Pitt basketball opens season with exhibition against Slippery Rock

As it typically does in the middle of football season, the college basketball season sort of crept up on me. Pitt actually gets underway on Saturday with an exhibition against Slippery Rock.

I would imagine the attendance will be pretty light but given the fact that this is the first time we’ll get to see most of Pitt’s roster in action, the curiosity factor might provide a small boost. And the fact that the game coincides with a bye week for the football team should help even more. A fundraiser to fight against local pediatric cancer is also being held in conjunction with the game.

As I wrote yesterday, that roster, of course, is almost entirely changed over from last season. The lone returnees are senior guard Jonathan Milligan and senior forward Ryan Luther. Everyone else is entirely new.

To the actual game, I’m not sure there’s much to see here. A loss would (and should) trigger panic and there’d even be some alarm with a narrow win. No, Pitt isn’t expected to be terribly good this season. But this is still a roster with Division I talent and if they struggle with a Division II team, that’s just trouble. Slippery Rock was just under .500 (14-15) last year and they return three starters. But the Panthers still need to win this one pretty decisively.

Game time is at 2:00 p.m. and you can catch it at the Pete.

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