Men's basketball: Outside shooting struggles early...and doesn't get better

A win is a win. And a scrimmage is just that — a scrimmage.

Those games are played for a reason. Its to grade a team's preseason performance and what they need to improve on. In the case of Pitt, it expects to win handily. For Slippery Rock, a loss.

But for much of Sunday's exhibition game against Slippery Rock, Pitt struggled.

With less than 10 minutes remaining the in the first half, the Panthers trailed the Rock 20-13. The best that Pitt could do in the first 10 minutes and 18 seconds of play in the first half is score 13 points against an NCAA Division II opponent. Part of the problem stemmed from the team struggling to convert on shots. In the first part of the first half, the Panthers had converted only five of their 15 field goal attempts — and were 0-for-4 in three-point attempts.

Although freshman Dante Taylor may have saved the game with his 27 points and nine rebounds, there is still work to do for the Panthers.

Boasting a trio of rising stars in sophomore Ashton Gibbs, junior Brad Wanamaker and redshirt freshman Travon Woodall — there's also senior guards Jermaine Dixon and Chase Adams — the Panthers were expected to dominate the outside shooting. After all, Gibbs led the Big East as a freshman last season in three-point shooting percentage.

But then again, the Panthers did win. And it's just nitpicking a team whenever they win, but head coach Jamie Dixon and the rest of the Panthers will need to learn from this game. They struggled rebounding and stopping Slippery Rock's impressive perimeter shooting — the Rock finished with 75 shots, including 46 from behind the arc — early in the game, but turned things around whenever Taylor re-energized his team.

Still, the Panthers, who are built more like an outside shooting team than an inside one this season, were 2-of-11 from the three-point line. Shooting 18.2% might work against a D-II opponent in a scrimmage, but it will need to be much better whenever they start the regular season and more importantly, conference play.

The Panthers will play one more scrimmage — against Coker College on Sunday, Nov. 8 at 4 p.m. — before starting the regular season on next Friday.

Want to see pictures from the Pitt-Slippery Rock scrimmage? Check out the photo blog.