Insanity.

Pitt had 15 scholarship players leave the team via the transfer portal in the offseason. Here's a look at how they did this past weekend.

Dayon Hayes (Colorado)
Samuel Okunlola (Colorado)
Colorado was off this past weekend. Hayes has played in four of the Buffaloes’ five games and has recorded a team-high two sacks and 3.5 tackles for loss. He has also recorded four pressures, according to Pro Football Focus.

Okunlola has made four starts in five games this season. He only has one sack but has recorded a team-high 11 pressures, according to PFF and has made 3.5 tackles for loss.

DeAndre Jules (South Carolina)
Bangally Kamara (South Carolina)
Buddy Mack (South Carolina)
Jules played a season-low 12 snaps against Ole Miss last Saturday. On the season, he has recorded three pressures and zero tackles for loss or sacks.

Meanwhile, Kamara, who has played only four games this season, announced this week that he will be taking a redshirt and transferring.

Mack played 12 snaps on special teams in the loss.

Solomon DeShields (Texas A&M)
One week after making his first start of the season against Arkansas, DeShields was back to working off the bench in A&M’s win over Missouri. DeShields logged 26 snaps but did not record a tackle.

Karter Johnson (Florida A&M)
Antonio Camon (Florida A&M)
FAMU was off this past weekend. Johnson has caught eight passes for 95 yards and a touchdown so far this season. Camon has played in three games this season.

Byron Floyd (Buffalo)
Floyd continues to serve as Buffalo’s primary long-snapper.

Trey Andersen (Utah State)
Andersen has gotten snaps on special teams in Utah State’s last two games.

Christian Veilleux (Georgia State)
Georgia State was off this past weekend and will host Old Dominion this Saturday. On the season, Veilleux has completed 59.5% of his passes for 1,073 yards, eight touchdowns and four interceptions.

Israel Polk (Akron)
After several weeks of lower usage, Polk saw seven targets in last week’s 27-20 loss to Bowling Green. But the former Pitt receiver only produced 17 yards on five receptions. On the season, he is averaging 5.1 yards per catch with 72 yards on 14 receptions.

Jahvante Royal (New Mexico)
Royal has not seen the field since he logged three special teams snaps in New Mexico’s opener against Montana State.

Stephon Hall (Youngstown State)
Hall has started all six of Youngstown State’s games this season, and he is third on the Penguins’ defense with 23 tackles and one tackle for loss.

Aydin Henningham (Albany State)
Henningham is Albany State’s leading tackler with 20 tackles through five games. He also has an interception for the Golden Rams, who started the season 0-2 but have won the last three games over Central State, Kentucky State and Allen.

I've seen the phrase "fool's gold" used when questioning whether or not this 2024 is actually a good team. Specifically, I saw the 2006 season referenced as a comparison.

That team opened the year 6-1 with wins against UVA (who went 5-7), Cincinnati (8-5), the Citadel (5-6), Toledo (5-7), Syracuse (4-8), and UCF (4-8). That's a combined record of 31-41. Pitt went on to lose to Rutgers (11-2), USF (8-5), UConn (4-8), WVU (11-2), and Louisville (12-1). That's a combined record of 46-18. In other words, for the most part, Pitt beat the bad teams and lost to good teams, i.e., Pitt was decidedly mediocre. (They also lost to Michigan State who went 4-8, which suggests that Pitt was really just a bad team).

While this year still has many games to be played, is Pitt in a similar position to 2006? In terms of schedule, it does seem like the 2024 Panthers have a back-heavy schedule. So far their combined opponents' record is 11-16. Their upcoming opponents' record is 27-10.

Now, obviously the comparison is imperfect: we don't know the final records of this year's opponents. But, so far, I would say that Pitt still has a lot to prove in terms of opponents faced. I'm not saying Pitt isn't good this year, only that it's possible they haven't really played a truly good team yet. WVU looks like they can have a decent season, but otherwise the other teams are either mediocre (Cincy, UNC), FCS (YSU) or just plain awful (Kent State). We'll see!

This is a really odd story. There are only 2 Pittsburgh Public Schools with boys soccer teams, Allderdice and Obama Academy. So, obviously, the City League doesn't have a soccer league. Those 2 teams play in the WPIAL which seems to make sense. But as the playoffs are set to begin, they were just informed that they are not eligible for the playoffs because they arent really in the WPIAL. They were told their section games would be changed to exhibition games so it sounds more like what they had with the WPIAL was just a scheduling agreement and not boys soccer membership. But NO ONE TOLD THEM THIS UNTIL THE SEASON IS OVER!

What types of fools run the WPIAL? The incompetence is astonishing.

too few 3 and outs for our defense. The opposition continues to grind the clock down on time of possession. A much better D will be needed going forward to continue this winning streak much longer. Pitt has the ability to score 40 plus points every game. But our D must get the ball back to the O much quicker in future games. NC could have easily won that game from what I witnessed on the replay.

** Disclaimer: This is a post for fans interested in the business/tv side of sports. For those not interested, simply ignore this thread instead of hijacking it into how you don't give a sh*t about the ratings...

Through the first two weeks of the season, Pitt's TV viewership has been...not good. In Week 1 vs Kent State which broadcasted on ESPNU, total viewership was 82,000. In Week 2 vs Cincy, broadcasting on ESPN2, total viewership was 304,000.

In 2023, Pitt's average viewership was 690,000, good for 56th in the FBS. In 2022, Pitt's average viewership was 650,000, still good for 56th in the FBS. In 2021, Pitt's average viewership was 550,000, good for 54th in the FBS. So Pitt's TV ratings through the first two weeks are well below average.

Our opponents haven't been great to start the year, but I was hoping Pitt could draw a little better than what they did since they played on national networks. The Cincinnati game was a little surprising to me given that it was a rivalry game (though a lesser one) and there was an exciting finish. It's straight embarrassing that Pitt drew below 100k views for Kent State. I think any P4 team would "aspire" to be a bigger draw than 100k viewers at a minimum, though besides winning they don't have much to do with that.

Pitt will get a huge boost this Saturday playing in the Backyard Brawl. In 2022, TBB drew 3.15 million viewers on ESPN on a Thursday night game, albeit being ESPN's opener for the new CFB season. In 2023, TBB drew 2.41 million viewers, which is a little concerning since it occupied a primetime slot on ABC (though that game was borderline unwatchable for the general public).

TV Ratings Week 1
TV Ratings Week 2
2023 Average Viewership by Team
2022 Average Viewership by Team
2021 Average Viewership by Team

After Jeff Capel shared some interesting insights on Tuesday, we're diving into some basketball talk on today's Morning Pitt, with thoughts on Jaland Lowe, the guards and more before the Panthers start what should be a very interesting season.

People hate Pat Narduzzi and it’s comical dude is one of the best coaches around at building culture and truly caring about his players. Duzz has had Pitt in the ACC Championship twice and another special team this year starting out 5-0 after a 3-9 disappointment. Our dude is such a great leader who gets culture. Sure he has his faults but Duzz cares and players know it.
Following a 3-9 season Duzz made some staff changes and he cleaned up the roster. Duzz went and recommitted himself and his program with the vision necessary to play for the ACC title. I am so glad that he is our coach and I think Pitt has one of the truly good guys in college football.

Let’s enjoy the ride 1-0 each week it’s simple. We not Me! H2P

Was thinking about making it to an away game this year and was curious what people's opinions were of the Louisville experience for a road trip and game?

In five games this season, Pitt is outscoring teams 73-10 in the game's final quarter. At the center of it, might actually be the defense.

Teams are averaging just 53.4 yards against the Panthers in the fourth quarter.

Pitt has pitched a fourth quarter shutout in 4/5 games.

Opponents are just 3-of-21 on third down conversions against Pitt in the fourth quarter.

Pitt has generated three turnovers in fourth quarters, including two which ended the game.

Of the 12 sacks Pitt has recorded this season, 9 have come in the fourth quarter, with another game-ender by Kyle Louis.

5-0!! What a fall for Pitt fans, to date! Here are some random thoughts and observations after rewatching the UNC game.

1. The WR group has been really, really good. We have 5 really talented players in Mumpfield, Johnson, Williams, Lee and Reynolds and every one of those guys has made big time catches this season.
2. Sauls has been money all season and Junko had a nice game against UNC but we still have a lot to clean-up on special teams. Crumpley and Malachi Thomas both had bad personal foul penalties late in the first half. I felt like those penalties took some momentum away and zapped potential scoring opportunities.
3. Welcome back, Fitzsimmons! He was disruptive in his return and maybe will provide a spark to the DL group. Hopefully we will get Nick James back against Cal, too.
4. What a final drive by the offense to essentially seal the game. I love that Bell didn't make it easy on UNC with predictable play calling. He trusted Holstein to make some plays and he delivered. If I have to gripe a bit, it would be the timeout around the 3-minute mark with 16 seconds on the play clock. Slowing down there and getting the right play was perfectly fine but no need to call the timeout that early. Waiting until the play clock ran down would have really shortened the game further.
5. I thought Brandon George was really good Saturday.
6. We were really, really close to creating multiple turnovers. There were 2 incomplete passes (one was a scoop and score) that were close to fumbles. McIntyre almost had a pick. Matlack almost had a strip sack. Biles also had a pick on UNC's final drive. I know almost doesn't count but hopefully moving forward we are on the better side of those close plays.
7. Rodney will get better and more comfortable with reps.
8. Carter has to make that catch on the first drive for a walk-in td.
9. Hampton is a nice back but hats off to our guys for bottling him up in the second half!
10. I don't want to make them out to be Texas or OSU but Cal is a pretty solid team. Their defense has shut down everyone so far this season, minus Miami in the 4th quarter. Big challenge for Bell, Holstein, and company!

It's been a long time, Lair. Between work/family life and the 2023 offensive abomination, I haven't really posted anything for awhile.

But I love Kade Bell and I want to sing his praises.

Because he had an answer for everything Geoff Collins tried on Saturday. And Collins really did try just about everything.

I saw more interesting offensive scheming in the first half against UNC than I did in the previous two seasons combined.

I'll go through the game basically chronologically and explain how I think Bell saw this game and the adjustments he made, and the re-adjustments he continued to make that rendered UNC helpless to stop the Pitt offense.

It seems like Pitt was pretty sure that UNC was going to come out in a zone defense. The answer to zone is identifying the leveraged defenders (ones who would be in a position to choose between covering one player nearby and another) and forcing them to make the wrong decision. And Kade seems to love him some pre-snap motion and he particularly loves to go to Reid in these situations. The first example is the 4th down play on the opening drive.




Here Bart shifts and then Poppi motions out and UNC is in a zone. The motion causes the flat defender (21) to loosen a bit before the snap and then the run action causes him to take a false step inside giving Reid the room to come underneath with an angle to sideline. Very nice little play set up partially by the motion and run fake.

Next, UNC switches to a man defense. Eli correctly reads man to man on the outside to Mumpfield but I love what Eli does here. Instead of rushing the throw and possibly giving the safety the chance to get over the top, he waits, looks to the middle of the field, and THEN releases a beautiful throw to where only Mumpfield can really make a plan on the ball for a big gain.



What a throw and catch. But it all starts with Eli identifying the matchup and making the play the "right" way. He's never really rushed in his decision making. It's really impressive for a young player.

Next, Pitt will do something it hadn't really done yet which is actually get the ball quickly to the motioning player. So far, the offense had been using motion as window dressing. If you do that enough times and the defense doesn't honor the motion, the right play is getting the ball to the motion guy.



It's a simple play and not a huge gain but you can see how UNC was not very reactive to the motion from KJ and the quick screen was easy money. All the yardage the past 2 seasons was hard, sometimes excruciatingly earned. Here, it's just easy. As an offense, you like easy.

Now all the side to side stuff helps create running lanes, especially when you have a QB like Holstein. Next you can see how reactive UNC's defenders are to the jet motion and how many are out of the picture to the bottom of the screen. Like I said before, easy yardage.



This is somewhat the reality for the Pitt offense. They aren't maulers in the run game. Maybe that develops as the year progresses, but as of now the passing game is the key to opening the running game. In that way, the offense is somewhat similar to the 2021 unit the relied heavily on the pass early then closed games running the ball. We still haven't seen the offense pound a team at the end like the 2021 team did, but I'm hopeful that will come as the OL gets more experience and confidence in the scheme.

Now is the part where I have to talk about Eli's INT...but how he completely corrected it later on!

First, Eli is clearly expecting man which would mean these defenders are locked on these receivers...

Instead, UNC is in a zone. I suspect Eli was just locked on Poppi Williams and not really reading the drop from the nickel corner inside that would have told him it's zone. The result is the outside flat defender (21) reads the out and jumps the route for the pick 6.



It's all good because Eli completely redeems himself. I read this next play as something of a cover 4 or matchup zone. Meaning it looks like zone and as soon as the receivers declare on their routes, the nearest defender locks on like it's man. Kind of similar to what Pitt does defensively. Where do teams often give Pitt trouble? A good receiving running back. Here, Reid just makes the MLB look silly. The read that Eli and Reid both makes shows some impressive synergy. If the MLB stays to the middle, Reid probably stays up the seam. If the MLB runs towards Reid, Reid runs for the open void around the backside of the MLB. Holstein throws the ball before Reid has even cleared the defender. What an awesome understanding of the play design and execution. The stack formation was also useful in creating a little confusion for the defense AND it helped to clear the middle of the field as the UNC defense FLEW to the outsides of the hashes.




I love this stuff.

Next, Pitt gets down into the redzone. Things can get congested and difficult to read sometimes. But here I think UNC made it kind of easy to diagnose. The way the defenders are aligned directly over the WR's and the extra UNC defenders are heavy to offense's left would tell me it's either cover 1 with a spy or cover 0 with an overload blitz.



Either scenario makes Censere Lee the obvious match up either on an out or a short corner.



Easy points in the redzone is such a welcomed change and it doesn't happen by accident. Kade Bell is just calling a hell of a game.

Pitt has another chance to put some points up in the 2nd half and here we see Eli absolutely perfectly diagnose a zone defense and deliver the ball before Poppi Williams really even makes his break. The motion and the run action will also cause the linebackers to not get the necessary depth in their coverage drops to have a chance to make a play.



This is my favorite play of the game. Eli knows EXACTLY what's happening here. His eyes are immediately on the MLB. As soon as he takes one little false step towards the the numbers, the ball is out of his hand and into the void where Williams is all alone. This play is like a symphony to me. It has all the elements of what Kade Bell had done so far. A shift, motion across, play action fake with crossing action from the TE to hold the eyes of the LB's. There's just so much going on in this one play that doesn't really happen without the plays that came before it. The result is an easy LOOKING touchdown.

That's probably enough for today. I am just completely on board with Kade Bell and Eli Holstein. I'm not positive the OL will hold up against a truly elite defensive front - but - I am confident that Bell is the right coach for this team because he doesn't really ask the line to do more than it's capable of doing. And that should help sustain this success as we get deeper into the season.

Login to view embedded media
Smart to do this after the crowds from the PSU game. Will make it a better experience for everyone involved.

Public service announcement for one of the biggest college soccer games of the year, and one of the biggest ever in Western Pennsylvania history:

#1*/#2^ Pitt men's soccer (9-1; 4-0) takes on #1^/#6* Denver (7-0-4, 2-0) at Pitt's Ambrose Urbanic Field, tomorrow night Monday, October 7th, at 7pm, broadcast live on the ACC Network.

*United Soccer Coaches' poll
^Top Drawer Soccer poll

Login to view embedded media
tickets ($10 in advance/$5 group): https://pittsburghpanthers.evenue.n...de=&dataAccId=245&locale=en_US&siteId=ev_pitt

All-time best fall sports season I imagine. The #1 Pitt futbol team takes on #6 Denver on actual TV tonight on ACC Network.

Thought it would be higher after Cal’s tough loss to Miami in last seconds.

Anyone put out the week to week Pitt Roster to share? The "updated" rosters from EA are awful.

their panel has us from 3rd (thanks) to 11th...Ish gets a Players to Watch mention...Pitt is It

Only two schools finished in the top 30 at BartTorvik.com without making the 2024 NCAA Tournament -- St. John's and Jeff Capel's Pitt Panthers, the latter of which went 12-8 in the ACC, and 10-3 in its final 13 games before Selection Sunday, but still landed on on the wrong side of the bubble. That was a tough break for Capel, who has guided the Panthers to a top-four finish in the ACC in two straight seasons but only has one postseason appearance to show for it. The good news is that four of the top six scorers are back -- most notably Ishmael Leggett, a 6-3 guard who averaged 12.3 points and 5.5 rebounds in 28.6 minutes per game last season after transferring from Rhode Island. That should be enough to have the Panthers in the at-large conversation again.

I have a conflict and can't use my 2 tickets for the volleyball game against SMU Wednesday. Hate to see them go to waste, so they are free to a good home. Feel free to reply or message me if you can use them.