Virginia puts clamp on Pitt, holds off Panthers comeback

If anyone outside the Pitt basketball program is qualified to comment on the state of the Panthers, it’s Virginia coach Tony Bennett.

And — get this — the coach with a national championship on his resume liked what he saw from his defeated opponent Saturday after the Cavaliers survived Pitt’s impressive yet unsuccessful rally in a 59-56 Virginia victory at Petersen Events Center.

“Their youth at times showed,” Bennett said of Pitt, “and then their heart and fight showed. Just like some of our inexperience showed.”

Virginia owns a five-game winning streak against Pitt that includes margins of victory of 25, 12, 29 and 24.

Virginia owned the Panthers — until the last 3 minutes, 26 seconds of Saturday’s game.

“Good thing we had a lead,” Bennett said.

The loss was the fourth in a row for Pitt (15-13, 6-11 ACC) and stretched Virginia’s win streak to four. The defending national champion Cavaliers (19-7, 11-5) are trying to dig themselves out of a hole that found them with the same record as Pitt (4-4) through eight conference games.

After trailing 54-41 with 3 minutes, 51 seconds left in the game, Pitt rallied to outscore Virginia, 15-5, by hitting six of its last eight shots, grabbing steals and rebounds and playing pressure defense.

Pitt had two legitimate chances to either win the game or send it into overtime.

First, Trey McGowens missed a 3-pointer with 5 seconds left and the Cavaliers clinging to a 58-56 lead.

Then, after Virginia’s Braxton Key made only one of two free throws to build the lead to 59-56, Pitt coach Jeff Capel called timeout to set up a final stab with 4 seconds left.

The play called for Xavier Johnson to dribble the length of the court and find Ryan Murphy. But there wasn’t enough time and Murphy’s shot left his hands after the buzzer.

“With four seconds left, I know you only have four dribbles,” Capel said. “Hopefully, Murphy could space and get to a spot and get to a shot. Unfortunately, we didn’t do that.”

Bennett was just happy to get out of town with the victory.

“That would have been a hard one to swallow,” he said.

Murphy is Pitt’s best 3-point shooter (34.5%), but he missed three games recently with a concussion. In the three games before Saturday, he was 1 of 6 from the field (0 for 3 from beyond the arc). He was 0 for 6 against Virginia, including four 3-point tries.

The loss leaves Pitt at 2-7 since Murphy’s buzzer-beater defeated Boston College on Jan. 22. But Bennett sees improvement for the Panthers under Capel.

“Coach is doing a great job,” Bennett said of Capel. “He gave all those young guys experience. Now, they’re in their second year. That’s how you build it. It’s hard in today’s college game to keep guys and get them to their upperclassmen years, but that was our model. You can just see it coming (for Pitt).

“If they’ll stay together and work, that’s a hard formula to beat, I think, in college basketball.”

The 13-point Virginia lead was made possible by the Panthers recording only one field goal in the first 7:50 of the second half.

Virginia leads the nation in average points allowed (52.6), but Capel said that was only part of the reason for his team’s scoring lull.

“We seem to have that every game,” he said. “And it’s frustrating. It’s frustrating for all of us, but I don’t have an answer for it.

“They are the best defensive team in the country. A lot of it had to do with them.”

Pitt is shooting 39% from the field in ACC games and was in line with that Saturday (22 of 57). Worse, the Panthers missed 12 of 15 from beyond the arc.

“When you’re not experienced and you’re not mature, that affects everything,” Capel said. “We have to be mentally tougher for 40 minutes, especially against that team.”

Sophomore forward Au’Diese Toney, who scored 13 points, said Pitt needs to “start off hungry.”

“We started off kind of slow and picked it up at the end. It’s too late.”

Johnson led Pitt with 16 points, the first time he has been the team’s high scorer since the victory Jan. 18 against North Carolina.

“We had our moments, and they had their moments,” he said. “Of course, they had more of the moments, though.”