Jerry DiPaola stories, Page 72

Aaron Donald never played for Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi, but they are part of the same team of donors to the football program. On Pitt’s sixth annual Day of Giving, Donald donated $200,000 to the Pitt Football Championship Fund. Narduzzi and his family gave an unspecified amount. Both men have...

Robert Morris football hopes to take a step forward in prestige, recruiting and championship possibilities after the Big South Conference, where it has been a member for nearly two years, announced an alliance with the Ohio Valley Conference. The merger of the FCS conferences will begin with the 2023 NCAA...

Two weeks before the start of the ACC Tournament – and with Pitt’s signs of life slowed down considerably by Georgia Tech on Saturday night — Jeff Capel wants to be clear about the current state of his team. “One loss we had the other day is not indicative of...

Christian Spears, who has been Pitt athletic director Heather Lyke’s top assistant since 2017 and administrator for football and men’s basketball, is leaving to become athletic director at Marshall University. Marshall’s Board of Governors voted Monday to approve the hire. Spears was Pitt’s deputy athletic director and chief operating officer,...

A man sporting an eclectic collection of skills, Mouhamadou Gueye blocks shots and makes 3-pointers with greater frequency than any of his Pitt teammates — 38 3s, 59 blocks. In fact, he is one of only two players from a power conference — Stanford’s Spencer Jones is the other —...

Senior guard Jayla Everett, who leads Pitt women’s basketball in scoring, was dismissed from the team Sunday for unspecified reasons, coach Lance White said. Everett had not played in Pitt’s most recent two games, but scored 18 at North Carolina on Feb. 10. It was her sixth game with at...

The fruit was juicy and hanging low for Pitt to pick. Or, so it appeared. There was momentum from a three-game winning streak, the largest home crowd of the season (9,085) eager for a reason to get excited about basketball again and even a last-place team in town as the...

All of a sudden, Pitt basketball is interesting, fun and worth the price of admission. Amazing what a little three-game winning streak can do. Pitt will try to make it four in a row Saturday against Georgia Tech at Petersen Events Center. Tipoff is 7 p.m. on the ACC Network....

The narrative surrounding Pitt before its stunning upset of North Carolina was this: The two-game winning streak was nice, but it’s time to confront the big boys of the ACC. Yes, the Panthers play hard, connect on defense and — thank you, Ithiel Horton — make the opponent respect the...

The noise from a crowd of 17,270 at North Carolina’s Dean E. Smith Center seemed to grow louder every time North Carolina hit a shot in the second half. And the Tar Heels made plenty of them, seven in a row at one point. Who knew the struggling Panthers could...

Time was running out for freshmen to enroll for Pitt’s winter semester, but Marquan Pope wasn’t worried. He had organized the first and final term of his senior year at Guyer High School in Denton, Texas, so he could graduate in December, spend the winter training for Pitt’s 2022 season...

If Puff Johnson crashes his 205-pound frame into Pitt’s 280-pound John Hugley on Wednesday night, North Carolina’s sophomore guard probably will be able to handle it. At least Hugley won’t throw Johnson into the bushes when the Panthers and Tar Heels get together at the Dean Dome. That’s how Puff’s...

The passage of time has blurred the truth. DeWayne Brown, who has trained Aaron Donald for the past 13 years, said his protege wasn’t wearing cleats the day he was “killing people” in one-on-one drills at a Pitt camp during summer 2008. Greg Gattuso, the defensive line coach largely responsible...

The ACC has six teams with winning records in league play. That’s fewer than half of the conference members. Four of them show up on Pitt’s schedule over the final 18 days of the regular season, starting Wednesday with the Panthers’ trip to Smith Center in Chapel Hill, N.C., against...

Pitt is taking a step forward in helping its student-athletes manage and profit from name, image and likeness opportunities. University officials announced Monday a partnership with The Brandr Group, a brand management, marketing and licensing agency that counts more than 35 college programs among its clients. “We support our student-athletes...

The mind wanders, wondering what if … • Ithiel Horton had played the entire season for Pitt? • His arrest never happened, and he was able to employ his long- and mid-range marksmanship in those five games that were lost by five or fewer points? Would 10-16 — Pitt’s current...

Conventional thinking might indicate Pitt’s 71-69 victory Saturday against N.C. State would give the team hope. Hope the Panthers can resurrect over the final three weeks what has been a troubling season. Hope the mistakes that made the game closer than it needed to be will disappear. Hope that the...

Long before the Pitt women’s lacrosse team’s historic 9-8 overtime victory against Duquesne on Friday night — the program’s inaugural game — coach Emily Boissonneault sat down to write her pregame speech. This wasn’t just any ordinary talk, though. These words mattered. Boissonneault said she wrote the speech “over and...

The questions on Pitt fans’ lips are these: Was the 56-51 victory at Florida State on Wednesday a product of Pitt finally adhering to coach Jeff Capel’s insistence on defensive focus? Or, was Florida State just that bad? Whatever the case, it was the lowest offensive output by an ACC...

At this embryonic stage of his college career, Ryan Baer might carry the highest profile of the 12 freshmen in Pitt’s class of 2022. That might be difficult to prove. After all, he’s been on campus for just a month and has yet to wear pads. But there’s no doubt...

Ithiel Horton knows what it takes to shoot a basketball through the cords. Eyes on the rim. Feet square. Ball secure. Fire. But there was much more to it Wednesday night when he scored 25 points in his first start of the season, leading Pitt (9-16, 4-10 ACC) to a...

Tiquan Underwood caught three passes for 30 yards for the New England Patriots during the 2011 season. Yet, he was proud to be part of the team the week before Super Bowl XLVI in Indianapolis. Then, the day before the game, he got the call: Bill Belichick wanted to see...

If you want to keep up with Pitt’s Kenny Pickett, Damarri Mathis and Cal Adomitis in their quest to reach the next level of football, you need to be willing to travel as much as they do. All three Pitt products have been invited to be among the 324 former...

Jeff Capel and his Pitt basketball team have not been home since Sunday, and they won’t return to campus until Thursday. So, Pitt’s coach probably hasn’t had time to look at the ACC standings. If he did, he’d see Pitt (8-16, 3-10) has fallen into the basement, tied with N.C....

There’s not much time for players and coaches to think about all the problems plaguing Pitt’s basketball team. After another embarrassing effort Monday night turned into a 74-47 loss to Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va., the Panthers must find a way to regroup in time for another road test Wednesday...