Women’s hoops teams at least value City Game

Every year we hear every excuse in the book from coaches all across the country about why they can’t find a way to play their traditional rivalry games. It is everything from “scheduling issues” to “need to play other people” to “need to balance home and away games” and on and on.

It is all nonsense. We know it, they know it, the athletic directors that allow it to happen know it, and everyone with a brain knows it. If two teams want to play a game, they can make it happen every year and fit it in around all of the other games they schedule.

Fans love and appreciate rivalry games, and the only thing that keeps them from happening is the ego and misguided sense of self importance or preservation or the petty spite of coaches who refuse to play them.

We used to have the City Game in men’s basketball annually, but that game died not long after Jeff Capel became the head coach at Pitt. He didn’t see the value in it, didn’t want to play it and — and along with Heather Lyke, who could have stepped in and ensured it — really deserves the lion’s share of the blame for why it died.

Duquesne coach Keith Dambrot is not completely blameless, however, as he felt like he was being lied to, condescended and disrespected by the people at Pitt and made his distaste of it all very public a few years ago, likely burning some bridges along the way.

He actually said as long as he is coach at Duquesne and Capel is at Pitt, there is very little chance they will work together to make it happen.

It is all silly. It is petty, and the only losers in the whole deal are the fans and the basketball community of Western Pennsylvania.

The game is very popular, and all you need to do is look at the annual attendance numbers for it to confirm that, but big-time college athletics ceased being about what fans desire long ago.

I don’t care who is at fault, to be honest; it is an embarrassment and travesty that the game isn’t played every year.

That brings me to the women’s basketball programs at Pitt and Duquesne, who thankfully are led by coaches who get it and put aside any of their own desires to make sure the game continues to be played.

To that I say thank goodness for Dan Burt and Lance White, a breath of fresh air in college athletics, as they understand that while it is their job to win games, it is also their job to create a great atmosphere for both the players they coach and the fans who support them.

And I can’t overstate the importance of coaches like Burt and White in the continuation of rivalries and rivalry games. They want to play the game and thus make it happen.

It is funny how that works.

White has every excuse Capel has to not play but still plays the game. And White is a coach who has been trying to build a program and could easily have said, “I need to schedule an easy win instead of Duquesne,” but he didn’t.

White isn’t even from this area and yet he recognized immediately the importance of the game and said he is committed to playing it because it is a great tradition and great for the program.

“The City Game has a long tradition and it is fun to embrace that challenge,” White said. “This game really highlights the level of basketball that is played in the city of Pittsburgh. Having this game on our schedule is a great test early in the year that brings emotional and physical energy that will help us in ACC play.”

Burt has every reason to say, “We don’t get anything out of this game because we have been better than Pitt for a lot of my years here, so beating them isn’t a big boost for us.” He didn’t, though, as he said he is committed to the game because it is an incredible opportunity to showcase Division I basketball to young basketball players in the area.

“The City Game has been competitive over the historical course of the series,” Burt said. “Playing this game allows young women in Western Pa. to experience high-level basketball in an intense setting. At Duquesne, we hope the series continues yearly as our team roster is filled with local players.”

“The highest concentration of WPIAL players on Division I rosters in men’s and women’s basketball is Duquesne women’s basketball. There is no university close to our numbers of local players.”

The two could have then wrangled about dates that don’t work, blamed the other side, claimed they wanted to play but needed to schedule something else. But they didn’t.

They both have consistently said, “The City Game is important and we are going to continue to play it,” and should be commended for that.

I say bravo, and maybe the men’s programs — plus football programs at Pitt and Penn State, Nebraska and Oklahoma, and basketball programs at Kentucky and Indiana — can take a cue and figure it out. This wouldn’t be the first time women led the way, but the women’s programs at Pitt and Duquesne are indeed doing just that.

The game is Saturday at 6 p.m. at Pitt this year and it is a game that local basketball fans should flock to because it is one of the last annual rivalry games we have standing in these parts.

The women’s teams have figured it out, and hopefully some day their male counterparts do, as well.

We all win when rivalry games are played, and I would argue we all lose something when they are not.