Blair, Young lead #4 Pitt to first ever win over No.1

Connecticut isn’t the only team in the Big East that has the beat.

DeJuan Blair’s second career 20-20 game with 22 points and career-high 23 rebounds notched his Pittsburgh Panthers ballclub their program’s first ever victory over a No. 1 ranked team as they defeated the Connecticut Huskies 76-68 on Big Monday.

Blair, the nation’s leading offensive rebounder, went into the half already with a double-double, the 30 th of his career and 16 th of the season, with 15 points and 13 rebounds.

The Panthers (24-2, 11-2 Big East Conference) came into Monday’s primetime matchup 0-13 lifetime was No.1 ranked teams and 0-3 vs. UConn (24-2, 12-2 Big East) when they were ranked as the top dogs in the country.

Monday night’s win also put the Panthers in a tie for first-place at 11-2 in the conference with the Huskies and the Golden Eagles from Marquette.

Sam Young, the Big East’s 8 th leading scorer, shined as well in addition to Blair’s record night as he recorded his 11 th game this season with 20+ points finishing with a game-high 25 points, including 4-6 from 3-point range.

Panthers’ floor general Levance Fields came into Monday with 56 assists and 6 turnovers in last five games, a 9.33 assist/turnover ratio, but it was his clutch shooting that put the Panthers ahead for good down the stretch.

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With 3:05 left and the game tied at 61-61, Fields found himself 0-7 from the field before connecting on back-to-back 3-pointers on consecutive Pittsburgh possessions putting the Panthers up 67-61 and ahead for good.

The guard play of the Panthers struggled before Fields’ run of six straight points shooting just 1-26 from the floor (Brown 0-5, Wanamaker 0-6, Gibbs 0-2, Fields 0-7, and Dixon 1-6).

All-American and potential Big East Player of the Year Hasheem Thabeet played just 23 minutes scoring five points, grabbing four rebounds, and rejecting two shots. His five points the lowest on the season since the 74-63 loss to Georgetown and his four rebounds were seven below his average of 11.

Monday’s loss marked the first game this year in which the 7’3 center fouled out.

Guard AJ Price scored a team-high 18 points, including 4-7 from downtown while Kemba Walker, the fill-in for the recently departed Jerome Dyson, scored 13 points.

Both teams with meet again in Pittsburgh March 7 th at 12:00 PM.

By Al Buzzelli
BigEast-fans.com Staff Writer

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