New Pitt coach rebuilding team point by point

System allows players to earn a spot in lineup

Two days before the Pitt women’s basketball team played Virginia Tech on Dec. 31, coach Tory Verdi implemented a new points system inpractice.

The team refers to it as the competitive cauldron. Players get points in four areas: Statistical elements — things like rebounds and steals — are positive points, while turnovers are negative. The other three categories are coachability, work ethic and attitude.

At the end of practice, the coaches add up all the points and it spits out a number to rank each player 1 to 11. The cumulative score between the usual two practices and shootaround before a game determinesthe starting five.

“Every practice has been very spirited,” Verdi said. “Some players who are like No. 6 or 7 before the practice, theyknow where they are and all of a sudden, they’re working really, really hard and doing everything possible becausethey know that they can move up to the starting lineup.”

The goal is to eventually not need the score sheet and it becomes habitual. Verdi, who is in his first year, is really using it as a motivational tool to solidify expectations and consistency.

It’s already shaken up the starting lineup just over the two games for which it’s been utilized. Freshman Lauren Rust earned her first start against the Hokies alongside seasoned starters Liatu King, Aislin Malcolm and Marley Washenitz. Bella Perkins had her fifth and sixth starts over thepast two games.

King and Washenitz became the only players to have started all 15 games when Jala Jordan and Gabby Hutcherson entered the lineup Thursdayagainst Notre Dame. It left Malcolm out of the starting five for the first time this season.

“I was excited to see the competitiveness of everyone on the team kind of amped up a little bit,” Washenitz said. “People maybe lack the consistency of competitiveness. ... That being implemented really kind of gave people motivation.”

It’s helped with the connectivity of the team, something that has been a bit of a rollercoaster this season. Everyone is fighting for minutes, and they’reworking together to do it. As individuals, they’re being rewarded for their competitiveness and consistency, which has translated to chemistryon the court.

Pitt was down by 20 points with 2:36 remaining in the first quarter against No. 16 Notre Dame on Thursday. It wasn’t looking good for the Panthers, who have only won six times this season. But they responded with a 19-3 run and were only down nine by halftime.

The Panthers would later take the lead courtesy of free throws by King and freshman JasmineTimmerson.

“We were connected and we were working together,” Verdi said. “When you’re that way, you’re gonna put yourself in a position to be successful regardless of who you’re playing. But when you’re not connected, we can’t win games. It’s just a constant reminder for myself and my staffto our players.”

Despite a Herculean effort from King, Pitt lost to Notre Dame 71-66. But the game had any number of “little wins” — important for a rebuilding team in which actual wins are hardto come by.

The Fighting Irish entered averaging 88.9 points per game and holding opponents to 59.5. Pitt scored above that margin and held the Irish below theirs. The Panthers also outrebounded Notre Dame 3731 despite the Fighting Irish having an ACC-best plus-13.7 reboundingmargin.

“The little ones mean kind of more, if not the same as the big wins,” Washenitz said. “Obviously, you want the big ones. But in order to get those big wins, you have to have the little ones. ... That’s going to build your confidence as a team and as a player and as a coach.”

For Washenitz, sometimes it’s as simple as only having to do a running drill once because everyone makes it in time. Other times, it’s about taking the lead against a rankedteam.

King has had a lot of “little wins” this season, including a career-high 34 points Thursday. But her biggest came against Georgia on Dec. 20. She was assigned to defend leading scorer Javyn Nicholson, who averages 16.6 points per game. Nicholson only scored12.

“She struggled, and I think we did well defending her,” King said. “She got in her headband and she didn’t really play much the first half. She’s a great player. She’s a big player, and just me being disruptive on defense, I think, isa win for me.”

King is the leading scorer and rebounder for the Panthers with 20.6 and 9.7, respectively. Both rank in the top three in the ACC. Her 55.9% shooting and 1.7 blocks per gameare both in the top 10.

“There’s a reason why she’s having a year that she’s having,” Verdi said. “She’s probably the most improved playerin the ACC right now.

“Other than that, ... it’s like I’m at the casino and I’m playing craps. I’m just rolling the dice and trying to figure it out because we don’t really have thatconsistency.”

Just relying on King isn’t a long-term solution. It helps that players such as freshmen Aaryn Battle and Timmerson have stepped up in recent games — Battle’s 17 points against Le Moyne and Timmerson’s eight against Notre Damewere both career highs.

They’ve especially been having inconsistencies with scoring at the guard position. Malcolm is the leading scorer there with 10.2 points per game, but she’ll have a stretch of games in the double digits followed by a few where she barelyscores.

Perkins is in a similar boat with her 7.8 points per game, and Washenitz has been so focused on running point that she’saveraging only 4.3.

“We need to figure out a way to score the ball at all positions,” Verdi said. “We need guards to be able to create for themselves and others and we don’t have that. I have to be ableto put a guard in a scoring position or be able to catch the ball in some type of [isolation] and let them go to work. We just don’t have the same strengths at every single position. That’s where we got to growand get better.”

Ultimately, Verdi and the team had hoped to be further along by this point. Still, considering that they already have six wins going into a game Sunday against Georgia Tech, Pitt is in a relatively good spot for Verdi’s first season. In two of the four seasons before Verdi arrived, the programhad fewer than six.

“We are hitting good strides being that we’re in the middle of the season,” King said. “We played our first two ACC games against top-20 teams. We can kind of see where we are, being that we only lost to Notre Dame by two possessions. We’re in a good spot, but I don’t want this to be the peak. I don’t want us to start to go down to a valley or start to plateau.”