Takeaways: Pitt vs. Monmouth – Nov. 18, 2019

Meta note: In an effort to get game recap posts out more quickly, I will no longer be doing film study segments in each game takeaways post. Instead, I’ll be doing separate film study posts once or twice weekly with analysis of Pitt’s games for the week. This week’s post will include clips from the Robert Morris, West Virginia, and Monmouth games.

Onto the basketball. After another brutal first half, the Panthers buckled down and held off the Monmouth Hawks, ultimately winning by a final score of 63-50 at the Petersen Events Center.

Following their poor shooting effort in the second half of the game against West Virginia on Friday, Pitt’s offense sputtered in the first half against Monmouth, as well. The problems started right at the top, with Xavier Johnson. After he committed three turnovers in the first six minutes of the game, Johnson was replaced by sophomore walk-on Onyebuchi Ezeakudo.

The first half was an abject disaster for the Panthers. Pitt turned the ball over 12 times. They shot just 5 of 26 from the floor, or around 19 percent. Worse yet, they made just one of their 11 three point attempts. Johnson had just two points.

At one point, the ACC Network showed an extended shot of Jeff Capel with his head in his hands in frustration. Pitt led 21-19 at the break of a game that they surely could have been losing.

The second half could not have been more different though, as Pitt flipped the script in just about every way. Pitt turned the ball over just three times in the half, two of which were offensive fouls by Terrell Brown. They shot an excellent 14 of 22 from the floor, good for 63 percent, and made three of their five three-point attempts. Johnson played with confidence that we haven’t seen much from him lately, and he finished the game with 15 points and nine assists, in what was his best game of the season by far.

Trey McGowens also settled down in the second half after putting up a few first-half turnovers, and he finished with 16 points and six rebounds, while he made all six of his free throw attempts. McGowens still took a few wild shots on ill-advised drives, but in general, he played a better game than he did against the Mountaineers on Friday.

Au’Diese Toney also put up his best game of the season, finishing with 10 points and seven boards. He continues to look like a strong defensive player, and a real presence on the offensive glass. If his offense can continue to improve–he’s now had at least 10 points in two of Pitt’s past three games–he can be a really important player for the Panthers moving forward.

Aside from Pitt’s sophomore trio, one of tonight’s brightest stars was freshman Justin Champagnie, who picked up 12 points and 10 rebounds in his first career double-double. He was efficient, shooting 50 percent from the floor and making all of his free throws, and even picked up a block and a steal.

Sharp shooter Ryan Murphy notably had a tough night, missing on all of his five shot attempts and scoring just two points in 35 minutes. Gerald Drumgoole evidently injured his ankle during practice this past weekend, and did not appear in tonight’s game.

Pitt finished Monday’s game on a high note, and will look to take their momentum into their next matchup, a Thursday night matchup against Arkansas Pine Bluff at the Petersen Events Center.

Keys to the Game

In the pregame, I identified a few keys to the game for Pitt. How did the Panthers do in those key areas?

• Get the ball to Murphy early and often to take advantage of Monmouth’s weaknesses against the three-point shot. As I noted above, Murphy did not have a good night shooting the basketball. But given that he notched just five attempts, you would be correct to note that Monmouth did a good job of bottling him up. And it worked, for the most part, as Pitt shot just 4-for-16 from three-point land. For teams with deficiencies against the three defensively, this could represent a strong template for success against Pitt–contain Murphy and make the other Panthers shoot the long ball.

  Unless Johnson, McGowens, Toney, Champagnie, and Drumgoole can shoot the three more effectively, expect Murphy to receive a lot of attention outside the arc. And until those shooters improve, Pitt needs to be more intentional about creating space for Murphy on the outside. We’ll dive into that more deeply later this week in our film review post.

• Force Monmouth to turn the ball over, while protecting the basketball–especially at the top with Johnson and McGowens. Mixed bag here. Pitt did their part in forcing turnovers from Monmouth, as the Hawks turned the ball over 16 times. However, Pitt played their own brand of sloppy basketball in the first half with 12 turnovers of their own. In the second half, Pitt finally protected the ball like they need to do so to be able to win games against inferior opponents and hang with tougher teams.

  Just three turnovers for the team and zero turnovers by Johnson marked a 42-point second half for the Panthers, who looked much more lively in the half. They’ll need to play consistently like they did in the second half to hang with the majority of their ACC opponents, as ACC play is unforgiving and playing one half of 12-turnover basketball against a Louisville or UNC team will almost assuredly end the game early in the evening.

• Contain Monmouth’s top junior duo of Ray Salnave and Deion Hammond. Pitt did a really nice job of containing Monmouth’s star guards, holding them to just 13 points on 5-for-23 shooting on the night. Salnave also did not shoot a single free throw tonight, which is huge given his ability to draw fouls and make his freebies from the free-throw line. Coming into tonight, Salnave had made 16 of his 18 free throw attempts in four games.

  Hammond struggled in particular, missing all seven of his three-point attempts, as he finished with just three points and four rebounds in 32 minutes of game action. For the night, Pitt limited Monmouth to 37.3 percent shooting from the floor, and just 27.8 percent from beyond the arc.

The rotation

Following the West Virginia game, Capel’s rotation largely fell back into normalcy, with plenty of familiar faces receiving the majority of minutes. Pitt largely had a rotation of just six players, as Johnson (36 minutes), Murphy (35), McGowens (33), Toney (28), Champagnie (24), and Brown (22) earned the lion’s share of the time on the court today.

Brown had his second consecutive tough game today after a brilliant start to the season, as he put up just four points and two rebounds in his 22 minutes. To be consistently as good as the player that we know he can be, Brown absolutely must be more consistently aggressive on the boards. If he could pull down five or more boards every night, in addition to his shot-altering capabilities and improved offensive efficiency, he could be a real force for Pitt. His inconsistencies have been eating into his minutes the past couple of games, and I expect that they’ll continue to do so until he can show consistently high effort on a nightly basis.

Once again, Abdoul Karim Coulibaly saw his fair share of time on the court as well, with 11 minutes. And once again, it was a mixed bag. Coulibaly seems like he will be able to provide a nice offensive presence, as he is able to spin out of traffic and finish at the rim with a smooth touch. Still, he looks mostly very raw defensively. In his 11 minutes, Coulibaly finished with just two points and one rebound. In fact, he now has just two rebounds in 34 minutes on the season.

Coulibaly often looks lost on the defensive boards, and has a similar issue as Brown in his lack of aggressiveness and/or awareness in boxing out opponents. The potential is there, and maybe he can even develop enough during out-of-conference play to contribute to Pitt’s interior defense, but he’s not there yet. I think he’ll wind up being very good, but young big men can take longer to develop at this level than young guards for instance, and it is not a knock on him if he isn’t ready for ACC play this season.

Graduate transfer Eric Hamilton continues to battle for time, as he just played six minutes tonight. He seems to be ceding his role as the alternate big man to Coulibaly, though Hamilton does add nice experience when he’s on the court. He finished with two points, one steal, and one rebound tonight.

Finally, Ezeakudo saw time in his second consecutive game, and I continue to be impressed by his effort level. I expect that we will continue to see Ezeakudo in this role–that is, relieving Johnson or McGowens when they’re struggling for short spurts.

What to look for moving forward

Pitt plays another game at the Petersen Events Center this week when Arkansas Pine Bluff comes to town on Thursday night at 7 p.m. The game will air on ACCNX, with a radio broadcast on 93.7 The Fan. That marks Pitt’s last home game before they head to Fort Meyers, Fla. for the Rocket Mortgage Fort Meyers Tip-off on Monday, Nov. 25.

Pitt has plenty to work on before ACC play, and the next week and a half will provide them with plenty of tests. It will be interesting to see how Capel continues to adjust his rotation as the season progresses, and who he trusts in key situations as Pitt will face some high-major teams over the course of the next 10 days.

Check back in with Dream Backfield for some film study later in the week, in addition to coverage of the Pitt-Arkansas Pine Bluff game on Thursday.