Short-handed Pitt loses to Louisville, but approach doesn't change

You might think that injuries to Justin Champagnie and Au’Diese Toney would change how Pitt’s basketball team will approach the rest of the season.

In a way, not really.

Although it hurts to lose your two leading scorers and rebounders – and the 64-54 loss to Louisville on Tuesday night at the Petersen Events Center is clear evidence – it doesn’t change what Pitt’s coaching staff has been preaching since the opening night loss to St. Francis (Pa.) on Nov. 25.

“When you lose Justin and you lose Au’Diese, a lot of that physicality and toughness wasn’t there,” said acting coach Tim O’Toole, who replaced Jeff Capel, absent for the night after testing positive for covid-19.

“But the reality was we knew we needed to be tougher and we needed to be more physical and we weren’t all night long. That’s something we have to keep addressing.

“That has been a point of emphasis since the St. Francis game. We had been pretty good until (Tuesday).”

As a result, Pitt (5-2, 1-1) was outrebounded, 45-26, by Louisville (5-1, 1-0).

O’Toole said such a deficit “breaks your back and you can’t get the ball.”

Champagnie’s loss to a knee injury for the next six to eight weeks is a devastating blow after he had become one of two ACC players averaging a double/double (17.8 points/12.3 rebounds).

Toney was second in those categories (16.2/5.0), but his ankle injury is less serious, and he will be evaluated day-to-day.

No matter how much time Champagnie and Toney miss, O’Toole said Pitt’s program will continue to uphold its goals.

“We’re going to keep our promises,” he said. “We’re here to build this into a national powerhouse. We’re not there yet, but that’s the goal.

“We show up and we did show up (Tuesday). We will make no excuses, none.

“We have to be resilient. The word I use, especially when I think of this city, is gritty. We weren’t gritty enough to win.”

Yet, in the first half, Pitt experienced a scoring surge, fueled by freshman guard Femi Odukale, who scored 12 points in less than four minutes.

Louisville led from the outset and built its advantage to 24-9 with 10 minutes, 31 seconds left before intermission after a 14-1 run.

Suddenly, Odukale hit shots from all angles — two 3-pointers, two two-point jumpers and a layup. When Ithiel Horton netted a driving layup at 1:11 – after he had missed his first four shots – Pitt had fought all the way back to tie the score at 28-28.

When Odukale’s 3-point attempt at the first-half buzzer rimmed out, Pitt had to settle for a 30-28 deficit.

Louisville, coming off an 85-48 loss to No. 9 Wisconsin on Saturday, never trailed in the game, and Pitt offered little threat after the midway point of the second half.

Odukale led Pitt with 16 points, opening up O’Toole’s eyes.

“Femi, he has such moxie as a guard,” he said. “He gave everybody this huge lift.”

But he scored only four points after halftime, missing all four of his foul-shot attempts while Pitt shot 8 for 19 as a team from the line.

Odukale is one of four freshmen who are playing – and will continue to play – meaningful minutes for Pitt through the next 18 ACC games.

“Our confidence is getting better every day,” he said.

But O’Toole was looking for increased production from his older players, Xavier Johnson, Ithiel Horton and Miami (Ohio) transfer Nike Sibande.

“Louisville knew that, too, and they weren’t going to let it happen,” O’Toole said.

Johnson scored 10 points, but played only 22 minutes while fouling out. Sibande, who walked into an empty gym nearly two hours after the game to shoot by himself, made his first start since he was declared eligible by the NCAA last week.

He scored eight and Horton added six while missing all four of his 3-point attempts.

Overall, the veteran trio missed 16 of their 25 total shots.

Champagnie and Toney were injured in practice Sunday and the team found out Monday they would be unavailable for the game.

“The reality is they’re out. Next man up,” O’Toole said. “Kind of like a football philosophy.”

But he added, “Easier said than done.”

“We need to fight like heck against all these (opponents). We didn’t sustain that over the course of the game.”

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