Well, if I’m going to be providing some basketball content on The Pitt POV then I need to cram some BB study in quick-like. To help with that, and to familiarize some readers to the details of the basketball program, here are some things to get started with.
We have a new BB coach! Yeah Us!!
Kevin Stallings was hired away from SEC’s Vanderbilt University in AD Scott Barnes’ first big personnel move. Like it or not – he didn’t have the best track record there. The Vandys had four sub-20 win seasons in the last decade and averaged only 20.9 wins per year… barely meeting the 20 win benchmark that defines a ‘good’ season.
But he’s our guy now, bought and paid for. 
As soon as he’s finished Part II of his anger management course I’ll try to get an interview with him. Just kidding!
I think our new Athletic Director went out on a bit of a limb to hire Stallings . Even though the general consensus among fans, at least from what I can tell and remember I’m new at the BB coverage, is that Jamie Dixon had run his course at Pitt. We were what we were and it wasn’t champions.
I did follow that story line a bit back when the chatter about Pitt changing coaches was on the Internets and it seemed to me that signs pointed to Dixon being gone no matter what the Pitt administration or the fans wanted. It was more like Jamie Dixon was washing his hands of the Pitt job rather than the reverse.
Many fans were not happy with the Stallings hire. I have no real opinion on it yet but I do wonder if he is a stop-gap measure by Pitt until there is enough money in the BB budget to go after someone that would be a better fit. Pitt is spending big money on the FB program.
Salaries are the highest they have ever been in that sport and we are pumping money into brick and mortar facilities, both in FB and with major investments in the ‘minor’ sports infrastructures.
I don’t know for sure but looking back on Barnes’ long-term plans news he released last week it does makes me wonder.
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