Pitt WR Tre Tipton feeling healthy, confident

If misfortune is handled correctly, the worst of times can trigger better days, perhaps even turn pain into a blessing.

Pitt junior wide receiver Tre Tipton hopes that’s true.

A year ago this summer, Tipton was hurt in a bicycle accident in New Kensington that left him with a knee injury that ended his 2017 season before it started. That was tough to accept for Tipton, a three-sport star at Apollo-Ridge.

All his life, he had been one of the leading players on his high school’s athletic stage: football, basketball and track and field. The spring before he enrolled at Pitt, Tipton set the WPIAL Class AA long jump record (22 feet, 11½ inches) and followed up with Apollo-Ridge’s first PIAA gold medal.

All of a sudden, he was a spectator on a team that could have used another option in its passing game. Of Pitt’s 12 touchdown receptions last season (13th in the ACC), six came from two wide receivers and one of them (Jester Weah) exhausted his eligibility and went to the NFL.

“It was a learning experience,” Tipton said of standing around and watching others perform. “I had to really and truly humble myself and be able to still help the team just by being a teammate. It taught me how to be a man about what’s going on.”

A friendly 22-year-old with an engaging personality, Tipton is not afraid to talk about what he called “a small bike accident.”

“I just wasn’t being smart about what I was doing,” he said. “I should have been paying more attention. It’s all good. I’m not tripping about it.”

He was determined to find something of value in the accident, and he did.

“It’s cool,” he said, “because I got an opportunity to learn (about) different muscles in my leg.”

He also learned that recovery from a serious injury involves more than getting muscles and ligaments to heal properly. Sometimes, the mind needs to be convinced that everything’s OK.

“It’s more mental than physical,” he said. “Once you’re mentally healthy, everything else just works itself out.”

Tipton and wide receivers Rafael Araujo-Lopes, Aaron Mathews, Dontavius Butler-Jenkins and Shocky Jacques-Louis did not play in Pitt’s spring game in April. Those players’ recoveries — and they all are expected to be ready for summer camp — could be among the most important events of the offseason.

“I was getting close to (100 percent physically in the spring),” Tipton said. “But I could have produced more mentally than I could have physically.

“I should have been able to be more involved just because once you get to the point where you feel like you can’t do the same things that you could do, you start telling yourself you can’t. As soon as you say you can’t, you won’t.”

Asked if he is completely healed with training camp three weeks away, he said, “I’m back to playing like myself. It feels good. It feels really great. Especially because these guys (teammates) helped me and made sure they let me know you can do better. That keeps me motivated.”Tipton has missed significant time during each of his three seasons at Pitt, but it was never coach Pat Narduzzi’s intent to redshirt him. The athletic ability was always evident.

Tipton, 6-foot, 185 pounds, played in four games as a freshman and caught 12 passes for 142 yards and a touchdown in 2016. Modest numbers for someone with Tipton’s aspirations.

“I still feel like I have to continue to get better in order for me to produce,” he said. “To say I want to be the old player I was, I’ll never be the same, old person. I want to be better than what I was.”

Pitt needs better production from its wide receivers than it received last year and in the spring. Of the seven players who caught touchdown passes last season, only three return: Araujo-Lopes and running backs Qadree Ollison and Darrin Hall.

The leader of the wide receiver group is Araujo-Lopes, a 5-9, 190-pound graduate senior who led the team in receptions last season (43).

“I had 40-something catches,” he said, “but at the end of the day, I wasn’t a superstar last year. We have a young group, we got an inexperienced group and we do have a lot to prove.

“We need to walk around with a chip on our shoulder like we have something to prove. That’s the kind of mentality that guys are coming to work with every single day. I’m not afraid to say it: Yeah, we got something to prove as a team and as a receiver group, too.”

There are plenty of bodies capable of catching passes, including talented junior Maurice Ffrench, who was third on the team with 25 catches a year ago. The others — Jacques-Louis, Butler-Jenkins, Mathews, Tipton, Darian Street, Michael Smith and Kellen McAlone — were either injured, on the bench or lacking in production last year.

Nonetheless, Araujo-Lopes said, “It’s a different feel this year. We have a whole bunch of guys who can play.”

Part of that optimism might stem from sophomore Kenny Pickett, who (like every Pitt quarterback before him) has spent at least four days a week this summer throwing with his wide receivers.

Tipton called Pickett, “One of the best quarterbacks I’ve ever seen.”

But who’s going to catch the ball? To Tipton, there is no question.

“We have so much depth,” he said. “We feel like we can do whatever we want this year.”

Jerry DiPaola is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Jerry at jdipaola@tribweb.com or via Twitter @JDiPaola_Trib.