SYRACUSE, N.Y. — The right to extend their season and play postseason basketball was on the line when Pitt traveled to the JMA Wireless Dome on Saturday afternoon for the 130th all-time meeting with Syracuse. It was win or go home and the Panthers didn’t want to go home just yet.

With an 71-69 win against long-time rival Syracuse (15-16, 6-12 ACC) on the road this weekend, Pitt (12-19, 5-13 ACC) earned another 40 minutes in their season. The Panthers earned the largest lead of the game in the first half, fumbled it away and rallied with its two best players avoiding foul trouble to clinch the final spot in this year’s ACC tournament.

“I’m really proud of our guys, proud of the win, proud of the fight,” Pitt coach Jeff Capel said. “And grateful for an opportunity to keep playing.”

The Orange, who had trailed for most of the game, eventually tied the game at 52-52 with six minutes to play on a 3-pointer from Tyler Betsey but six points. Syracuse tied the game five times and took the lead twice over the final 5:19, but each time it lost a lead, Pitt either found a timely bucket, many of them from senior star Cam Corhen, or points at the free throw line, where they made 13 of 18 attempts in regulation.

But a pair of 3-point misses on either end during the two final possessions of regulation meant that the final game of the regular season for either team would be decided in overtime. And in the extra period, it was outstanding individual defense that made the difference. Pitt held Syracuse scoreless on its last four trips down the floor, clearing the way for a game-winning goal tend by William Kyle III as he tried to reject a Nojus Indrusaitis layup with 4.3 seconds left.

“As we got into the game, our guys were able to lock in a little bit more on the tendencies,” Capel said. “But I just thought we battled throughout. ... We just kept fighting, kept battling and, most importantly, we kept believing.”

Naithan George’s desperate final shot attempt fell wide of the rim, cementing a Pitt win that was closer than it probably should have been.

Game flow

Pitt led for the first 18:59 of Saturday afternoon’s game. Behind efficient early offense and an aggressive effort on the offensive glass. The visitors led by as many as nine with Corhen, continuing a hot scoring streak, scoring nine quick points in only 12 minutes. And Roman Siulepa opened the game by scoring four points and grabbing five rebounds to temporarily break a recent cold streak.

But foul trouble on those two offensive catalysts and Indrusaitis spelled trouble for the Panthers. It started at the 7:46 mark of the first half, when Corhen picked up his second foul. Little more than a minute later, Siulepa was charged with his second. And at the 4:46 mark, Indrusaitis incurred a second penalty.

Indursaitis added scoring, logging double-figure points for the fifth straight game. And Siulepa rebounded like a madman, grabbing eight in 32 minutes to lead the team. Corhen provided both the points and quality box outs to clear the way for his teammates. As each of them were recalled to the bench and Pitt’s offense suffered mightily as a result.

The Panthers scored only eight points over the final 11 minutes, and zero over the final 3:44, leading into halftime. They made only two of 14 attempts from beyond the arc in shades of Wednesday night’s loss to Florida State.

The frequent fouls also gifted Syracuse eight attempts from the free throw line, all of which were makes. The home team made it’s last two 3-pointers, after starting the game having missed six of seven attempts from beyond the arc.

If it wasn’t already abundantly clear how desperately the Panthers needed Siulepa and Corhen, they outscored the Orange 10-4 during the first 4:54 with those two back in at the start of the second half and reclaimed a 38-35 lead. They ripped off a 12-0 run over 2:49 that stretched the lead beyond double digits for the first time all day but it was quickly reduced to two again at the 7:41 mark of the second half while Corhen took a brief rest.

It was that run which set the stage for a dramatic final few minutes and a thrilling win for Pitt.

Quotable

Capel came as close as he ever has to publicly acknowledging his shaky job status following the victory. He and his players are well aware that the overwhelming majority of Pitt fans not only want him to be fired, but expect that it will happen when the season is over. But he continued to heap praise on his players for their focus amidst all the unpleasant conversations being held beyond the locker room.

“This hasn’t been an easy season. It’s been very difficult,” Capel said. “And when it’s difficult and you’re in a place where they care about it, there’s a lot of noise. … There’s a lot of noise around the program and our group has continued to fight and battle, even in the midst of all of that. My stuff has maybe been a distraction to them, but they haven’t shown that to me.”

Player of the game

It’s hard to imagine how much worse this season could have gone if the Panthers didn’t have Corhen at their disposal. He has been indispensable, as of late especially, and his 21-point effort despite the foul trouble he faced against the Orange in the regular season finale was critical to earning a spot in next week’s conference tournament.

“I’m really proud of our guys,” Capel said. “They showed toughness, togetherness, fight, which is what this team has done all year through the midst of all sorts of adversity.”

Key stat

Plus-minus is an imperfect measure of how any given player performed but the figures for Corhen and Siulepa are illustrative of how the game went for Pitt. By the end of the first half, everyone besides the two starting members of the frontcourt owned a negative plus-minus while Corhen played to a plus-five mark and Siulepa was at plus-three.

By the sounding of the final buzzer, Siulepa was plus-eight and Corhen was plus-15 in their 67 combined minutes of work.

As long as those two were on the court, this thin and flawed roster was able to survive and outplay the Orange, but take them out and they had little hope of competing. Though Capel credited his bench for helping pick up some of the slack and keeping the team in the game despite the foul trouble.

“I thought Kieran Mullen and Macari Moore gave us great minutes in the first half to help us keep it right there,” he said. “We had a lead, we had three guys who had two fouls and those two guys did a really good job of helping us out.”

Up next

The Panthers have just barely snuck into the ACC tournament field as the 15 seed by virtue of a head-to-head win against Notre Dame. The matchup was set as Pitt headed to overtime. With Wake Forest’s win against Cal earlier in the day, 10 seed Stanford ends up drawing Pitt at 2 p.m. ET Tuesday at the Spectrum Center in Charlotte, N.C. ACC Network will carry the broadcast.

“We just want to keep playing, to stay together, to play,” Capel said. “We had a situation a couple of years ago where a team in our league, they were counted for dead and they went on a magical run. It would be great if it happened, but all we’re focused on is the opportunity to play another day.”

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