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Rohrssen's departure imminent
Pitt officials will say they did everything within reason to keep the Brooklyn-born Rohrssen, a recruiting whiz and a key figure in the program's return to prominence.
They will present the fact that they gave him a raise in excess of $40,000 to stay after the 2003 season, when Ben Howland left for UCLA and wanted to take Rohrssen with him.
They will remind us of their willingness to give Rohrssen another significant bump on his $135,000 salary before next season.
In fact, they will point out that they offered to make Rohrssen the highest-paid assistant coach in the Big East as it currently is constructed.
Chancellor Mark A. Nordenberg and vice chancellor Jerry Cochran also could tell us, justifiably, that they do not shrivel when it comes time to write big checks.
When they value a coach, they make a bona fide monetary effort to keep him.
They did it with Howland, and they did it with Paul Rhoads, the football team's defensive coordinator, who in the winter of 2002 was awarded a bundle when it appeared he was headed to Auburn.
Basketball coach Jamie Dixon is due a significant raise any day now.
Rohrssen, if he is so inclined, could counter by saying that he wanted to stay, that he told Dixon as much and that Pitt couldn't possibly have offered to make him the highest-paid assistant in the Big East, because St. John's made a better offer -- believed to be around $200,000 per year.
Rohrssen also could say, perhaps justifiably, that Pitt didn't act soon enough, that it didn't make him an offer until after it granted him permission to speak to St. John's this week and that a big raise wouldn't even make him the highest-paid assistant coach on campus.
That distinction still would belong to Rhoads.
Rohrssen also might suggest that the raise he received last season was more than recovered in the form of freshman center Chris Taft, a Rohrssen recruit who helps pay the bills.
Most of the points cited on both sides will have validity.
The bottom line is that Rohrssen, apparently, is gone.
It is a significant blow. Ill-timed, too. Pitt this weekend is hosting 6-foot-6 forward Alex Galindo, a much-coveted player from Newark, N.J.
Rohrssen was the point man in recruiting Galindo. Same goes for two of the gems in next year's freshman class, Ronald Ramon and Keith Benjamin.
It's possible that Bronx native Orlando Antigua, the team's director of basketball operations, could help maintain Pitt's Big Apple pipeline if he is elevated to assistant coach.
But Rohrssen already owns a key to New York City.
Here's how big he is: At a Knicks playoff game Wednesday, which Rohrssen attended with St. John's officials, an usher said to him, "Come home, coach."
It appears the usher will get his wish.
It is certain that many hard questions will linger.
You wonder if Oakland will ever be considered a final destination, rather than merely a steppingstone for the Howlands, Steve Pedersons and Rohrssens of the world.
For all of them, it seems, this was a Pitt stop on the journey home.
You wonder, too, whether Panthers basketball will continue to thrive if Rohrssen convinces New York blue-chippers in the mold of Taft and Carl Krauser to stay put.
Pitt officials might have made a very generous bid to keep Rohrssen.
Apparently, they failed to make him an offer he couldn't refuse.
