I was worried about this game all week and we really just came out and crapped our pants. I'll go through my normal list of talking points but there is really only one thing that mattered:
- That was the worst I've seen a QB play since Pat Bostick. Even the completions looked awful. I've never seen a college QB consistently under throw, throw out of bounds, throw into double coverage like that. He looked like he was taken out of the stands and starting his first big time college football game. The instincts were awful too. How do you take a sack on 4th down after the turnover? I really was in the "we are in trouble" mode after the first series. I also think we are going to have a leadership problem. You cannot stink that bad all night and then make that comment about being booed. Regardless of how you feel about boo vs not boo, this showed ZERO accountability and is not a great look. The other issue here now is, what additional damage is done by benching the kid that came back to Pitt? I'm not saying you can't because it absolutely should have happened last night. But it's just another thing that makes this situation untenable. I thought for certain he was going to be a second day pick and now I think he shouldn't be starting for a MAC team.
- The o line wasn't good last night. Almost never had time to sit back and observe and the run game really didn't go anywhere.
- I can't believe how this team constantly just shot itself in the foot last night. Any time we got a play, we did nothing. Got a stop? Jurk fumble. Drive down to get a second TD, don't block their best d lineman (who ran into Epps who didn't seem to know the snap was coming) and then miss the FG. Score a TD? Give up a massive run. It was like the old 6 win Pitt teams.
- I don't think the early missed FG meant as much as we thought. If we had 10, instead of 7, I'm not sure Narduzzi goes for it on 4th down on the second TD.
- I thought the receiving corps did a nice job of getting open. El Barto had a great game and probably should have had over 100 yards receiving if we had even half of a QB.
- I don't understand what happened to the run defense last night. The whole defense is predicated on selling out against the run and yet we couldn't stop and were getting gouged. Yes, the LBs were out of position a lot but holes were MASSIVE. I'm still shocked we pitched a shutout in the second half. I thought O'Brien wasn't as bad as everyone made him out to be. I thought he tackled well. I also thought DeShields, Kamara, Danielson, Hayes, and Williams played well.
- I hate to even bring this up after a game like that, but Junko was great punting the ball last night.
- We have only seen Narduzzi go away from a starter one time as far as I can remember other than injury when he had Peterman take over for Voytik. We are going to see very quickly if he's too stuck in his ways. I think most of us had this team starting 3-0 and if we are 1-2 going into UNC, especially if we lose to WVU, the pitch forks are going to be out. One thing he has always excelled at keeping the team focused and motivated. I'm not ready to write the season off but we can kiss 10 wins goodbye.
