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Solid Opening Night For Former Pitt Panthers Johnson, Toney and Coulibaly

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It’s safe to say that all is not well when it’s comes to the Pitt Men’s basketball program.

The fan base is disgruntled and have every right to be following the Panthers 78-63 loss to The Citadel, a game in which they were dominated from the opening tip.

One of the issues that Pitt will have to try and overcome is getting consistent scoring from players other than John Hugley and Femi Odukale. That pair combined to score 47 of Pitt’s 63 points last night.

New players will have to step up and develop as the team tries to replace scorers from the 2020-21 team such as Nike Sibande (injured) Ithiel Horton (suspended), Xavier Johnson (transfer), Au’Diese Toney (transfer) and Abdul Karim Coulibaly (transfer).

Newcomers to the program contributed very little to the Panthers effort: Mo Gueye (2 points, 8 rebounds), Nate Santos (5 points, 2 rebounds, 3 assists), Daniel Oladapo (2 points) and Chris Payton (0 points).

To rub salt in last night’s wound, three starting players that left the program had solid debuts with their new team.

Coming off the bench for No. 23 ranked St. Bonaventure, Coulibaly scored 12 points (6 of 7 from the field) and grabbed 4 rebounds in 17 minutes.

Toney was in the starting lineup for No. 16 Arkansas and was outstanding with a stat line of 18 points (7 of 9 from the field) and 11 rebounds in 37 minutes.

Johnson was in the starting five for Indiana and finished with 14 points, 2 rebounds and 3 assists in 25 minutes of action. Johnson was 4 of 9 from the field and 5 of 8 from the line.

Sandy Schall, Coldwell Banker
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Justin Dietrich
Justin Dietrich
2 years ago

They are not Panthers, who cares how they performed??? Let’s focus on how embarrassing our program is right now…

ec2it
ec2it
2 years ago

Exactly, who gives a rat’s ass!

Eli
Eli
2 years ago

Salt in the wounds.

Pittband
Pittband
2 years ago

Johnson was a cancer on the program.

Send it in !
Send it in !
2 years ago
Reply to  Pittband

Since so many bailed….either multiple malignancies or One Giant Tumor.

Send it in !
Send it in !
2 years ago

This team & program is pathetic at the moment. And has not progressed one iota since Capel took over.

waysmarterthanyou
waysmarterthanyou
2 years ago

thank god we have football…..this is going to be another looooonnnnggggg basketball season

Grachon Gibson
Grachon Gibson
2 years ago

I think i was the last Capel supporter. Now im done. Lets start the Brandin Knight era, before he has success and we cant afford him

Joe Bunda
Joe Bunda
2 years ago
Reply to  Grachon Gibson

They’ll bring in Sean Miller.. . at least he’ll play Duquesne.

Paul
Paul
2 years ago

The bigger question is why will nobody come to Pitt?
The atmosphere is good, they play in the ACC, and capel is a guy that can recruit.
I understand top 50 guys won’t come here, but guys from 50-200 should want to play here and you can build a really good program with those guys. This doesn’t make sense to me and makes me wonder if this problem goes beyond the coach. I have no idea

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