Pitt basketball notebook: Panthers await tough challenge from No. 19 Wisconsin

In a venue layered in history that once was a Cold War safe haven for U.S. congressmen and served as host for 28 presidents, Pitt gets a chance Sunday to open eyes across the college basketball landscape.

The Panthers play No. 19 Wisconsin in the championship of the Greenbrier Tipoff in White Sulphur Springs, W.Va. A victory would give Pitt its first 7-0 start since 2013, its initial season in the ACC. The Badgers own a 12-7 all-time edge on Pitt, including the most recent meeting, a 47-43 Wisconsin victory in the 2016 NCAA Tournament. It was Jamie Dixon’s last game as Pitt’s coach.

Wisconsin (6-0) will be Pitt’s most difficult opponent until it visits No. 12 Duke on Jan. 7.

The Badgers have defeated two Big 12 opponents in the nonconference slate: Arizona, 103-88, and UCF, 86-70, the latter in the second game of the Greenbrier doubleheader Friday.

John Tonje, a 6-foot-5 graduate guard, leads Wisconsin with a 21.3 points-per-game scoring average. He previously played at Missouri and Colorado State. Bothered by injuries last season, he didn’t play against Pitt when Missouri visited Petersen Events Center.

Tonje has been an accurate shooter this season from anywhere on the court:

• Free-throw line, 50 of 53, 94.3%

• 3-point line, 12 of 27, 44.4%

• From the field, 33 of 62, 53.2%

The game will involve Pitt’s quickest turnaround this season. Tipoff is 5:30 p.m., only about 48 hours after the Panthers defeated LSU, 74-63, on Friday. Assistant coach Milan Brown hopes it won’t be Pitt’s first game with a break of one day.

“Knock on wood and, hopefully, this happens,” Brown said on the 93.7 FM postgame show. “It’s like the NCAA Tournament. You play a game. You have a day off. You play a game.”

The basketball court at the Greenbrier is more ballroom than gymnasium, with fans seated closer to the players than at most places.

“They really gave us energy, especially in the second half,” Pitt coach Jeff Capel said after the Panthers rallied from their first halftime deficit of the season.

Capel used only eight players in the victory, with guards Ishmael Leggett and Jaland Lowe playing a total of all but five seconds. Cam Corhen and Guillermo Diaz Graham were on the court for 36 and 32 minutes, respectively.

Leggett and Lowe are Pitt’s leading scorers, averaging 18.2 and 15 points per game.

Up next

Pitt, which has won all six games by double-digit margins, continues its power conference road tour Friday in Columbus, Ohio, at Ohio State before traveling to Starkville, Miss., to meet Mississippi State on Dec. 4 and Blacksburg, Va., on Dec. 7 in its ACC opener against Virginia Tech.

A bit of history

Capel reserved part of the time at Greenbrier for players to tour the large underground nuclear bunker built in 1958 under orders from President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Eisenhower visited during World War II when the facility was used as a hospital for injured soldiers.

Designed to house all 535 members of Congress in the event of a national emergency, its existence was secret for 34 years until a 1992 Washington Post story. The government immediately decommissioned the bunker after the Post story.