More often than not this season, Pitt has been a team adept at finding ways to lose basketball games.
Falling behind early, missing free throws, sputtering offense — the list goes on as to how the Panthers endured a rocky nonconference schedule before dropping six of their seven ACC games leading into Tuesday’s tipoff at Petersen Events Center versus Wake Forest.
Several of the aforementioned recurring issues plagued Pitt against the Demon Deacons, yet the Panthers’ resilience made up for it in a 80-76 overtime victory.
“I’m just proud of them for continuing to show up,” coach Jeff Capel said of his team postgame. “What we’ve been through is difficult, but like we told our guys, you have to run towards it. You can’t run from it. We’ve put ourselves in this situation. We’ve got to fight our way out of it.”
Freshman Omari Witherspoon drained the winning bucket for the Panthers (9-12, 2-6 ACC) with 15 seconds left in the extra period, which ended on a 6-0 Pitt run.
After the Panthers’ Roman Siulepa tied the score 66-66 with a steal and fast-break dunk at the 1:02 mark of regulation, Pitt and Wake Forest headed to overtime.
Pitt trailed by as much as 12 in the first half and had a lead as large as five in the second. The majority of the final 20 minutes were neck-and-neck, with the teams largely staying within a basket of one another.
For a period of 3 minutes, 54 seconds down the stretch of the final half, Pitt was stuck at 62 points, unable to generate any offense.
With 2:49 to go, Wake Forest (11-10, 2-6) took a 66-62 lead. For the remainder of regulation, the Panthers prevented any Demon Deacons points.
In overtime, the Panthers prevailed, snapping a three-game losing streak.
“We needed this, big-time,” Witherspoon said. “We’ve been on a losing streak, so we just needed this to turn us around and spark us into the win column.”
Siulepa (15 points, 15 rebounds) and Witherspoon (13 points, four assists, three boards) were the heroes for Pitt on Tuesday.
Barry Dunning Jr. contributed 15 points and nine boards, and Brandin Cummings scored 13 points.
Wake Forest’s Juke Harris, who ranked third in the ACC with a 20.6-point average, dropped 17.
Tuesday marked Siulepa’s third consecutive double-double.
As a team, Pitt shot 38.2% (26 of 68) from the floor and 11 of 36 (30.6%) from deep, compared to Wake Forest’s 45.8% make rate (29.2% from beyond the arc).
Once again, the Panthers dealt with blown opportunities at the free-throw line, hitting only 68% (17 of 25) of their shots.
However, in overtime, after Witherspoon hit his fadeaway jumper that won things for Pitt, he hit a pair of shots from the charity stripe for insurance.
“These guys found something inside of them, where we were able to push through hard,” Capel said. “The last two minutes of regulation, we were able to get stops. (Wake Forest) didn’t score. Guys made some outstanding defensive plays, (and) guys stepped up and made some big offensive plays. Same thing in overtime.”
Pitt found itself in a 7-0 hole to start the game, and with 10:47 left in the opening half, the Panthers trailed by 10.
While the Demon Deacons’ advantage grew to 12, Pitt was able to conclude the first half in a manageable position as Nojus Indrusaitis hit a 3-pointer to make it 36-30 after 20 minutes of play.
In the second half, with 10:31 to play, Pitt had jumped ahead to a 55-50 lead following back-to-back 3s from Indrusaitis and Witherspoon.
Neither team could pull away for the remainder of regulation, but Wake Forest appeared on the verge of doing so when it took a 66-62 lead at the 2:49 mark.
From there, Dunning made it 66-64 with a layup, and Siulepa’s steal on Myles Colvin translated to the equalizer.
“I had tunnel vision and was just looking down, but I think the biggest thing was still staying aggressive on defense,” Siulepa said of the sequence. “ … Barry just talked about competitive stamina, and we were able to finish this game and do right by that. Just proud of the guys.”
A Siulepa 3-pointer 33 seconds into overtime made it 69-68 Panthers, but with 3:45 to go, the score was tied 71-71 thanks to a long ball from Wake Forest’s Cooper Schweiger.
After Cummings and Colvin traded 3-pointers, Wake Forest led 76-74 with 2:07 to go.
At the 1:26 mark of overtime, Witherspoon failed to tie the score, missing one of two free-throw attempts, but he more than made up for it on Pitt’s next offensive possession.
After Cummings’ route to the basket was blocked at the edge of the foul line, he fed it to Witherspoon, who dribbled, stepped back and released a few feet away from the baseline.
“That’s a shot that I work on all the time,” Witherspoon said. “I shoot it a lot in practice. That’s just my shot right there. It really was second nature when I got to that spot and did my little sidestep to put it in the basket.”