Pitt pounds Houston Baptist

How about five dunks with three alley-oops in the first eight minutes?

The No. 22 Panthers started with a flurry of slams and raced to a record-breaking, 103-62 victory over Houston Baptist in the 2007-08 season opener Friday at Petersen Events Center.

"I kind of had a feeling that was coming," Houston Baptist coach Ron Cottrell said.

Pitt (1-0) will play North Carolina A&T (0-1) at 4 p.m. today.

Last night, the Panthers led, 13-0, less than four minutes into the game and finished with a couple of school records and posted the program's highest-scoring game in nearly 12 years.

Junior power forward Sam Young led all scorers with a career-high 22 points on 10-of-15 shooting and grabbed nine rebounds.

Freshman center DeJuan Blair posted arguably the finest debut in the history of Pitt basketball, finishing with 20 points on 9-of-11 shooting. Blair added 14 rebounds (10 offensive), the most in a Pitt freshman's debut in 30 years, and four steals, both game-highs, in only 19 minutes.

"I had fun out there," Blair said. "It was an excellent game. My teammates make me feel comfortable. I wasn't nervous at all. I felt great, actually. Everybody made me feel welcome."

Blair started the early dunkfest about two minutes into the game, as he scored the Panthers' first six points. All told, half of the Panthers' first 10 field goals were dunks.

It started with Blair's slam and ended with Gilbert Brown's throwdown off an alley-oop.

In between, Young treated the audience of 9,072 to three dunks, highlighted by an alley-oop from Blair and a ferocious, breakaway windmill slam.

The 6-foot-6 Young is relishing the Panthers' new up-tempo style of play.

"I've played this way all my life -- all through high school and AAU," Young said. "And then, I get here, and I'm supposed to slow it down a little bit.

"I felt like I wasn't taking advantage of my strength. ... That's what I did tonight, and that's definitely more my style of play. I feel more comfortable. I feel more of a need to present myself more and make things happen."

Pitt set school records for rebounds (59) and offensive rebounds (27) and enjoyed its most prolific scoring night since beating Long Island, 108-67, in 1995. The Panthers also flirted with school record for assists and steals.

Blair barely missed a pair of records for a Pitt freshman debut -- Ricardo Greer's 21 points and Sam Clancy's 16 rebounds. It was the first double-double in a freshman debut since Sean Miller in 1987.

"It was a good first game for us," Pitt coach Jamie Dixon said. "We had some built-in advantages over Houston Baptist (1-2). But I thought we passed the ball and we rebounded the ball well. When you do those two things, you feel good about yourself."

The Panthers made it clear there would be no repeat of the upsets that have dotted the NCAA early-season landscape. Pitt led, 37-10, with seven minutes left in the first half against outmanned and undersized Houston Baptist.

Houston Baptist, which played NAIA last season, missed its first seven shots and didn't score until 4:20 into the game. Pitt led, 48-21, at halftime despite shooting 1 for 15 from 3-point range in the opening 20 minutes.

Pitt missed 18 of its first 19 3-point attempts and finished 10 of 34 from behind the arc. But Blair cleaned up the mess, scoring seven baskets on offensive put-backs.

"Blair is just so big," Cottrell said. "It was almost like they were throwing it up there from the 3 for him to go get it, just so he could put it back in."

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