So it has come to this: The final three games of a 27-game regular-season schedule will determine the fate of the three-time defending Big East Conference regular-season champions.

	Matt Freed, Post-Gazette West Virginia's Patrick Beilein grabs a ball in front of Pitt's Levon Kendall under the basket in the second half Wednesday night. On the left is West Virginia's Kevin Pittsnogle. Click photo for larger image.

Pitt can finish anywhere from first to eighth in the conference. The Panthers can still secure a high seed in the NCAA tournament or they could be left out all together. Three games in eight days will finally straighten out Pitt's roller-coaster season.

The first of the three is at 3:45 p.m. tomorrow against No. 17 Connecticut at the Petersen Events Center. The next is two days later at No. 3 Boston College and the final one is March 5 at Notre Dame. Of the eight teams jostling for position in the jumbled Big East, Pitt's road to the conference tournament in New York is by far the most difficult.

"It's a tough situation for us. Our backs are against the wall," sophomore guard Antonio Graves said in the aftermath of a 70-66 home loss Wednesday to West Virginia, a setback that put the Panthers in a three-way tie for fourth place in the conference and in danger of having to play a first-round game at the Big East tournament for the first time in four years. "We just have to stick together. We've got UConn Saturday. That's it right there. We have to focus on that and come out with a win. We can't put pressure on ourselves. We just have to go out there and keep believing in each other."

The top five teams in the Big East receive a bye in the first round of the Big East tournament. Pitt not only has a challenging final three games, but the Panthers also lose Big East tiebreakers to most of the teams around them in the standings. If the Big East tournament started today, the Panthers would be the No. 6 seed and would have to play the No. 11 seed in a first-round game because they lost games against Georgetown and Villanova, the two other fourth-place teams.

Big East tournament seeding, though, might be the least of Pitt's worries. The NCAA selection committee has several criteria for inviting teams to the NCAA tournament. Chief among them is how a team finishes the season, in addition to the Ratings Percentage Index (RPI).

Pitt's projected RPI dropped to No. 51 after the West Virginia loss. With Pitt's remaining schedule acting as a double-edged sword, the Panthers can build their RPI back up, or it could fall even more.

With Pitt's questionable RPI, 20 victories might not be enough to secure an NCAA invitation. If the Panthers win one of the final three and then one in the conference tournament, they would leave their fate in the hands of the NCAA selection committee. In order to remove all doubt, they need to win two of their final three regular-season games and at least one game in New York. Or win one and make a deep run in the Big East tournament.

"We have to keep looking ahead, keep our heads up and stay together," Graves said.

That there are such Big East and NCAA worries is a new late-season scenario for Pitt. For the past three years, the Panthers had just three conference losses. Those Pitt teams were predictably good. You could set your watch by them.

This Pitt team is unpredictable, and seems to have multiple personalities -- one for the good teams and one for all other opponents. The Panthers are 3-1 against ranked Big East foes; 5-4 against the unranked conference squads.

Forget about trying to dissect it. There is no explanation.

This team gets down by 17 points to Connecticut and Syracuse in back-to-back games, and it comes back to win both of them. It leads West Virginia by 14 at home with less than 10 minutes remaining and finds a way to lose. It loses to Bucknell and Georgetown at home and at Big East bottom-feeder St. John's.

Maybe playing the best the Big East has to offer over the final eight days of the regular season is just what the doctor ordered.

"I think it's a plus in a way," Graves said. "If you take a look at the way our season is going against the big teams and the smaller teams, it's a plus. At this point of the season, it doesn't matter. You have to play the same way for 40 minutes. That's all that matters."

The game against Connecticut tomorrow is senior day, the final scheduled game of the season at the Petersen Events Center. If the Panthers don't start winning again soon, they could be back at home for another unscheduled game in mid-March.

An NIT game.