Pittsburgh guard Damian Dunn will miss at least six weeks after surgery on his thumb

Pitt men’s basketball had a good start to the season, but on Monday, transfer guard Damian Dunn hurt his right thumb and had to have surgery to fix it. He will be out for at least six weeks.

At the start of Sunday’s Greenbrier Tip-Off championship game, Pitt lost to Wisconsin. Dunn hurt his hand and twisted his left ankle.

On average, Dunn scored 11.1 points and grabbed 2.1 boards in Pitt’s first seven games. He shot 49% from the field and a team-high 52.6% (10 of 19) from beyond the 3-point line. He scored ten or more points in each of the first five games, but that first Greenbrier game against LSU on Friday was cut short because he got too many fouls.

He has scored 1,366 points, grabbed 388 boards, and passed the ball 204 times in 116 games at Temple, Houston, and Pitt.

Also, the Panthers were placed 25th in the USA Today Coaches Poll on Monday, which gave us an early, but by no means final, answer to the question of which ACC men’s basketball team might be third-best, after Duke and North Carolina.

The only ACC teams in the Top 25 were No. 10 Duke (4-1), No. 13 North Carolina (3-1), and No. 6 Pitt (6-1). For the first time since Week 17 of the 2022–23 season, the Panthers made it into the list.

The Associated Press Top 25 poll came out on Monday as well, and Pitt was placed 27th with 62 vote points, three points behind No. 25 Mississippi State (86) and No. 26 BYU (70).

Another early-season computer measure that puts the Panthers high is ESPN’s BPI (No. 25), along with the KenPom net rating (No. 17), adjusted offensive efficiency (No. 20), and adjusted defensive efficiency (No. 17).

Ishmael Leggett and Jaland Lowe, two guards for Pitt, have led the team through the first month of the season. Leggett has averaged 18 points and 6.4 rebounds per game. Only Lowe in the country scores at least 15 points, grabs six boards, gives out 5.5 assists, and steals two balls per game. Lowe has met three of those goals so far, and he has also averaged 5.7 assists per game.

Also, forward Cam Corhen has scored 10 or more points in all seven games. He leads the ACC with a 70.7% field-goal percentage and averages 13.3 points and 5.6 rebounds per game.

Pitt has the day off before going to Ohio State on Friday and Mississippi State on December 4.

Since 2011, Jerry DiPaola has been a TribLive writer covering Pitt sports. He moved to the Trib from Pittsburgh in 1993 and worked there first as a copy writer and page designer in the sports department. From 1994 to 2004, he was the Pittsburgh Steelers reporter.