Pitt Basketball: Assistant Pat Skerry To Towson / Barry Rohrssen To Pitt?

Another year, another lost coach for Pitt. This time, it's one-year assistant Pat Skerry. Skerry came from Providence and was one of the main reasons for Pitt landing super recruit Khem Birch.

Now, Skerry is headed to Towson to become their new head coach and Jamie Dixon is again needing to replace an assistant. The good news is that he's had lots of experience doing it.

So with Skerry headed to Towson, what's next? Well, a while back, I wrote about former Pitt assistant Barry Rohrssen being booted from Manhattan after failing to keep the program that Bobby Gonzalez built afloat. Rohrssen went 52-70 and had only one winning season there. That lack of success may be the reason it takes him a while to land another head job. Programs are willing to take a chance on a top assistant like Rohrssen that has no head coaching experience, but far less excited to hire a coach that struggled at a job and has no other head experience.

When I wrote about Rohrssen's demise, I mentioned the possibility that he could come back to Pitt if one of the assistants left for another job. Now that it's happened, could it open the door for Rohrssen's return? Ray Fittipaldo of the Post-Gazette seems to think so.

Still, it's no guarantee. Steve Lavin at St. John's could come calling and like I mentioned in that previous post, Rohrssen had an offer last year to join Lavin's staff. St. John's is a program on the rise and it could be an attractive job for Rohrssen. The program is on the rise and he would be right at home in New York.

Fittipaldo mentions that Rohrssen has been a big fan of the Pitt program, even after he left, and was spotted at the Panthers' two NCAA tournament games.

Interesting.

Losing the guy that helped land Birch is a big deal. But Rohrssen is an excellent recruiter himself and was a big reason Pitt's pipeline to New York recruits existed while he was around.

He'd be my first choice.