Big East Tournament Championships (2003 & 2008)

3 Big East Regular Season Championships (1 outright, 1 West Div., 1 West Div shared) including an overall regular season conference record of 88-42 (.677)

3 All-American selections (2X Wooden, 2nd & 3rd team Brandin Knight 2002, 03) and Aaron Gray (3rd team 2007)

1 National Coach of the Year (Howland consensus 2002)


So yeah, wow, which era is better? Try to take the natural bias of the current era out of it and I think you have to go with the earlier era because of the 2 National Titles and the “greater” talent (at least nationally recognized talent with the POY, 1st team All-Americans, etc). Plus, you have to factor in the lack of an opportunity in the early era for post-season slots since there was not a 64 team NCAA + 32 team NIT and include the fact that there were only postseason tournaments in existence for 4 of the 16 years of the early selected era. Also, a lack of conference affiliation for over half of those years probably reduces the number of conference championships (especially in the 20s). However, there is no doubt that the current era is certainly more consistent since we haven’t had any “off” years with losing records, and we could be on pace to smash that era if it can get over the NCAA “hump”.


• Speaking of history, we are building today what Kentucky, Carolina, and Kansas look back on as evidence of their pedigree. These banners are all important because they make up the mystique of tomorrow. I really hope that soon people will look back over our history in the Big East…including our 2 Big East titles in the 80s and our 12 post-season appearances from 1980 to 1993… and ask “What happened at Pitt for those 7 years in the 90s?” That should be the anomaly, not the sort of seemingly constant surprise at Pitt’s string of successes in the 2000s.

• Speaking of those 7 years in the 90s…. Look what the wrong coaching choice can do, even when at the time all indications point to it as a homerun selection. How many of us were doing back flips when they named Ben Howland coach in 1999? I’ll answer that for us: zero. How many schools coaching changes have flopped or gone stale/mediocre in the last 8 years? We are soo, sooo lucky to have had Howland/Dixon. As others have pointed out, anyone that doesn’t see that flat out doesn’t understand college basketball in the least.

• Speaking of Golden Eras, how great was it to be a Pitt fan in the 20s and 30s. Football (MNCs in ’29, ’31, ‘36, & ’37, named by at least one selector in ’25, ’27, ’33, ’34, and ‘38) and Basketball (MNCs in ’28 and ’30, Final 4 in ‘41) national dominance! That is a true “bling” Golden “bling” Era. With a nod to another mini-golden era from ‘74 to ‘84, could we be about to embark on a 2nd Major Golden Era of all-around Pitt athletics?

• And whom do we really have to thank for our current Golden Era? Well here’s a little nod to the bumbling ACC! My distain for all things ACC, Boston College and Miami continues, but think of what they have given us. We were all set to have Skip Prosser (RIP) come on board as coach in 2003 until the impending raid scared him off. Our ACC hand-delivered “booby prize”:…Jamie Dixon. Plus, we all know what opportunity there is laid out before us in the Big East football side. Thank you ACC.

• Every so often, some people like to start threads about how the Big East should break up or how Pitt should try to wiggle its way into the Big Ten (as if that later idea is even remotely realistic). Folks, the connection we have to NYC and the opportunities we’ve had to play there thanks to our Big East membership, is a huge reason for our success the past eight seasons. Remember that. Hopefully, our presence in NYC will continue to grow…and I mean in the media and consciousness of the sports fans. Selfishly, that means I hope St. John’s program (& Rutgers and Seton Hall) continues to be stagnant. Red Storm fans must despise hearing about our New York kids all the time and our team calling MSG our second home. Becoming a favored team in NYC area through hoops can only be helpful for us in other aspects, like football and student recruiting, as the school seeks to advance its national and regional following.

• Oh yeah, BTW, Hail to PITT!