Pitt has 11 seniors who could potentially return as super seniors next year: Todd Sibley, Shocky Jacques-Louis, Grant Carrigan, Owen Drexel, Gabe Houy, Marcus Minor, Carter Warren, Deslin Alexandre, Cam Bright, Damarri Mathis and Kirk Christodoulou. Pat Narduzzi was asked yesterday about which of those 11 will be recognized at senior day and which guys have said they'll return in 2022. Here was his response:
Have you had super senior conversations with guys who are potentially going to come back? And how are you handling senior day?
Narduzzi: What we’re doing on senior day is, anybody who wants to say they’re a senior can come out and as a senior. I’m not going to get into that, but Kenny Pickett was a senior last year when we did senior day. Thank God he came back.
So, kids gotta make decisions, but they don’t want to make a decision saying - I think we had this conversation last year - they don’t want to make a decision saying, ‘Hey, I think I’m going to leave - oh can we go back and do that senior day again?’ So it’s better to have senior day and you get two of them.
We had to change the whole order last year. Chris LaSala just reminded me - last year Kenny’s ankle wasn’t good and he was supposed to be up as the senior to come out and we had to change the whole order because he went in to get his ankle fixed. I don’t think he wanted to come out for senior day. Maybe that was a telling story right there. He almost missed senior day. We had to make him last.
So are you encouraging guys to do this Saturday and make the decision once the season is over?
Narduzzi: Yeah. If they don’t want to do it, I’m not going to tell them - to me, it’s their decision. I’m not going to force them to do it. It’s their decision what they want to do. But what I’ve said is, take your time. With all those conversations, the big thing is, take your time and make a good decision like Kenny did. I think everybody can learn from Kenny’s decision. I think a year is better than getting drafted in the fifth, sixth, seventh, whatever some of them will be projected at. It’s hard to know what the projection is. Everybody’s got a different story. But just take your time and make a good decision. It’s a business decision for every one of those seniors. 23 of them, it’s a business decision. Obviously, not for 23 of them; some of them don’t have a choice. But there’s some that do have a choice.
So it sounds like there's a decent chance most of those 11 are announced on Saturday. It's notable that Todd Sibley and Owen Drexel were not in the seniors graphic Pitt tweeted out this week, so perhaps those guys will not be announced and are coming back. But I would say the door is still open even for guys who do participate in senior day; some of them could still come back.
That said, I would guess we don't see Bright, Mathis, Alexandre, Minor or Warren return. I'm not sure about the others.
Have you had super senior conversations with guys who are potentially going to come back? And how are you handling senior day?
Narduzzi: What we’re doing on senior day is, anybody who wants to say they’re a senior can come out and as a senior. I’m not going to get into that, but Kenny Pickett was a senior last year when we did senior day. Thank God he came back.
So, kids gotta make decisions, but they don’t want to make a decision saying - I think we had this conversation last year - they don’t want to make a decision saying, ‘Hey, I think I’m going to leave - oh can we go back and do that senior day again?’ So it’s better to have senior day and you get two of them.
We had to change the whole order last year. Chris LaSala just reminded me - last year Kenny’s ankle wasn’t good and he was supposed to be up as the senior to come out and we had to change the whole order because he went in to get his ankle fixed. I don’t think he wanted to come out for senior day. Maybe that was a telling story right there. He almost missed senior day. We had to make him last.
So are you encouraging guys to do this Saturday and make the decision once the season is over?
Narduzzi: Yeah. If they don’t want to do it, I’m not going to tell them - to me, it’s their decision. I’m not going to force them to do it. It’s their decision what they want to do. But what I’ve said is, take your time. With all those conversations, the big thing is, take your time and make a good decision like Kenny did. I think everybody can learn from Kenny’s decision. I think a year is better than getting drafted in the fifth, sixth, seventh, whatever some of them will be projected at. It’s hard to know what the projection is. Everybody’s got a different story. But just take your time and make a good decision. It’s a business decision for every one of those seniors. 23 of them, it’s a business decision. Obviously, not for 23 of them; some of them don’t have a choice. But there’s some that do have a choice.
So it sounds like there's a decent chance most of those 11 are announced on Saturday. It's notable that Todd Sibley and Owen Drexel were not in the seniors graphic Pitt tweeted out this week, so perhaps those guys will not be announced and are coming back. But I would say the door is still open even for guys who do participate in senior day; some of them could still come back.
That said, I would guess we don't see Bright, Mathis, Alexandre, Minor or Warren return. I'm not sure about the others.
