Hoping this is a fun offseason topic. I kind of adapted this from a recent topic on the Solid Verbal talking about the ups and downs for various teams in the last 15 years.
You can turn one loss to a win in the Narduzzi era. What are you picking?
I was between three choices personally.
2016 VT -- If Pitt wins that game, it wins the Coastal and goes 9-3. Rematch with Clemson in the ACC title game that Pitt could 100% win again. Winning the ACC that year, beating a great Clemson team twice, and beating PSU likely supercharges Narduzzi's program, and I think Pitt is in much better shape entering the NIL era than it is now.
2019 PSU -- This is all personal and would have the least impact on Pitt's program. I'd love to have gone 2-2 against PSU, 1-1 at home, 1-1 away. The 2019 team would then be 8-4 instead of 7-5 and would've played a better bowl opponent than EMU -- but might have lost. Narduzzi winning 8 games in 5 of 7 seasons would be a good stat.
2021 WMU or Miami -- I don't know if 12-1 Pitt gets into the playoff over 13-1 Cincinnati. Probably not. The Miami loss happens too late, but if you leave the WMU loss, Pitt has a terrible loss on its schedule. I just don't think one game flips this year into a playoff team. I'm also unsure if you even want to be a playoff team just for the sake of it. And if you don't make the playoff, 12-1 going into MSU is no different than 11-2. In a different era, the bowl game would mean a lot. I don't think winning the Peach Bowl would matter that much.
Those are my three. If I had to pick, I'm taking 2019 PSU. It would have given me the most joy. I'd argue 2016 VT is the bigger what-if for the Pitt program, but I came down to it's unlikely that Pitt beats that Clemson team twice so I'm taking the bragging rights with that PSU win.
You can turn one loss to a win in the Narduzzi era. What are you picking?
I was between three choices personally.
2016 VT -- If Pitt wins that game, it wins the Coastal and goes 9-3. Rematch with Clemson in the ACC title game that Pitt could 100% win again. Winning the ACC that year, beating a great Clemson team twice, and beating PSU likely supercharges Narduzzi's program, and I think Pitt is in much better shape entering the NIL era than it is now.
2019 PSU -- This is all personal and would have the least impact on Pitt's program. I'd love to have gone 2-2 against PSU, 1-1 at home, 1-1 away. The 2019 team would then be 8-4 instead of 7-5 and would've played a better bowl opponent than EMU -- but might have lost. Narduzzi winning 8 games in 5 of 7 seasons would be a good stat.
2021 WMU or Miami -- I don't know if 12-1 Pitt gets into the playoff over 13-1 Cincinnati. Probably not. The Miami loss happens too late, but if you leave the WMU loss, Pitt has a terrible loss on its schedule. I just don't think one game flips this year into a playoff team. I'm also unsure if you even want to be a playoff team just for the sake of it. And if you don't make the playoff, 12-1 going into MSU is no different than 11-2. In a different era, the bowl game would mean a lot. I don't think winning the Peach Bowl would matter that much.
Those are my three. If I had to pick, I'm taking 2019 PSU. It would have given me the most joy. I'd argue 2016 VT is the bigger what-if for the Pitt program, but I came down to it's unlikely that Pitt beats that Clemson team twice so I'm taking the bragging rights with that PSU win.
