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5. Pittsburgh. (Ed. note: Pittsburgh's ranking changed from six to five after publishing of article.) I'm taking a break from my irregularly scheduled reverse countdown of Big East teams to discuss the Pittsburgh Panthers, who again were rocked by the arrest of one of their guards on Sunday, the second such arrest since the Panthers bowed out to UCLA in the Sweet 16 in March.

The following is according to a police affidavit. Early Sunday morning, an off-duty police officer who was serving as security at Pure nightclub asked the 20-year-old Levance Fields to stop yelling and using offensive language. Fields then left the club and began arguing with a man out front. The officer again approached Fields to ask him to cease his behavior. At this point, Fields punched the officer in his chest and grabbed for the officer's weapon. The officer pushed Fields away and another guard shot Fields in the chest with a Taser.

Five months ago, Fields' sometimes backcourt mate, Keith Benjamin, was arrested after a domestic dispute with his ex-girlfriend. During a dispute involving a set of car keys, Ashley Olczak — and this again according to the criminal complaint — hit Benjamin in the chest at which point Benjamin punched Olczak on the left side of her face. Olczak hit Benjamin again, and Benjamin again punched Olczak, this time knocking her down. Officers observed bleeding coming from Olczak's knee and cuts and swelling at her neck and on her face when they arrived on the scene. Benjamin said he simply blocked Olczak's hits with his hands and did not know how she got her injuries. The charge of simple assault has since been dropped.

I would be remiss not to mention that both players — Benjamin from Mount Vernon, N.Y., and Fields from Brooklyn (Xaverian H.S.) — are part of the Ben Howland-Jamie Dixon New York pipeline that has filled Pitt's basketball program with many of the players that have made the Panthers a premier Big East team this decade. Former teammate Aaron Gray defended the character of the two troubled players.

Regardless of Gray's personal feelings about the two young men, Dixon has a decision to make. All three players to run into problems with the law since Dixon came to Pittsburgh — four seasons as an assistant starting in 1999 and then four as a head coach — have been dismissed from the team. Chris Seabrook and Isaac Hawkins, two holdovers from the Ralph Williard Era, were kicked off the team after an incident in 2001. More recently, Yuri Demetris was booted in 2005 after being charged with burglary and simple assault, a penalty meted out before Demetris had completed the judicial process.

The question is whether the recent incidents are consistent with those that have led to the dismissal of players in the past, and if so, whether Dixon and the athletic department will punish Benjamin and Fields, a second-team, All-Big East performer last season, in the same way. Until they make that decision, a cloud will hang over the program entering a transition season.

Aaron Gray and Levon Kendall are gone, a pair that formed an exceptional defensive and rebounding combo for the last two seasons. Those two surpassed all expectations in replacing the imposing Chris Taft and Chevron Troutman in 2005-06, and the 4 and 5 for Pitt must do the same in 2007-08.

Forward Tyrell Biggs saw his playing time increase and his offense improve in his sophomore season, but the stocky forward still has shown little ability to defend or rebound in the Big East. After playing about a quarter of the team's minutes last year, he should see his playing time double as a junior, but Pitt will feel the drop-off from Kendall and Gray to Biggs on the glass and the defensive end.

If Biggs is not quite an unknown commodity at power forward, the two men vying to fill Gray's shoes offer little but questions. Red-shirt freshman Austin Wallace (Bronx) is a long, lean player who excels at rebounding but showed an immature offensive game and insufficient strength to bang defensively. A year in the Pittsburgh system and a college weight room has likely added polish and strength to Wallace, but it's hard to know what to expect from him in important minutes. Gary McGhee is a much more burly product out of Anderson, Ind. He averaged 11 and 13 rebounds per game in his last two seasons in high school and may be more ready to step in and contribute immediately. Still, big men often take time to develop, and with the shortage of size on the Pitt roster, time is something Dixon has in short supply.

Dixon has a couple of options if he doesn't want to overexpose his young big men. He could go with experience and sacrifice a lot of size by starting Fields and Ronald Ramon side by side in the backcourt with Mike Cook and Sam Young at forward flanking Biggs. This would give Pittsburgh a starting five that measures 6-1, 5-10, 6-4, 6-6, 6-8, which is probably too small for the style they'd like to play.

With the body of a bowling ball but the handle of a playground legend, Fields is a playmaker with shot that goes hot and cold. He's smart and unselfish and also pretty good on the defensive glass. Ramon, now a senior, has a game as limited as when he first stepped on campus. He is still a deadly outside shooter, but doesn't do anything else particularly well. His experience will be valuable in tight games, but he's not a player whose hands should be on the ball very often.

Cook is the rare college guard who eschews the three and takes the ball inside. Despite making 47.8 percent of his 3-pointers, he only attempted 46. He has a nice mid-range game and does not demand the ball, a good thing in an offense dominated by Fields. Young does everything well from the wing, except shoot. Unfortunately, beyond Gray, Young took the highest rate of shots on the team last year. With his ability to block shots and rebound, Young takes away from his game with his quick trigger.

If that lineup proves too small, Dixon could also mix and match by integrating his best freshman, 6-7 DeJuan Blair into the frontcourt and bringing Cook or, more likely, Ramon off the bench. Blair already has 240 pounds on his frame, very much in the mold of Biggs. But Blair is a better rebounding prospect with terrific hands, though his body frame is ill-suited for shot-blocking and defense, two areas he'll need to improve should he get a lot of run up front.

There's enough talent here for Pittsburgh to stay near the top of the conference but also more questions than Pitt teams usually face. This squad looks similar to the one two years ago that was picked to finish in the middle of the inaugural 16-team Big East. All the Panthers did that season was win their first 15 games, advance to the Big East Tournament title game and earn a No. 5 seed in the NCAA Tournament. But a winning record in conference and a top-half finish in the Big East followed by an NCAA Tournament berth would be a fitting and more modest response by Pittsburgh after losing its entire frontcourt.

But before Dixon can worry about rotations, rebounding issues and postseason prospects, he'll need to figure out whether the actions of Fields and Benjamin are isolated or a symptom of a greater problem with his program. History says you can't read too much into a couple of incidents, but it also says that Fields has played his last game in blue and gold. If that's the case, then all bets are off for the winter.