At home Tuesday night in Manhattan, Ed Gonzalez clicked on his TV to watch Pitt play Duke.

Flashing across Gonzalez’s TV screen was former Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School basketball star Justin Champagnie, warming up inside Petersen Events Center.

The game mattered to Gonzalez because he’s been the coach at Bishop Loughlin for 12 years, helping push Champagnie toward success in high school. Just as important, he’s the guy who opens up the school’s gym in Brooklyn (pre-covid) when Champagnie comes home and insists on getting some shots up.

“Whenever he wants. This is home,” Gonzalez said. “I’ve known him since eighth grade when he came to my basketball camp.”

Gonzalez is a coach and, as such, he deals mainly in reality. But when he saw Champagnie getting ready to play, he made a prediction.

“You know what’s funny. I saw it in his eyes,” he said. “I was watching TV and I said to myself, `He’s going to have a monster game.’

“There’s a certain look that I know. I coached him for three years.”

The game was Champagnie’s second since returning one month after injuring his knee. He was supposed to be out at least six weeks.

Didn’t matter. Champagnie scored 31 points, matching his career high set last year against Wake Forest, and grabbed 14 rebounds, pretty much fulfilling his former coach’s prophecy.

But do you know what Gonzalez noticed? The 14 rebounds and Champagnie’s two missed free throws while Pitt was ahead by six in the final 17 seconds.

“I was a little annoyed he didn’t get 20 rebounds,” Gonzalez said. “I get upset at him.” (They spoke by phone the next day).

“This is my point. Once he figures it out. What do I mean by that? He’s got 10 rebounds at halftime. `Keep on getting after it.’

“This is the scary part. He’s not 110 percent yet and that’s what he’s doing. When he figures it out and when he takes care of business from A to Z, it’s going to be unbelievable. You guys haven’t seen it all yet.”

What Gonzalez appreciates most of all is what Champagnie does when there’s no basketball in sight.

“In the hallways, in the building, just making kids feel good,” he said. “If someone was going through something, Justin takes the time to talk to people.

“That’s huge. He’s a star basketball player and he’s talking to someone who doesn’t even play sports. You know what I mean. That tells you about his character and who he is.”

When Gonzalez was hospitalized last year with a brain aneurysm, he said Justin and his twin brother, Julian, were among the first to reach out to him at his bedside.

After making a full recovery, Gonzalez is pleased to see that the twins — five months shy of their 20th birthday — could be in process of the ultimate double/double.

Justin, 6-foot-6, 200 pounds, leads the ACC in scoring (20.25 points per game) and rebounding (13). Two inches taller 20 pounds heavier and a starter at St. John’s, Julian leads the Big East in scoring (20) and is eighth in rebounding (7.2).

“Best of friends. They’re great together,” Gonzalez said. “They compete against one another. They support one another. They rally for each other.”

While at Bishop Loughlin, Justin was injured during a game in a tournament in Delaware.

“I’ll never forget it. Julian just came in and picked up the slack for both of them,” their coach said. “He said, `I gotcha. Don’t worry about it.’ They have that relationship.

“They’re hard on each other in a good sense. They get after each other and make sure the other is doing the right thing.”

At one point, Gonzalez believed the twins would attend the same college. Pitt offered both of them, but they decided to make their own paths.

Both players were ranked as three-star prospects by Rivals.com and were not heavily recruited by many Power 5 schools. Why?

“You’d have to ask the college coaches,” Gonzalez said. “They get the big bucks.”

Of course, that doesn’t matter now.

“Part of (their success) is they were not five-star recruits. But they know they can compete against all those guys,” Gonzalez said. “The more you put that in front of Justin, the more he relishes the opportunity to play against whomever and have the confidence to play against whomever.”

Indeed, Champagnie said he was looking forward to sharing the court with Duke’s Matthew Hurt, who was leading the ACC in scoring before the game.

After Champagnie scored 31 and Hurt 13, the Pitt sophomore said, “Before the game, I kept saying to myself, `I don’t think he’s better than me,’ and I went out there and kind of proved it.”

This summer, when the gym at Bishop Loughlin was closed by the pandemic, Champagnie found a place in New Jersey where he could practice. “It was quite a ways (from Brooklyn),” Gonzalez said.

At Pitt, coach Jeff Capel said Champagnie regularly asks to stay after practice to work on individual skills with coaches.

“He wants to be great. Not very good,” Gonzalez said. “He wants to be great.”

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