Tim Benz: After 5 straight losses, how does Pitt's Jeff Capel get his rebuild back on track?

So now what?

You can't blame Pitt basketball fans — and even the program itself — if it has that question at this juncture of its mammoth rebuild.

First-year head coach Jeff Capel received — and deserved — high marks for the initial stages of the salvage mission. His energy, connection with fans, and name recognition alone boosted the morale of the program. If not for his hire, it could have remained dormant even in the wake of firing Kevin Stallings after that 0-18 ACC campaign in his final season of 2017-18.

Capel then brought in and retained enough talent to make the Panthers a competitive enough outfit to win 10 of 13 games in the pre-conference slate.

That helped the Petersen Events Center to become a popular destination again with energetic, sizeable crowds against the likes of Duke, North Carolina and Florida State.

Heck, the Panthers even crossed off a few "firsts" on their ACC to-do list. They got their first conference win since March 2017 when they upset Louisville in overtime on Jan. 9. Then they got their first win over a ranked opponent since February 2017 by upsetting then-11th-ranked Florida State 75-62.

From there, despite losses to Syracuse in the Carrier Dome and Duke at home, legendary coaches like Jim Boeheim and Mike Krzyzewski showered Capel's team with praise, and the buzz around the club has been good.

Which brings us back to, "so now what?"

Because behind all the verbal bouquets and positive headlines, the Panthers have fallen to 12-10 overall and 2-7 in conference play. They are now losers of five straight. A nine-point (65-56) loss at home to Syracuse Saturday was the closest game of that batch. Every other margin of defeat was between 11 and 15 points.

"Got to go back to the drawing board at practice," said sophomore Terrell Brown after the defeat by the Orange.

Well, not necessarily. Pitt doesn't have to wipe the slate clean and start over. They don't have to pull the plug and start fresh.

Again.

Just look at Brown as a case study. His game against Syracuse may have been his best of the season, totaling 16 points on 8-of-13 shooting to go along with six rebounds.

But what they do need to do the rest of February is just win a couple. Just get a few wins and give a little factual foundation to support all the external claims of progress.

It's a lot easier to believe that significant steps were taken if the "0" in the conference-win column from last season is replaced by a "5" or a "6" as opposed to the "2" they have now.

Despite the Panthers' recent struggles, that plan isn't out of reach. Pitt has only six games left in February, starting Tuesday night at Wake Forest. Five of those games are going to be played against teams that currently have records under .500 in ACC play.

The lone exception is a Feb. 16 date at home against Virginia Tech.

Even looking ahead into March, Pitt's schedule doesn't appear to get much harder. Aside from the tortuous task of visiting Virginia on March 2, Capel's crew only has two other games before the ACC tournament, and they are against Notre Dame and Miami. The Irish and the Hurricanes have a combined 3-15 record in conference play this season.

So, yes, the first half of Pitt's conference schedule has been a bit out of whack. Facing Duke, North Carolina, Florida State, plus Louisville and Syracuse twice each was daunting for this young group of Panthers.

That's why the story surrounding where Pitt is now after an extended losing streak shouldn't be about the bloom coming off the rose. The next phase in the evolution of Capel's group should be about becoming battle-tested following those defeats against the upper echelon of the conference and actually getting the job done against opponents that are on a more level playing field.

"The next step for us is to get better," Capel said Saturday night. "In some of these losses that we've had, maybe we've gotten better. It was going to be very difficult for us to beat Duke. And win at Syracuse. Louisville is one of the better teams in the country right now.

"We're not as talented as a lot of the teams we are playing against right now," Capel continued.

However, Capel went on to draw an analogy to Virginia. As he described, the Cavaliers are frequently atop the standings in the ACC, even if head coach Tony Bennett doesn't "have a team stacked with McDonald's All-Americans."

"He built a culture," Capel said of Bennett. "That's what we are trying to do. It may not equate to wins. We aren't judging ourselves on that. I know we have to win. That's really important. But I do think we are continuing to get better."

Maybe now the schedule will allow Capel's team to show some evidence to go along with that theory.

Tim Benz is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Tim at tbenz@tribweb.com or via Twitter @TimBenzPGH. All tweets could be reposted. All emails are subject to publication unless specified otherwise.