Pittsburgh Basketball: 3 takeaways from blowout home loss to Miami

The differential in guard play apparent in matchup

Coming into the game, the only hope that Pittsburgh had to beat Miami was to not get beaten too bad on the perimeter, while Hugley has his way inside. The frontcourt was an area where the Panthers had the advantage on paper but in the battle of the trio guard starters, it was no contest.

Senior point guard Charlie Moore got everything he wanted early on, scoring 11 points in the first 10 minutes of the game. Kameron McGusty, who leads the team on the season with 17.4 ppg, did his damage later on to make the game out of reach for the Panthers. Both he and Moore had 19 points each for the Hurricanes, with the third key guard Isaiah Wong with just four points on 2/10 shooting.

But Pittsburgh’s trio of guards (Femi Oduakle, Jamarius Burton, Ithiel Horton) wasn’t much better than Wong, let alone the other two Miami guards. Odukale was benched early on after two early turnovers and had 10 points and three assists overall. The combined production for the three starting guards was 28 points on 12/34 shooting from the field, along with six assists and 11 turnovers. As a team, Pittsburgh had 20 giveaways on the night, with the Hurricanes scoring 30 points off of it.

And that’s a recipe for an automatic loss. Pitt’s offense is never going to be elite this season but giving easy points to the opponent is fatal for them. And while Moore’s 19 points of scoring production were important, it was how he led the offense as a true point guard that the Panthers had no answer to. They shot 55% from the field and got good looks 90% of the time. Compare that to Pittsburgh who just simply can’t run any true offense outside of giving the ball to Hugley and hoping he scores or draws a foul.

Pittsburgh’s ball control this season has been best when former walk-on Onyebuchi Ezeakudo is on the court for a three-guard lineup. The problem is that when he’s on the court, it’s effectively 4 on 5 offense for the Panthers. But while Horton is a double-digit scoring threat and a needed shooter, turnovers tend to go up.

At this point, it’s safe to say that neither Odukale nor Burton are true catalysts of an offense. So the team will have to hope for a starting-caliber point guard out of the portal. What that could mean for Odukale and his future will be interesting since that scenario would mean he wouldn’t have the ball much in his hands. But just like how Moore has turned Miami around, the Panthers will hope that another ball-handler can stabilize the offense and turn them around in 2022-23.