Fresh off the first two-a-day of training camp, the Pitt football team was back on the field Tuesday morning for a practice that head coach Pat Narduzzi said wouldn’t have any live, full-contact periods (although he added there would be some “heavy, heavy thud” - or touch drills).
With or without contact, though, the interesting developments with the team continue to be depth chart moves, even if they’re relatively minor.
I mentioned in Monday’s report that it looked like Dane Jackson had moved past Phillipie Motley in the battle at cornerback opposite Avonte Maddox, and Narduzzi said as much Tuesday morning, adding that redshirt senior Ryan Lewis is still the leader at that spot for the time being.
“Opposite Avonte, Ryan Lewis right now is - he had a nice day again yesterday,” Narduzzi said. “He’s made some strides. You start to look at him and say, ‘We can rely on him.’ Phillipie Motley and Dane Jackson are in a heat right now, and I’m not sure that Dane Jackson isn’t ahead of him. Dane Jackson has really come on strong the last four or five days. And Phillipie is still there. Malik (Henderson) had maybe an average day yesterday, but he’s battling. They’re all battling out there.”
The notable quote in there is this bit about Lewis: “You start to look at him and say, ‘We can rely on him.’”
That was certainly something that was missing last season, when Pitt almost never rotated cornerbacks. Despite Maddox and Lafayette Pitts having issues from time to time, Lewis - the top cornerback behind those two - saw very little playing time on defense. So having the coaches feel like they can rely on him is a step in the right direction, even if it falls short of saying “He’s making plays,” which is this staff’s - and other staffs’ - ultimate compliment.
- On the offensive line, things appear to be far from settled. While the lineups we’ve seen in walk-throughs thus far have been consistent - left to right: Adam Bisnowaty, Dorian Johnson, Alex Bookser, John Guy and Brian O’Neill - Narduzzi made it clear that things are in flux.
Arguably the main spot up for grabs is right guard, where Guy has been working since spring camp but Alex Officer - last year’s starting right guard who missed the spring with an injury - has rotated in with the first team.
“John’s just a steady, ‘steady Eddie’ guy,” Narduzzi said. “He’s just tough, he’s physical and he just goes about his business in a professional way. That’s what you really like about John. He doesn’t say ‘Boo’ out there; he just gets the job done. So he’s doing a good job competing for that right guard position.”
To which I asked: Is he leading for that right guard position?
“Uh, you know, I don’t know if he’s leading at this point,” Narduzzi said. “We’re still kind of juggling them around in there. There’s a lot of competition going with the offensive line. The great thing is, I think on game day you’re going to see we can play up to eight guys, which will be good. You’re keeping a guy fresh and in the fourth quarter, you don’t have an exhausted guy. Maybe we can make a bigger play or pop a big run because there’s a fresher guy in there because we can play more guys at that position.”
So Guy is far from locked in as the starting right guard, particularly with a two-year starter in Officer pushing him. And then there’s Jaryd Jones-Smith lurking on the second team. Plus, the staff seems to like Connor Dintino as a backup center.
That gives Pitt the eight that Narduzzi was talking about, and the coaches seem to like what the competition is doing for the group.
“I think there’s all kinds of competition. It depends on how you throw them out there. There’s only five starting positions and I think we can play eight guys, so there are a lot of guys fighting to be a starter out there.”
How will it all shake out? That remains to be seen. I still have a hard time imagining either Officer or Jones-Smith - let alone both - coming off the bench, but we may be at a point where we have to start thinking about Pitt’s offensive line as a collection of six or seven rather than five, since a rotation of some sorts seems more and more likely each day.
- We talked about the linebackers a good deal yesterday, and Tuesday’s practice gave a pretty clear impression that Elijah Zeise has moved ahead of Oluwaseun Idowu for the first-team Star position, or at least was taking reps ahead of him Tuesday morning.
I think we’ll see a rotation at linebacker, too, this season. I think they have enough varying skill sets that they’ll mix and match combinations depending on the situation (down and distance).
- The media viewing window lasted four periods on Tuesday, and the second period in that group was the team’s stretch, as run by Dave Andrews. As you can imagine, there’s not a lot to see there. But I did notice that the nine lines of stretching players were led by these nine players: James Conner, Dontez Ford, Matt Galambos, Ejuan Price, Dorian Johnson, Mike Caprara, Reggie Mitchell, Nate Peterman and Adam Bisnowaty.
While seeing those guys lead the stretching lines - they’re really just the first person in line, not necessarily leading anything - it dawned on me that this team has a pretty solid group of seniors. It’s not the biggest group (although there are 19 of them, which is rather sizeable) and there have been more accomplished senior classes in Pitt history, but these seniors are a tight bunch and a good set of leaders for the team.
With or without contact, though, the interesting developments with the team continue to be depth chart moves, even if they’re relatively minor.
I mentioned in Monday’s report that it looked like Dane Jackson had moved past Phillipie Motley in the battle at cornerback opposite Avonte Maddox, and Narduzzi said as much Tuesday morning, adding that redshirt senior Ryan Lewis is still the leader at that spot for the time being.
“Opposite Avonte, Ryan Lewis right now is - he had a nice day again yesterday,” Narduzzi said. “He’s made some strides. You start to look at him and say, ‘We can rely on him.’ Phillipie Motley and Dane Jackson are in a heat right now, and I’m not sure that Dane Jackson isn’t ahead of him. Dane Jackson has really come on strong the last four or five days. And Phillipie is still there. Malik (Henderson) had maybe an average day yesterday, but he’s battling. They’re all battling out there.”
The notable quote in there is this bit about Lewis: “You start to look at him and say, ‘We can rely on him.’”
That was certainly something that was missing last season, when Pitt almost never rotated cornerbacks. Despite Maddox and Lafayette Pitts having issues from time to time, Lewis - the top cornerback behind those two - saw very little playing time on defense. So having the coaches feel like they can rely on him is a step in the right direction, even if it falls short of saying “He’s making plays,” which is this staff’s - and other staffs’ - ultimate compliment.
- On the offensive line, things appear to be far from settled. While the lineups we’ve seen in walk-throughs thus far have been consistent - left to right: Adam Bisnowaty, Dorian Johnson, Alex Bookser, John Guy and Brian O’Neill - Narduzzi made it clear that things are in flux.
Arguably the main spot up for grabs is right guard, where Guy has been working since spring camp but Alex Officer - last year’s starting right guard who missed the spring with an injury - has rotated in with the first team.
“John’s just a steady, ‘steady Eddie’ guy,” Narduzzi said. “He’s just tough, he’s physical and he just goes about his business in a professional way. That’s what you really like about John. He doesn’t say ‘Boo’ out there; he just gets the job done. So he’s doing a good job competing for that right guard position.”
To which I asked: Is he leading for that right guard position?
“Uh, you know, I don’t know if he’s leading at this point,” Narduzzi said. “We’re still kind of juggling them around in there. There’s a lot of competition going with the offensive line. The great thing is, I think on game day you’re going to see we can play up to eight guys, which will be good. You’re keeping a guy fresh and in the fourth quarter, you don’t have an exhausted guy. Maybe we can make a bigger play or pop a big run because there’s a fresher guy in there because we can play more guys at that position.”
So Guy is far from locked in as the starting right guard, particularly with a two-year starter in Officer pushing him. And then there’s Jaryd Jones-Smith lurking on the second team. Plus, the staff seems to like Connor Dintino as a backup center.
That gives Pitt the eight that Narduzzi was talking about, and the coaches seem to like what the competition is doing for the group.
“I think there’s all kinds of competition. It depends on how you throw them out there. There’s only five starting positions and I think we can play eight guys, so there are a lot of guys fighting to be a starter out there.”
How will it all shake out? That remains to be seen. I still have a hard time imagining either Officer or Jones-Smith - let alone both - coming off the bench, but we may be at a point where we have to start thinking about Pitt’s offensive line as a collection of six or seven rather than five, since a rotation of some sorts seems more and more likely each day.
- We talked about the linebackers a good deal yesterday, and Tuesday’s practice gave a pretty clear impression that Elijah Zeise has moved ahead of Oluwaseun Idowu for the first-team Star position, or at least was taking reps ahead of him Tuesday morning.
I think we’ll see a rotation at linebacker, too, this season. I think they have enough varying skill sets that they’ll mix and match combinations depending on the situation (down and distance).
- The media viewing window lasted four periods on Tuesday, and the second period in that group was the team’s stretch, as run by Dave Andrews. As you can imagine, there’s not a lot to see there. But I did notice that the nine lines of stretching players were led by these nine players: James Conner, Dontez Ford, Matt Galambos, Ejuan Price, Dorian Johnson, Mike Caprara, Reggie Mitchell, Nate Peterman and Adam Bisnowaty.
While seeing those guys lead the stretching lines - they’re really just the first person in line, not necessarily leading anything - it dawned on me that this team has a pretty solid group of seniors. It’s not the biggest group (although there are 19 of them, which is rather sizeable) and there have been more accomplished senior classes in Pitt history, but these seniors are a tight bunch and a good set of leaders for the team.
