6-5-19

The Pitt News

T h e i n d e p e n d e n t s t ude nt ne w spap e r of t he U niversity of Pittsburgh | PIttnews.com | June 5, 2019 ­| Volume 110 | Issue 4

IS IT DEALS YOU’RE LOOKING FOR?

PITT SEEKS INPUT IN MED SCHOOL DEAN SEARCH Emily Wolfe

Contributing Editor

Buyers look through used items at Saturday’s Mexican War Streets Yard Sale. Thomas Yang | visual editor

PITT MEN'S STUDY REFLECTS ON PAST, FUTURE OF HIV FIGHT George Smith

For The Pitt News When an outbreak of sexually-transmitted human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV, hit the United States in the early 1980s, not much was known about the virus or how it spread. But scientists, researchers and volunteers at Pitt have been working for almost four decades to try and change that.

The Pitt Men’s Study was formed in 1984 and has followed almost 3,000 separate cases of HIV with the goal of determining the causes of the virus and then finding treatments and cures.

Dr. Mackey Friedman, a PMS co-investigator, said in an email participants attend semi-annual study visits, some of whom

have not missed a study in 35 years. Participants, who are accepted on a rolling basis, range from young to old and are subject to blood testing, clinical trials and regular interviews.

While deaths caused by HIV and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, or AIDS, which often follows, have dramatically decreased in the last decade, a cure has yet to be found. The National Institutes of Health is the largest public entity currently working towards a cure, and PMS operates as a branch of NIH’s ongoing work.

The outbreak didn’t occur in the distant past — a few cases of HIV popped up in the United States in the ’70s, but by the ’80s, the virus was spreading across the

country.

William Buchanan, the clinical coordinator of PMS and member of the program since 1988, said the decade was marked with uncertainty.

“Men were becoming ill and dying of these very strange diseases that nobody ever heard of, nobody ever understood why,” Buchanan said. “There was a panic and an urgent need to do something about it.”

Buchanan said bars began using plastic cups instead of glasses in fear of spreading the virus. Sex education classes increased at the behest of then-Surgeon General C. Everett Koop and homophobia skyrocketed.

See Study on page 2

When Arthur Levine announced in January that he would step down from his role as senior vice chancellor for the health sciences and dean of the School of Medicine, he said he would remain in the position until a replacement was found. This summer, the search has begun in earnest, and the University is seeking feedback from the Pitt community for aid in finding the best candidate.

The search committee, chaired by Provost Ann Cudd, will hold a total of three open forums seeking input from University affiliates. In addition, the committee has created an online survey for Pitt community members to share their feedback on the search. The survey gives respondents the chance to nominate specific candidates, or offer qualities they would like to see in the person chosen.

The first open forum for the next School of Medicine dean, held Tuesday at the Graduate School of Public Health, was streamed live here. The next forum will be held Wednesday, June 12, at 11 a.m., and the last will be held Friday, June 21, at 8 a.m. Both will take place in Lecture Room 6 of Scaife Hall.

Levine worked in the School of Medicine for more than 20 years. When he announced his retirement from the position of the school’s dean and senior vice chancellor, Levine had the highest base salary of any University official — $891,667 in 2019.

He has already begun transitioning to a new passion project, an Alzheimer’s research laboratory in Pitt’s Brain Institute.

At the time of the announcement, Chancellor Patrick Gallagher commended Levine for his achievements as head of the medical school, including significant additions to the curriculum and the creation of several departments within the school.

News Study, pg. 1

One of the significant issues surrounding the epidemic is the stigma. During the initial outbreak, infected men either did not know they had contracted HIV or were uneasy about coming forward due to the surrounding controversy. Furthermore, speculation over the virus’ causes created a dangerous environment for those infected.

“There was a lot of distrust with the government,” Buchanan said of the time period. “People were reluctant to have it known that they were infected or that they were gay.”

At a World AIDS Day event in late November, scientists, researchers and members of PMS gathered at Heinz Chapel to commemorate those lost to the disease.

Dr. Charles Rinaldo, principal investigator of PMS, commended the first 60 men that came forward to participate in the study.

“It was 1982, at the beginning of the epidemic, when fear of AIDS was rampant, when 60 gay men in Pittsburgh answered our hand-drawn recruitment posters,” Rinaldo said. “Without those 60 men, there would be no Pitt Men’s Study.”

As the patients have aged, PMS and its goals have also changed.

Buchanan said that the goals of the study, originally to understand the causes of HIV and how it spreads, have evolved into keeping those infected healthy so they may live longer lives. PMS has accomplished these newer objectives through clinical trials and substudies.

He added that PMS has found HIVpositive men now live much longer and healthier lives compared with in the past due to new treatments created since the late ’90s in conjunction with NIH and the national Multicenter AIDS Cohort Study.

Dr. Jeremy Martinson, a PMS co-investigator since last year, said research at PMS has recently focused on understanding and treating complications that HIVpositive people encounter as they age.

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Audrey Murrell named acting dean of Honors College pittnews.com “People who have been infected with HIV for a long time, such as many decades, have greater health problems as they age. They are at greater risk of heart disease, stroke, cognitive problems, and even some cancers,” Martinson said in an email.

PMS has seen the presence of HIV plummet in its patients, but not entirely disappear, due to the virus latching onto cells in spots that current medicine cannot reach. As a result, scientists at Pitt’s Graduate School of Public Health announced in an April press release they had created a new treatment, dubbed “kick and kill.”

Dr. Robbie Mailliard, a lead scientist in the effort, said the method works by “kicking” the virus out of the hard-to-reach locations and then killing it. The scientists primed dendritic cells, a component of the immune system, to attack and destroy certain T-cells, another component of the immune system, which HIV uses to hide itself from detection.

“There are some promising therapies being developed for the kill,” Mailliard said in the release. “But the Holy Grail is figuring out which cells are harboring HIV so we know what to kick.”

Buchanan said PMS has achieved a successful “kick and kill” operation in a test tube and is looking forward to a clinical trial.

The American public has accumulated a broader comprehension of HIV, its risks and its causes because of scientists like those at PMS. As a result, the stigma surrounding the virus has dropped considerably since the troubling times of the ’80s.

Martinson said the study has faced challenges like funding shortages, failed trials and a lingering prejudice against people living with HIV/AIDS, but said the volunteers have always gone to great lengths to participate.

“Many of them have been enrolled in that since the mid-’80s but still come into our clinic twice a year to give blood, answer questions and take part in research studies, for little reward beyond parking validation,” Martinson said.

PITT LISTS 25 TOP-PAID EMPLOYEES

Jon Moss

News Editor Pitt released a list of its 25 highestpaid non-officer employees for fiscal year 2018, with Patrick Narduzzi, the men’s football coach, topping out at more than $3 million. The disclosure is required for all state-related universities by Pennsylvania’s Right-to-Know Law. Narduzzi earned $3,142,424 in fiscal year 2018, following a series of increases in recent years. He earned $2,887,319 in fiscal year 2017 and $1,768,841 in fiscal year 2016.

But pay increases are also forthcoming for top University officials. The Board of Trustees’ compensation committee approved salary increases of 2.25% for Chancellor Patrick Gallagher and other senior University officials in December 2018, going into effect for 2019. His base salary will be $555,000 for 2019.

In addition to Narduzzi, the 24 other highest-paid non-officer employees at Pitt include: Kevin Stallings, former men’s basketball coach, $2,426,368 Suzanne McConnell-Serio, former women’s basketball coach, $667,813 Michael Becich, associate vice chancellor for informatics in the health sciences, $642,060 Mark Nordenberg, former chancellor, $635,162 A. Everette James III, associate vice chancellor for health policy and planning, $574,985 Donald Burke, associate vice chancellor for global health , $492,629 Peter Strick, chair of the neurobiology department, $488,114 Steven Reis, associate vice chancel-

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lor for clinical research, $475,000 Lise Vesterlund, economics professor, $467,686 David Denis, Katz Graduate School of Business finance senior chair, $460,507 Thomas Braun, former School of Dental Medicine dean, $451,545 Arjang Assad, College of Business Administration and Katz Graduate School of Business dean, $441,360 Bruce Freeman, chair of the pharmacology and chemical biology department, $432,519 Mark Shlomchik, chair of the immunology department, $430,731 Rocky Tuan, director of the Center for Cellular and Molecular Engineering, $428,093 Ivet Bahar, chair of the Computational and System Biology department, $412,918 Diane Denis, Katz Graduate School of Business finance alumni chair, $407,550 Steven “Shawn” Watson, former football offensive coordinator, $405,000 Dario Vignali, cancer immunology chair and vice chair of immunology department at the School of Medicine, $401,289 O’Neil Outar, former interim vice chancellor for Institutional Advancement, $401,042 D. Lansing Taylor, director of the Pitt Drug Discovery Institute, $400,669 Minking Chyu, Swanson School of Engineering associate dean for international initiatives, $398,554 J. Jeffrey Inman, Katz Graduate School of Business associate dean for research and faculty, $396,079 Ann Thompson, vice dean of the School of Medicine, $391,798

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Opinions

column

from the editorial board

YouTube should make changes to protect children Uploading a YouTube video of two young girls playing outside in bathing suits might appear to be a harmless action, but recent reports on the video website’s algorithm suggest that doing so could unintentionally attract sexual predators.

The New York Times recently reported that Youtube’s algorithm, which the site uses to personalize content recommendations for its users, was showing a video of girls playing outside in two-piece swimsuits to users who had watched other videos of prepubescent, half-dressed children — after they had watched sexually themed content. The result of this was a loop of videos that experts say sexualize children.

Since the allegations arose, YouTube has made several half-hearted attempts to curb the harm of the algorithm, but they haven’t made any changes adequate enough to fix the algorithm from attracting sexual predators, or allowing innocent home videos to enter the stream of those who watch sexually promiscuous adult content. The streaming service needs to step up and make major changes in order to protect children and families.

Youtube banned comments on many videos of young children in February in an effort to block predators, according to The New York Times. After blocking the comments, YouTube said that they would be examining ways to better the algorithm over the next few months.

“Recently, there have been some deeply concerning incidents regarding child safety on YouTube,” Susan Wojcicki, the company’s chief executive, wrote in a post on Twitter. “Nothing is more important to us than ensuring the safety of young people on the platform.”

But predators on YouTube are difficult

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to keep up with. Sometimes, their actions are more subtle and therefore more difficult to detect. Commenters will often post timestamps that direct others to sections of the video where a girl’s backside or bare legs are visible. Others just post suggestive emojis, according to a report by The New York Times.

This, along with YouTube’s failure to address the recommendation system — which is the list of videos that play on a continuous loop after the first video that one deliberately watches — has done little to improve the streaming service’s problem. And even after being warned about the dangerous algorithm activity, YouTube didn’t make very much of an effort to improve safety, according to The New York Times.

“When The Times alerted YouTube that its system was circulating family videos to people seemingly motivated by sexual interest in children, the company removed several but left up many others,” the Times reported.

This is concerning, as it shows that YouTube is not as committed to the safety of children as it claims to be. The algorithm doesn’t just cater to those who are attracted to suggestive videos of children either. It can also show up in the feed of those who have been watching any kind of sexual content on YouTube.

Though the recommendation system changed slightly after the algorithm tweaks, YouTube said that it was not the result of a deliberate policy change.

But a deliberate policy change is exactly what YouTube needs if it wants to protect children, families and people who have no intention of watching revealing videos of young children.

TIME TO EXECUTE THE DEATH PENALTY

A California prison lethal injection room. image via wikimedia commons

Leah Mensch Opinions Editor

New Hampshire overrode Gov. Chris Sununu’s, R-N.H., veto and voted to abolish the death penalty on May 30, making it the 21st state to kill the death penalty in the last few decades.

The state’s efforts to end capital punishment have been going on for years.

The United States is one of the few developed countries in which the death penalty is still legal in certain places, despite it being an inhumane and outdated form of punishment. The practice is also expensive, irreversible and ineffective when it comes to curbing criminal offenses. This information has long been known and wellresearched. Needless to say, it’s time for other states to follow New Hampshire in abolishing the death penalty.

Pennsylvania is one of the 30 states that still allow execution as a sentence. When Gov. Wolf, D-Pa., announced the moratorium of the death penalty in 2015, he noted that six people had been exonerated from Pennsylvania’s death row that same year. While that number may appear

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to be shocking, it really isn’t surprising.

According to studies conducted by legal experts, one in 25 people on death row are wrongfully convicted. In other words, 4% of those put to death are innocent. Since 1976, 1,499 people have been put to death in the United States.

These statistics suggest that at least 59 of these people were not guilty of the crimes for which they were executed.

Unfortunately, most of the people who are wrongly convicted are never granted liberty. For example, Cameron Todd Willingham was put to death in 2004 for killing his three daughters and then setting his house on fire. He maintained his innocence throughout his entire trial and residence on death row. Evidence has periodically emerged indicating that the fire was likely a complete accident and Willingham was completely innocent. And Willingham’s story is hardly unique. The Death Penalty Information Center has a running list of people who have been executed but were likely innocent.

Despite there being no way to 100% prove See Mensch on page 4

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Mensch, pg. 3 the guilt of everyone on death row, some still support capital punishment, insisting that the death penalty can act as a deterrent against other crimes. In other words, people will not commit certain crimes due to the looming fear of possibly being put to death. One of the more famous people to speak to this was former U.S. President Richard Nixon.

“Contrary to the views of some social theorists, I am convinced that the death penalty can be an effective deterrent against specific crimes,” Nixon said after a court ruling in 1973.

But studies conducted in the past decade have shown that social theorists are probably correct. A comprehensive study conducted in 2009 found that 88% of leading U.S. criminologists do not believe that the death penalty is a homicide deterrent. The alternative to the death penalty is a life sentence in prison without parole, which is actually less expensive for the government and taxpayers than carrying out executions. This isn’t due to the cost of the execution itself, but rather the trial leading up to the sentencing.

Capital cases are much more lengthy than cases where the death penalty is not considered.

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They also cost about four times more in their entirety, according to a study conducted by the Kansas Judicial Council in 2014. The Washington State Bar Association estimates that death penalty cases generate roughly $470,000 in additional costs to the prosecution and defense versus a similar case without the consideration of the death penalty. This estimate does not even take the cost of court personnel into account. According to Richard C. Dieter of the non-partisan DPIC, studies have repeatedly shown that a death penalty trial costs $1 million more than one in which prosecutors seek life without parole.

Even conservatives, who are typically against abolishing the death penalty, have weighed in on the economic threat it poses.

“Forget justice, morality, the possibility of killing an innocent man or any of the traditional arguments that have been part of the public debate over the death penalty,” Ed Barnes, a Fox News reporter wrote in 2010. “The new one is this: the cost of killing killers is killing us.”

All economic concerns pushed aside, there’s still an ethics problem with the execution methods. Until the 1980s when lethal injection was deemed more ethical, the electric chair was the most corporate execution method. The chair was phased out for good reason. In the past, prisoners have needed more than one shock to

die completely, and bodies have bled and caught on fire.

But lethal injection is just as unethical as electrocution, if not more than. The actual process happens in a series of three injections — first, an anesthetic to knock the inmate unconscious, and then pancuronium bromide, which paralyzes the muscles. Finally comes the potassium chloride, which stops the heart and kills the inmate. The final two injections are incredibly painful without an anesthetic.

The United States stopped manufacturing the anesthetic drug, thiopental, around 2010.

European nations refuse to sell the drug to U.S. government officials because those carrying out executions are not pharmacists or doctors. As a result, states have moved to the drug midazolam to act as the anesthetic.

Midazolam does not have any anesthetic or painkilling properties on its own, though. Even when mixed with other sedatives, the drug is only used in a medical setting for something called “conscious sedation,” which is a type of incomplete anestesia that works for short outpatient procedures, not administering sodium chloride to stop the heart.

Because of this, executions can be extremely painful for inmates, though they cannot express their pain because they are paralyzed. One of the

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most famous cases of botched execution is Clayton Lockett, an Oklahoma man who was put to death by lethal injection in 2014. The injection needle was not administered properly, and Lockett said the paralysis drug was not injected into his bloodstream. There were no backup drugs on the day of his execution. A report from the execution describes the way in which he “began breathing heavily, writhing on the gurney, clenching his teeth and straining to lift his head off the pillow.”

“People convicted of crimes should not be test subjects for a state’s grisly experiments,” said Antonio Ginatta, U.S. advocacy director at Human Rights Watch, after the execution. “Last night’s botched execution was nothing less than state-sanctioned torture.”

More than 7% of lethal injection executions are botched and 3.15% of executions are botched overall, according to the DPIC. While it’s arguable whether the death penalty itself violates the constitution as an act of cruel or unusual punishment, torturing someone on their deathbed most certainly does violate the Eighth Amendment.

At the end of the day, the death penalty doesn’t benefit anyone. New Hampshire was right to abolish it, and now it’s up to other states to follow its lead and execute the death penalty once and for all.

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Culture

Movie Blog: Curse of the video game adaptation pittnews.com

TREVOR NOAH BRINGS LAUGHS TO PITTSBURGH

Elizabeth Martinson Staff Writer

Following a slickly produced video that was a cross between a pump-up video and an ad, Trevor Noah walked on stage to raucous applause from the audience at the Petersen Events Center Friday. The large crowd filled the floor and lower bowl of the Pete with a few people dotted around the upper level.

Noah, a South African comedian known for his deadpan satire and observational comedy, has been the host of Comedy Central’s long-running The Daily Show since September 2015, when he took over for Jon Stewart. He, along with opening acts Vince August and Josh Johnson, traveled to Pittsburgh as part of his Loud and Clear Tour. They began in Toronto in January and have spent the weekends since

then travelling around the United States and Canada.

At their Pittsburgh show on May 31, the crowd was energized and excited as Noah took the stage and began his hour-long set. He opened the show with a poignant look at the top five things white people love. On this list was his recent visit to the Andy Warhol Museum, where he toured the museum’s extensive collection. During the tour, Noah said he felt chastised by his guide for not spending long enough contemplating the artworks, asking, “How long should you spend looking at each piece, anyway?”

His takes were a mix of biting and poignant observations and throwaway laughs, including one of his picks for “things white people love,” being white, as an example of the latter. Nevertheless, Noah showed the

audience the differences he has found between black and white people in America without once vilifying or disparaging either group. For example, Noah explained that white people might look better swimming, but that doesn’t mean that black people are bad at it.

Taking the top spot on Noah’s list was Neil Diamond’s hit song “Sweet Caroline” — a song near and dear to all Pitt fans.

After his top five list, Noah moved on to discuss lightweight topics such as Donald Trump’s presidency, abortion and women’s rights.

Noah used his perspective as an outsider and immigrant to reframe America’s highly politicized abortion debate. The question of pro-life versus pro-choice is inherently ridiculous and, according to

Noah, you’d be hard pressed to find someone alive who isn’t “pro-life.”

The discussion should not be a simple dichotomy — it is possible to be both.

As Noah explained, he was flummoxed by the question “Are you pro-life or prochoice?” when he first was asked. “Both,” he replied. “I’m pro-life and pro-choice.”

Supporting a woman’s right to decide what happens within and to her body does not mean that you don’t support and value a newborn’s life. The conversation is not that simple.

In addition to Noah’s rousing performance, his opening acts brought laughter to the Pittsburgh audience. Vince August works as a “hype man” for The Daily Show, performing a set for the show’s audiences before each taping. August once again See Noah on page 6

STAFF PICKS: SUMMER READING LIST

The Pitt News Staff

While the days of required summer reading are far gone for college students, we here at The Pitt News want to share some of our favorite books to get you through the dog days of summer.

“The Idiot” by Elif Batuman // Delilah Bourque, Senior Staff Writer I read “The Idiot” last summer and haven’t been able to stop thinking about it or recommending it to people since. I borrowed it initially from Carnegie Library and have since picked up my own copy because I enjoyed it so much. The book, which was a finalist for the 2018 Pulitzer Prize in fiction, is semi-autobiographical. It follows Selin, a Turkish-American girl attending her first year of Harvard in the mid 1990s. Much of the story focuses on the friendships she cultivates with exchange students Ivan and Svetlana during the summer after her freshman year.

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I’ve always loved a good coming-of-age novel, a genre which sometimes feels stuck in the young adult literature section of the bookstore. “The Idiot” is a decidedly adult take on what it means to come of age and the limbo first-year college students often find themselves in. It is an in-depth look at the life and personality of one character, which is part of what makes reading the story an enjoyable experience. Batuman’s detailed writing makes it easy to relate to Selin and her rich inner life. A hallmark of young adult literature is the way characters, rather than plot, take center stage. “The Idiot” takes a character-centric approach to writing that is more mature, which makes it a perfect read for anyone who grew up reading authors like John Green and Rainbow Rowell, but is in search for a read that is more aligned with where they are in their lives now.

“Cujo” by Stephen King // Melanie Pantano, For The Pitt News I don’t want to assume, but I’m pretty

sure everyone has heard of this book. You probably know it’s about a rabid dog, but what you don’t know is that there is so much spicy relationship drama surrounding it. In short, the protagonist, Donna, and her toddler son, Tad, get trapped when their car breaks down on a sweltering summer day and the titular rabid St. Bernard terrorizes them. The book takes place in the 1980s, so Donna has no way to contact the outside world due to the limited technology of the time. While her husband is trying to figure out what has happened to his wife and young son, Donna’s time is running short as her and Tad sit in their sweltering vehicle, waiting for help.

If you’re familiar with any of Stephen King’s other thrillers, such as “Misery,” or “Gerald’s Game,” I highly recommend this psychological-horror. The prose is simple and straightforward, making for a highly engaging and quick read. Once you get hooked there’s no turning back. As a fan of

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King’s work, I find this book always stands out to me because it plays on many common fears. There’s nothing really supernatural about the story, but the fact that this could happen in real life left a mark on me as a reader.

“We All Looked Up” by Tommy Wallach // Sara Nuss, For The Pitt News I read this book a few years ago and it has since become one of my favorites.

“We All Looked Up” by Tommy Wallach is a story about four high school students named Peter (the athlete), Anita (the overachiever), Eliza (the outcast) and Andy (the slacker) who all learn they only have two more months left to live before an asteroid called Ardor wipes out the Earth. Slowly, the four seniors start to learn who they really are when all they have left is the present with almost no guarantees of a future.

Find the full story online at

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Noah, pg. 5 took the job of warming up the crowd and came on stage waving a Terrible Towel, a sure-fire way to ingratiate himself to a Pittsburgh crowd. The Hackensack-native Steelers fan reminisced on the simple joys of life as a kid in the 1970s and ’80s — going to parks and playing on remarkably unsafe playgrounds, using pay phones and street lights to make sure you were home in time for dinner.

After this trip down memory lane, August moved on to talk about hunting — a popular pastime in Pennsylvania — and, by extension, guns. Adeptly avoiding the issue of the Second Amendment and the right to bear arms, August observed that if you need an AR-15 to hunt something that doesn’t know you’re there, maybe you aren’t very good. In a further blow to the hunter’s ego, August argued that hunting can’t — or at least shouldn’t — count as a sport. How can it if one side doesn’t even know that they’re playing?

After August’s energetic set came Josh Johnson, a young comedian and Daily

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Trevor Noah at a “Loud and Clear” performance in Ohio.

image via wikimedia

commons

Show writer who routinely performs in New York at The Comedy Cellar. This experience was apparent as there was a stark difference between Johnson and August.

Although August was the older comic, Johnson was clearly more comfortable as he moved through his set before the large crowd. His set flowed better and he understood more adeptly when to pause for

audience reaction and when to carry on to let the energy build.

By the end of his set, Johnson had the audience in tears as he recounted a fight he had with his ceiling fan — trying and failing again, and again and again to turn it off. No matter how many times he pulled the cord, the blades wouldn’t stop spinning. They might slow down a tad,

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but despite his verbal chastisement they’d be off again. The fight got so out of hand the cops were called to put an end to the domestic dispute — his neighbors, hearing two voices, assumed the argument was between Johnson and his (nonexistent) girlfriend.

Throughout his set, Noah held the audience in the palm of his hand. He knew when and how to “ratchet up” the tension and crafted a vivid picture in the audience’s mind’s eye, only hitting the punchline when the whole crowd was seeing the same image.

After bringing up the energy with the story of his first period, which was actually a urinary tract infection, and delving further into the different worlds occupied by men and women, Noah brought the audience to the edge of its collective seat when he talked about losing his voice.

The room went from taut and giddy to subdued and concerned in the blink of an eye.

The show did not end on such a low note, as Noah found the humor in his vocal cord operation and showed the audience how he finds the funny in every situation — serious or otherwise.

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Sports

Projecting Pitt’s 2019 football season pittnews.com

RECRUITING ROUNDUP: CAPEL NABS MURPHY BUT COMES UP SHORT Tyler Moran Staff Writer

The college football season is fast approaching, but basketball recruiting news commands the headlines for the Pittsburgh Panthers — most of it bad. In our first recruiting roundup of the summer, we mostly talk about basketball recruits that decided to commit elsewhere to Pitt. Not all hope is lost for the Panthers, though. They’ve managed to land one strong recruit each in both basketball and football in recent weeks.

Men’s basketball Although Pitt has missed out on several promising recruits recently, at least one believes in the program — three-star Junior College shooting guard Ryan Murphy, who announced his commitment to Pitt on May 8. Murphy will join the Panthers for the 2019-20 season, choosing Pittsburgh over schools such as Washington State, East Carolina and Iona.

Murphy becomes the fourth member of the Panthers’ basketball class of 2019 and will make a great addition to the team, giving the Panthers a sharpshooter from behind the arc, something they have desperately needed. Pitt can rely on him to get the team a basket in order to halt opposing teams’ scoring runs. He’s also shown he can become a deadly scoring threat behind the three point line.

But outside of Murphy things aren’t looking as good. Pitt currently sits 49th in the national recruiting rankings for the class of 2019. Coach Jeff Capel still looks to add to the upcoming class, but lately has fallen short on various targets.

The inability to have big time recruits come to Pitt is not because Capel is doing a poor job, but instead is due to the recent failures of the program.

These kids want to win, and in recent history, Pitt has just not done that. As Pittsburgh improves as a program, it’s more likely that talented recruits will want to play for them — it’s that simple and it’s only a matter of time.

Pitt failed to acquire the services of four-star

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Coach Jeff Capel’s class of 2019 currently sits 48th in the national recruiting rankings. Thomas Yang | visual editor JUCO power forward Khadim Sy, who ended up committing to Ole Miss over Pitt and East Carolina. He likely chose in favor of Ole Miss because of the recent success the program has had.

Not landing Sy hurts the Panthers the most.

He was their main target and his size is desperately needed on the roster.

This is one of the first missteps during Capel’s coaching tenure, and it’s one that truly stings. Pitt seemed to be the front-runner in this battle, but that obviously wasn’t the case. The talent that Sy would have injected into this young Panther roster will be missed next season.

Another recruit Pitt lost out on was five-star point guard and former McDonald’s All-American Jahvon Quinerly, a transfer from Villanova.

Quinerly whittled down his transfer destinations to Pittsburgh and Alabama. Unfortunately for the Panthers, he chose the Crimson Tide.

Although Quinerly was not needed on the roster as much as Sy, it never hurts to add a fivestar talent to the squad. Pitt is already equipped with two dynamic guards in Xavier Johnson and Trey McGowens, so sharing play time amongst the three would have become an intriguing task

for Capel.

It is possible that Quinerly thought about this reality and ended up going to Alabama so he could be the centerpiece of the team.

Quinerly’s abilities really were not put on display at Villanova — this is the reason he ultimately decided to transfer. He is a dynamic guard who has elite handles and is best when operating in open space. Alabama picked up a great player in Quinerly. It’s a shame we won’t get to see him in a Panther jersey next season.

Then there’s Julian Champagnie. Champagnie, twin of Pitt class of 2019 commit Justin Champagnie, committed to St. John’s on May 29.

The commitment from the three-star small forward blindsided just about every party involved.

After his brother Justin committed to Pittsburgh on March 14, Julian decided to reclassify back to his original class of 2020. It was then announced on May 27 that Julian was to reclassify back to the class of 2019 and commit to the program that he thought had the most faith in him.

Many assumed that program would be Pittsburgh.

That wasn’t the case.

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At the end of the day, though, St. John’s is the better fit for Julian. Pitt already has various players that would sit above Julian in the rotation, including his own brother. Julian will likely get the play time that he desires with the Red Storm. He is a solid wing player that will help the program for years to come.

Finally, Olivier Robinson-Nkamhoua, a three-star power forward and Pittsburgh target, ended up committing to Tennessee. Although he’s not as talented as Sy, Robinson-Nkamhoua would have still added size to this undersized Panther roster. He is a guy that would have stayed for all four years and had a good amount of playing time under Capel.

Though it’s lost out on most names on this list of possible recruits, Pitt still has its eye on one more name for the class of 2019 — Josaphat Bilau.

Bilau is a three-star power forward from Geneva, Ohio. Getting him into a Panthers jersey for next season would finally give Pitt the size that it has longed for and missed out on with Sy and Robinson-Nkamhoua.

Pitt is in competition with schools such as Illinois, Wake Forest and Georgia Tech for Bilau.

Bilau would get a good amount of play time if he were to commit to Pittsburgh, so the odds of landing him are high compared to those other programs.

A commitment from him would be a magical end to Pitt’s class of 2019 and might even avenge the recent recruiting failures.

Football All these basketball headlines, put together with the football-less summer, mean there’s just one piece of football news to report.

But it’s exciting news for Pitt football fans. The Panthers landed their third commitment for the class of 2020 in Jaylon Barden, a three-star athlete who has decided to take his talents to the 412. He will likely play wide-receiver for the Panthers due to the fact that Pitt already has plenty of running backs to go around.

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June 5, 2019

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