Yes. They tried to improve from Wanny and they failed miserably. They once again suffered losing records and walked 3 head coaches up to the podium in a span of 12 months and made the program a laughing stock once again.
FWIW, Pitt was Big East Co-Champs in 2010, they just didn't win the tie-breaker for the BCS Bowl game. (That isn't really a bad thing, imo)
When you think about it, they didn't really try to improve from Wanny. They hired Mike Haywood.
When Pitt fires a football coach, they have a whole roster of players that are hit with the realization that they are going to be playing for a staff that didn't recruit them, (new system, personalities, etc.) so naturally not all of them are going to stick around. The entire staff is dusting off their resume. Pitt is thrust into a a leadership void with a tight time frame to hire a new head coach, and the coaching search itself is a game where the deck is stacked against Pitt. It's usually a step back before a step forward at a school like Pitt that isn't a major player in recruiting.
It's ridiculous to fire a coach that is winning, competing for conference championships, and recruiting at a somewhat higher level than Pitt has in the past 20 years. The risk/reward just doesn't justify it.