Pitt Take 5: ACC Tournament carries meaning for Jeff Capel on many levels

Jeff Capel was once a wide-eyed North Carolina school boy, full of eager anticipation while his teacher wheeled a TV into the classroom for the students to watch the ACC Tournament.

“For as long as I was in school, when it got to the ACC Tournament, you really didn’t do anything in school,” he said.

Later, he was a ballboy for Wake Forest — his father was an assistant — actually soaking in the tournament from floor level at the Greensboro Coliseum.

He also was a guard at Duke, realizing his dream of actually playing in it.

“Knowing all the unbelievable players and teams and coaches and games that have been played on (the Greensboro Coliseum) floor, having a chance to play on it was very special for me.”

He is now coach of his own team, starting a quest for Pitt basketball’s first ACC championship at 2:30 p.m. Thursday at Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C. It doesn’t even matter to Capel that the tournament is being played this year outside his native state of North Carolina. Capel has lived the ACC Tournament in four phases of his life — elementary school student, ballboy, player and coach — which makes Pitt’s quarterfinal game against Wake Forest more than just one of 32 games.

BUBBLE WATCH: Wake Forest over Notre Dame.

Thursday's game between the Demon Deacons and Pitt feels like a "Loser Leaves Town" match from Monday Night Raw in the 1990s.

— Jon Rothstein (@JonRothstein) March 13, 2024

Capel has plenty of personal history tied up in the ACC Tournament, but it’s the present that matters most. Pitt needs to win to extend its season into the semifinal round Friday and boost its hopes of reaching the NCAA Tournament. Some are calling Pitt vs. Wake Forest a play-in game.

Maybe, but for sure it’s lose, go home and settle for the NIT.

Here are some thoughts to ponder before tipoff:

1. The tiebreaker

Pitt and Wake Forest meet for the third time this season, with Pitt winning 77-72 on Jan. 31 at Petersen Events Center and Wake Forest answering Feb. 20 with a 91-58 victory in Winston-Salem, N.C. It was the most points scored against Pitt this season.

Wake Forest kept its bubble hopes alive Wednesday with a 72-59 victory against Notre Dame in the ACC Tournament’s second round. The Demon Deacons’ defense didn’t allow Irish freshman guards Markus Burton and Braeden Shrewsberry to keep the game close with their 3-point shooting. They missed 10 of 12 from long range.

That’s relatable to the Pitt game because the Panthers usually need Blake Hinson to fire away with precision from beyond the arc. In Wake Forest’s victory against Pitt, Hinson scored only 10 points — nearly nine short of his average — and was 1 of 5 on 3-pointers. If that happens again, Pitt has no chance.

Another important key will be Pitt’s ability to keep 7-footer Efton Reid III from dominating in the paint. Reid had 26 points and seven offensive rebounds in two games against the Panthers.

2. Homes away from home

Pitt has won eight games away from the Pete, including a neutral-site victory against Oregon State. The seven victories at enemy venues are as many as Houston, Duke, Marquette, Purdue, Arizona and Kentucky have won in those situations.

“When we go on the road, it’s an us vs. them and their fans type of thing and maybe even sometimes the refs,” Ishmael Leggett said. “We know nobody’s going to have our backs but each other.”

The game at Capital One Arena won’t be totally foreign to Leggett, a native of Prince George’s County, Md., who played there when he was 12 at halftime of a Washington Wizards game.

“I definitely know how to put the ball on the rim on that court,” he said.

Leggett and Bub Carrington, a Baltimore native, will be playing in front of several friends and family.

3. Capel takes care of ‘x- y-z’s’

Leggett won’t be introduced to the crowd as a starter because he has become a valuable player off the bench. He is the second Pitt player in two seasons to win the ACC’s Sixth Man Award, joining Nike Sibande from last year.

“It speaks to the culture,” Leggett said. “Capel had a plan, and we executed that plan. He has a great basketball mind, and we trusted him and he trusted us. The x-y-z’s have been taken care of (by the coaches). We just have to go out there and play hard.”

After Leggett missed the first Louisville game Jan. 6 with a shoulder injury, Capel discovered that having Carrington and Jaland Lowe on the floor together gave him two skillful ball-handlers.

“I just liked what I saw with Jaland and Bub together. It wasn’t a knock against Ish,” Capel said. “It was just something I saw, the way the ball moved. I thought it helped take some pressure off Bub where he didn’t have to be the primary ball-handler all the time. That can wear you down.”

When Leggett’s injury healed, he returned as the first player off the bench — without a whisper of a complaint. He didn’t have time for that. “I came here to win,” he said.

In his third game in that role, Leggett scored 11 points in the upset of Duke. In the last 14 games of the regular season, he averaged more than 28 minutes per game, with 12.3 points and 5.2 rebounds.

If he maintains his standing as the team’s leading rebounder (5.5), he’ll be the first Pitt guard to do so for a season since Jaron Brown in the 2001-2002 season.

“The main thing was him still feeling value and understanding his value to our team,” Capel said.

4. Savoring his final Pitt days

Some day soon, Hinson will play his final game as a Pitt basketball player.

So, it was no surprise when he didn’t want the moment to end Saturday night, spending several minutes after the final home ACC game with friends and family on the floor of the Pete.

Why not go straight home and get off his feet after a grueling 37 minutes against N.C. State?

That’s just not him.

“Just two years ago when I was dropping off groceries at people’s front door, no one was asking for my autograph,” he said. “I really like to take advantage of that type of stuff because you never know when it might be gone.”

He said his journey through three universities — Ole Miss, Iowa State and Pitt — helped shape his character.

“I love the person I am today because I’m humble,” he said. “I really listen to people, and I try to learn. It wouldn’t have happened if I wouldn’t have went through what I went through.”

5. One sport is enough

A final note about Hinson, the football player.

He was a wide receiver at Deltona (Fla.) High School, attracting scholarship offers from Baylor, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Miami, Michigan, Florida, North Carolina and SMU, according to Rivals.com. He never received a star rating from Rivals because he spent his final year playing basketball at Sunrise Christian Academy in Bel Aire, Kan.

Despite a 6-foot-8, 230-pound build befitting a tight end or defensive end, Hinson said he never heard from football coach Pat Narduzzi during his two years at Pitt.

“I don’t think coach Capel was going to let that happen,” Hinson said. “I feel like I’m one of the better basketball players in the nation. So, I wouldn’t spend much time playing football.”

What if his beloved Tampa Bay Buccaneers called?

“I would stop and think about it and say no,” he said.