Pittsburgh hopes to continue a late-season push into the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament while Stanford seeks to end a two-game losing streak in its pursuit of a 20-win campaign when the Panthers and Cardinal duel on Wednesday night in California.
With four games remaining in the ACC regular season, Stanford (16-11, 5-9 ACC) finds itself tied with Wake Forest for 13th place. Fifteen of the conference’s 18 teams will qualify for the annual postseason showcase.
Meanwhile, Pittsburgh (10-17, 3-11) improved its chances of reaching the event with a 73-68 home win over Notre Dame on Saturday. The victory moved the Panthers into a tie with the Fighting Irish for 15th place, each a game ahead of Boston College and Georgia Tech.
Pittsburgh coach Jeff Capel applauded his players for their ability to rebound from a five-game losing streak. It made the long flight to Northern California — the Panthers’ longest trip for a basketball game since going to Hawaii in November 2014 — a lot more pleasant.
“These guys deal with things a lot differently than I do,” Capel noted to reporters. “I can separate from it; I can get away from it. They can’t. So for them to show up with a great attitude and continue to work, as a coach, I’m grateful for that and think it speaks to the culture we’ve built here.
“We’ve been thrown a lot of adversity this year, and all of us will be better for it.”
Nojus Indrusaitis was the standout of the Notre Dame win with a career-best 17 points. The sophomore has scored in double figures in three of the Panthers’ last five games, after doing so just eight times in his first 37 college contests.
Stanford won 21 times in coach Kyle Smith’s first season last year including the NIT postseason, a number the Cardinal had in sight before falling at Wake Forest and Cal in their last two games. Now, they’ll need not only to make the ACC Tournament — it’s not guaranteed yet — but also win at least once there to potentially reach 21.
At the same time, Stanford would love to see star Ebuka Okorie made the national All-Freshman team. He will take the court Wednesday as the third-leading scorer among freshmen (22.3 points per game) behind Duke’s Cameron Boozer and BYU’s AJ Dybantsa.
Okorie had 26 points in the loss to Wake Forest, then complemented 17 points with 13 rebounds against Cal.
“He’s got a growth mindset,” Smith boasted to the media after Okorie’s season-best rebounding effort against Cal. “(He’s already) one of the best players I’ve coached.”
