By HUNTER O. LYLE
BRADFORD, PA – While it wasn’t as pretty as their newly acquired and freshly hung banner, the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford’s men’s basketball team’s christening of KOA Arena came with a win, eking out a 80-70 comeback victory over Grove City.
After a three game road trip to open the season, which included a trip to Newark, NJ for the John K. Adams Tipoff Classic, the Panthers returned home with two wins under their belt. Once in familiar territory, they briefly rested on their laurels as the team unveiled the new addition to their rafters: the 2024-2025 NCAA Division III Tournament banner.
“Seeing the championship banner in person today was a great feeling, especially for our first game at home in front of the crowd. Seeing all the work we did last season come to fruition was a good feeling,” said Jeremy Rodriguez, a third-year Panther who averaged 17.1 points per game during Pitt-Bradford’s title run. “It’s a great record and it’s going to be hard to do that before, but with the guys we have now, the coaching staff and the trust we all have, I think we can make that happen again.”
With a fresh slate ahead of them in the 2025-2026 campaign, the Panthers were ready to get back to work. Despite playing under new head coach Daniel Smay, who took the position during the summer, Pitt-Bradford retained their run-and-gun system that brought them so much success from a year prior. That system, however, was still being fine tuned and Grove City was eager to help stress test it.
Out of the gates, Pitt-Bradford’s offense struggled to find its rhythm. Slogging through a tough and tall Wolverine 2-3-zone, they couldn’t find space or opportunity, instead settling for forced late-shot-clock jumpers or contested drives through the heavily guarded paint. While they missed their first handful of half-court offense shots, their defense, specifically their aggressive full-court-press that typically created points off turnovers a season ago, failed to slow down the Wolverines.
Pitt-Bradford finally broke the seal after five and a half scoreless minutes, scoring on a deep triple from Coby Farley and looking up at a 10-3 early deficit.
“(Grove City’s) zone has always been good. That’s a staple of their program a lot of times and it’s designed to slow us down. They want to slow us down and cut our tempo,” said Smay. “We just tried to get the ball moving as fast as possible to get a shot up right away. We didn’t placate into passing back and forth, we tried to attack, attack, attack.”
Using their height and control in the paint, Grove City continuously outrebounded the Panthers under their own rim. Coming away with multiple offensive rebounds and several clean looks in close, the Wolverines managed to stay ahead of Pitt-Bradford, who had found their next six points from the free throw line.
Midway through the first half, however, the Panthers began to show glimpses of a rally. Just before the ten-minute mark, a steal and score from Tra Edwards followed by second chance points from Xavion Boone cut the deficit to just four at 17-13. While Grove City widened the gap with a triple thereafter, Pitt-Bradford responded with another deep 3-pointer from Farley.
Slowly the momentum began to turn and after a few more steals and successive scoring opportunities, the Panthers had narrowed the gap to just one at 25-24 with just over five minutes remaining.
As the first period wound down, Grove City ultimately retaliated. Ending the half with a flurry of offense both inside and out, the Wolverines sparked a 13-4 run that put them back up by double-digits heading into the break.
Although Pitt-Bradford countered out of the intermission with a 5-0 run in the first minute of play – Boone came away with an offensive rebound on their first possession to feed Rodgriuez before he, in turn, came away with a steal and assist to Boone – their initial run was short lived, with Grove City quickly building the lead back up to 11 right after.
But then the Panthers’ hustle finally emerged, starting on defense. Still hounding the Wolverines with a full-court-press, Pitt-Bradford began finding successful double-team traps in the backcourt while probing passing lanes for deflections as they harassed their opponents into several turnovers. Coming away with fast break points as well as made shots both in the lane and on the perimeter, the Panthers chipped and chipped until they took hold of their first lead of the night at 52-51 with just over ten minutes remaining.
“In this system, you can’t come out flat footed. You have to be bouncing around, ready to fly around and we didn’t do that. Guys just have to find a way to be aggressive and get their motor going,” said Smay. “Tonight, it just took us a while to get going. Once that second wave, that second (lineup) goes in, they find the energy, wake the place up a little bit and then we start going. We just start starting games a little faster and with a little more energy.”
By then, both teams had entered the bonus and along with trading baskets in the open court, the two squads also traded trips to the charity stripe, slowing the game down to a tick-for-tack crawl. However, finding a slim one-point advantage with six minutes left, Pitt-Bradford hit the gas. Starting with back-to-back paint scores from Xander Norris and Samuel Brown, Rodriguez captured the momentum with a made 3-pointer that came with a trip to the line. Converting the four-point play, the Panthers held their largest lead of the night at eight points.
All they had to do was finish out with some staunch defense. That defense, however, came with a little too much physicality, resulting in Grove City having several opportunities to catch up at the free throw line. Luckily for Pitt-Bradford, the Wolverines shot an abysmal 2-for-8 at the line in the final minutes, and as the Panthers finished the game with a 8-2 run, they had secured their first win at home.
For a third time in four games, Rodriguez led the Panthers in scoring with 21 points, also coming away with four steals, four assists and four rebounds. Farley, who shot 4-for-8 from beyond the arc, ended with 16 points and Norris contributed 12 points and a team-high seven rebounds in the win.
Up next, Pitt-Bradford heads back out onto the road for one game against Alfred on Friday, before kicking off a three-game home stand on Monday, Nov. 24. During that stretch, on Wednesday, Dec. 3, the Panthers will see the start of AMCC conference play with a matchup against Hilbert.
“I think we have a lot to learn, that’s the good thing about this team and this system. We have a lot to learn and we’re still winning games,” said Smay. “I think the future is definitely bright, we just need to lock in a little bit more on the gameplan and tighten a few things up. Moving forward, I think we’re going to be better for it.”
