1. You’re never as good or as bad as you seem but make no mistake, Pitt was atrocious last night. We had an incredible view behind the Pitt bench of a world class tail kicking. Manhandled in all 3 phases. Terrible game plan on both sides of the ball. Duzz was spot on postgame. Unacceptable. Hard to watch.
2. Eli is clearly off and rattled. Would have liked to seen some better play calling though. Especially early. Pretty hard though when your OL is getting manhandled every play. Rough day at the office.
3. Speaking of that OL. What is the strategy here? Is 50 really one of your best 6? Between him and the C I’m not sure either one of them spent a minute of that game going forward unless they whiffed on a block, which was often. Hard to run the ball when your interior line is getting driven 5 yards back and your T’s just aren’t quick enough to pass block or run some of the speed option plays Kade prefers.
4. Not sure what they were doing on defense either? It’s maddening to watch mass substitution after every series. Why? It wasn’t hot. How does anyone get into a rhythm when you’re substituting ad nauseam? Looked like an inexperienced staff w zero answers last night.
5. Our DB’s and LB’s were simply atrocious last night. Some of the worst angles and tackling this Pitt fan has ever seen. Once again though, what is the strategy here? Why are you in press man to man when the other team is clearly faster and quicker than your best guys? Some of the worst technique possible yesterday as well. Atrocious.
6. How is that P still kicking for Pitt? Simply incredulous how he keeps getting run out there time after painful time.
7. That fake punt was comical as well. Two SMU guys right there and the kid still tries to execute the fake. Again cannot believe he’s still the P. Game changingly bad.
8. What is the fascination w slamming Dez into the interior of the defense, especially with Pitt’s interior OL being so thoroughly dominated. No misdirection. No screens. No draw plays. Wtf? Not a good day for Mr. Bell yesterday either. Seemed helpless as the OC last night until it was too late.
9. Not sure Pitt took one shot over 5 yards the entire first half. Wtf was the game plan Kade? Dink and dunk and ram a Smurf into a wall of defenders on every short yardage play? Hard to watch.
10. Overall SMU was a great little campus w a cool, old school stadium. Great sight lines. The Boulevard was awesome. Great Pitt tailgate. Etc, etc. One major complaint however: no Student Section, which allowed rude, drunk, spoiled and foul mouthed little punks to intermingle with adult fans, prompting us to leave in the 3rd quarter. No adult with small children wants to sit behind the Pitt bench surrounded by drunken, foul mouthed kids. Other than that, pure class from the SMU faithful, just wish the Ponies wouldn’t have treated us so rudely on the field. Oh well, onto the Hoo’s. H2P!

This is so hard now with all the transfers but I'll give it a shot:

1. Duke - Cooper Flagg will be the best CBB POY and they return Tyrese Proctor.

2. UNC - RJ Davis is back. Not super impressed with the rest of the roster other than Ven Allen Lubin from ND but they should have enough.

After #2, the next 7-8 could be in any order

3. Pitt - I expect Lowe to be a 1st Team type talent. Corhen and Dunn are bigger additions than anyone thinks. And Leggett is very underrated. This team could mess around and win the league.

4. Clemson - Hard to pick against Brad Brownell. He returns several starters and has a decent portal class.

5. Wake Forest - Like in previous years, I see Pitt/Wake/Clem battling for tourney spots. Wake returns Sallis, mamabear's kid, the English dude, and that little kid. Lossing Miller to SMU was big though.

6. Syracuse - I am buying Syracuse. I love Eddie Lampkin's game from TCU/Colorado. They have some good transfers and return Starling and Bell.

7. SMU - Miller from Wake, nice transfer class and I like Enfield

8. Miami - Should be as high as 3 based on talent but I think Larranaga is in semi-retirement mode. They return Pack and Cleveland. The Stetson transfer is a stud. Lynn from VT is a very good college big. Just picking them this low based on Larranaga. They have league champion talent.

9. NC State - Keatts regresses to the mean

10. Stanford - Kyle Smith is maybe the best coach in the league, pound for pound. I expect him to win games right away.

11. Louisville - Kelsey didnt return anyone but for good reason. I think he has a chance to get to the NCAAT in Year 1.

12. Notre Dame - darkhorse team. Burton and Shrewsbury are 2 very good guards. Losing Lubin was big though.

13. Virginia - now they have dont have Bennett to go along with no talent. Bad combo.

These bottom 5 might all be really bad and NET anchors which the league needs to avoid. Hard to rank these 5.

14. VT - only because Young is a good coach but man he needs some players.

15. Cal - dont return a player who averaged more than 1 PPG but the transfer class looks somewhat promising

16. GT - return Ndongo and not much else.

17. FSU - Time to call it quits, Leonard

18. BC - I feel bad for Earl Grant. Impossible job. ACC should kick them out and add UConn.

It is apparent that Pat Naduzzi is a fraud. This game was to decide the future of the ACC, and of course Narduzzi and his goons underperform. There are many great options available. I think number 1 should be Urban Meyer. He has a massive name and can bring millions of NIL revenue to Pitt that smuck Tepper refuses to contribute. It is time to get rid of Narduzzi and hire an elite coach like Saban or Urban.

Its FINALLY gameday, get HYPE. I wanna see some predictions for the season.

Townsend is a joke and an embarrassment to the university. Why isn’t he sending pep bands to every away game? He also refuses to do anything new at home games. We need to hire a HBCU band director to get things rolling.All I heard all night was SMUs garbage band.

Noon kickoff on ESPN

I am coming up to the burgh from SC with my son and his wife for the Clemson game. We would love to watch a volleyball match while in Pittsburgh. Any advice on the best way to get tickets for either the Friday night FSU game or Sunday UM games? Go hang out at the doors and scalp some? Thanks in advance.

Heard that he's taking his official visit this weekend. Anyone have updates on where we stand with him?

Sorry, guys. I was traveling last week and missed it when my season preview was posted.
It's all still pretty relevant, just ignore the mention of the Navy dual.
https://pittsburgh.rivals.com/news/five-questions-as-pitt-wrestling-prepares-to-open-season

Pitt…nice plugs

You might want to consider that both major party Presidential candidates are having rallies in Pittsburgh on Monday afternoon/evening when deciding when to leave home.

Together with some half assed fake. Punt

Like clockwork all the posters who hid all year, finally come to the board with their childish posts. Most of you could not wait for this to happen

Like a bunch idiots you all come on here ranting and raving. Now SMU is some great team. Pitt played bad as a whole team at the worst time. That is all.

A team that lost for the first time this year, and posters just couldnt wait. You fools are some of the lamest people. Take your sorry asses back where you came.

Prior obligations aren't going to allow me to watch the game at 7 and I see its on ACCN xtra/ESPN+ is there a way to record or watch later by chance that I am not privy to?

The first loss of the season is always difficult to digest....we were not prepared, we made tons of mistakes....etc, etc. I won't bother to rehash the game itself. The worst part of this loss is that it was simply a reality check for this program. I was actually beginning to believe that this team was pretty good. That we could reasonably play with some of the better teams in the country. Yesterday completely destroyed any illusion that we're at remotely close to being a top team. We're miles away from being seriously competitive with any top team. Not only did we get boat raced but anyone who was an impartial observer realized that SMU was better than Pitt at virtually every position on the field. If we played them 10 times we'd be lucky to win one. We need a serious infusion of talent at virtually every position (particularly the lines) in order to be competitive. Given our current posture relative to NIL, it's hard to see how that happens.

Lest this comes across as all doom and gloom, I'll state that we've already exceeded my modest expectations for the year. If we can post a 9 win season that's not too bad. In the greater scheme of Pitt football 9 wins is probably excellent. I guess being a Pitt fan means that you really need to embrace setting low expectations so that you'll be happy slightly exceeding them.

Cruzer

Bickell is obviously the largest donor to A412/Pitt sports. Most here don’t have his $ but many still donate what we can. This is not news to anyone that we obviously don’t have many big fish donors.

We know A412 the former AD etc have not done enough… communication, planning, etc. They have not got other Whales (weather, individuals or corporations) who can make a huge impact.

But what’s the deal with former Panther athletes who have made tons of $? As far as I know A. Donald is the only one to make a significant donation. Patrick Mahomes just donated 5 million to Texas Tech. Guess what??? Larry Fitzgerald (the highest paid WR in NFL history) made 46 Million more than Mahomes as per today, just counting NFL career earnings and as far as I know, he’s never made a large/any donation to Pitt. Check out the NFL career earnings of a few former panthers:

Fitzgerald 182 million, AD 157 million, Revis 125 million, McCoy 61 million, Curtis Martin 47 million.

A few current players: Brian O’Neal 92.5 Mill contract in 2021 with 53.5 Mill at signing. Boyd has made over 47 Mill, Conner over 21 Mill, etc. Check out this article about O’Neill and how he thanked PN for convincing him to move to OT. How about you thank PN with a large donation so he can buy players???


Pitt sports fans have a reputation for being cheap. Why does it seem like most of our millionaire former players seem to take after the fans regarding donations? SMH

But hypothetically speaking, by some kind of biblical miracle, if Pitt were to win out, and Syracuse beats Miami, Pitt would be in the ACC championship game. So, there’s still something to play for, I think.

Did not watch last night's game so the views below are solely based on examining the box score for the game's stats--without being influenced by emotions from having actually watched the game.

1. Terrible 2nd Quarter that began to really go down hill with Saul's missed FG which would have made the score at the time 14-6 vs keeping it at 14-3.

2. Other than the 2nd quarter scoring was roughly even over the other 3 quarters---Pitt 25 pts, SMU 24 pts. The 3rd and 4th quarter results suggest Pitt players did not quit.

3. Total offense SMU 467 yds to Pitt's 453 yds. Based on the theory that an efficient team should score about 1 TD for every 100 yards of offense---Hypothetically the score should have/could have been something more like Pitt 31 -- SMU 34. Obviously, SMU exceeded that 34 by 14 and Pitt failed by 6 of scoring 31.

4. Four fumbles with 1 lost and 1 interception thrown obviously standout as big negatives for Pitt.

5. The two long scoring plays were big for SMU as Pitt won time of possession.

Overall, based on the stats, and given that it was a road game, the loss doesn't look quite as bad to me as the score indicates.

As you all know, through the years I have been one of pat’s biggest detractors. I’m not rehashing that.

The response on here has been a little baffling. It was an ugly game, but also if we are being realistic not a totally unlikely outcome. I didn’t make a prediction because I thought getting blown out was a fairly real possibility, abd that we just aren’t that great.

Here is the bottom line reality. We went 3-9 last year. We implemented a whole new offensive system. Turnarounds take time and starting 7-0 was rather miraculous. Even if we split the last two and finish 9-3 this year is wildly successful. Hopefully the bell offense progresses and grows.

In any case, everyone REALLY needs to chill out a bit.