Pitt head coach Jeff Capel met with the media over Zoom on Monday morning as part of the weekly ACC Basketball coaches call. Capel talked about the team’s game with Syracuse tomorrow, the health of Ishmael Leggett, and more. Here is a complete rundown of everything he had to say.

How did you see your team handle the past week as far as the workload and taking a week off to reassess things and reprocessing so you can get ready for the rest of the season?

Capel: Yea, we just got back to work, bottom line. We just got back to work. We’ve had good practices, good preparation, and excited about the opportunity to play again tomorrow.

What were you able to take away from the first Syracuse game and what can you apply with learning from the mistakes you made for tomorrow’s game?

Capel: We have to be stronger with the basketball. 66 of their 81 points came in the paint, so we have to do a better job of protecting the paint. We can’t have live ball turnovers, so we have to be strong with the ball. We can’t allow them to knock the basketball away. We have to rebound and then we have to be strong offensively. Again, I thought in the second half, I thought they played really really hard and we had live ball turnovers and they were able to get dunks and layups, so we have to do a better job of protecting the basketball and just being stronger and tougher all the way around.

What’s your relationship with Mike Tomlin today and what have you learned from him whether it’s about coaching or anything?

Capel: Since I took the job here, I’ve got to know Mike. He reached out. There’s a genuine friendship there. He is someone from afar before I got here that I admired for the way that he leads. I’ve had a chance to get to know him and pick his brain at times. He came and spoke to our team last season before the season. Just admire him as a man, a leader, and the job he continue to do with his organization.

Is there any further updates on Ish Leggett? I know he played in your last game, but do you think he’s back to 100%?

Capel: I think he’s close to it. He did no-contact until yesterday and then yesterday he was full-go with contact and the biggest thing right now is just getting back in game shape, but he’s good to go.

I was wondering about Blake Hinson and all the confidence he exudes on the the court. Have you ever seen a guy with that kind of confidence, even when he’s not making shots?

Capel: I’ve been around some guys who are good players and really believe in themselves and Blake is certainly one of them. I think he trusts his work. He really gets in and works on his game. He’s an outstanding player and we need him to be better and to understand what defenses are trying to do and to be able to have counters to attack that. But he’s a great young man to be around and he means a lot to our program in the time since he’s gotten here and just need to continue for him to be a high-level player for us.

How do you guys embrace Martin Luther King Day while also focusing on the season?

Capel: Yea, well I think each person does it individually. I’ll speak to my team a little bit today, just to make sure historically they understand who this man is and what he did for people, not just black people. Obviously he’s a done a lot for my community, but I think he’s done a lot for our community, Americans. He’s did a lot to help make our world better. So again, it is something that I will bring up and discuss today after practice, but I think each person celebrates him in their own unique way.

Obviously Syracuse had Jim Boehim for like 40 years and you got to coach against Adrian a few weeks ago. What were kind of the differences you saw that he does or is it kind of the same?

Capel: There are some similarities, especially offensively, the freedom that he allows his players to have, especially the guards. The biggest difference is that they don’t play as much zone as Coach Boeheim did. They were primarily zone with Coach Boeheim, with Red (Autry) they are primarily man-to-man. Against us, they were zone on under out of bounds. I know against North Carolina the other day they played a lot of zone. But to me, that’s the big difference. When you’re around someone, Red was around him as a player and as longtime assistant, that stuff rubs off on you, especially when you have success like their program has had. So I think a lot of it is still the same, but just the difference in the philosophy defensively.

Is there a difference you have seen in the team in the last week as they try to put the last loss behind them as you move onto this week?

Capel: Yea, we have to. Obviously that stung and I’m hoping that was an outlier. That is the one time this year where I didn’t think we fought like we have all season, but we played an outstanding team. They were terrific, but again you’ve got to get off the mat. You’ve got to come back and work, and we’ve done that. We’ll see tomorrow. Again, we’re playing against a team that’s hungry, talented, and that will be ready to play.

Can you talk about how you reached out to Jon Scheyer about partnering with the ALS efforts between your programs?

Capel: The organization that I’m on the board with, we actually started talking last year. We were having discussions last year about getting involved and trying to make a dent in college basketball. They did an unbelievable job with Major League Baseball and partnering with Major League Baseball and getting the word out there about awareness and also about raising money. The guys that were involved in that reached out to me and they knew my history with my father. So again, these discussions started happening last year. We weren’t able to get anything significant last year so as we got into this season we started talking about that game because my father’s doctor was at Duke and is still at Duke. Obviously the relationship that I have with Duke University, we thought that game would be a great to kind of break into this. I reached out to Jon Scheyer and I reached out to Jon Jackson at Duke and asked them if they would be willing to do it. They jumped at it right away and we let the people that organized it kind of take it from there. I’m grateful for Jon Scheyer and Duke basketball and Duke University to partner with us with the University of Pittsburgh and our basketball program and our athletic department to get some recognition out there for ALS.