Commentary
Let’s face it the loss at Ohio University was down right brutal. It has to be one of the worst half dozen loses since Dave Wannstedt was a student at Pitt back in the earlier 1970’s. An Associated Press writer compared it to the loss to South Florida in 2001under Walt Harris (Pitt bounced back to go 7-5 that year) and the loss to Temple in 1984 under “Foge” Fazio. Pitt did not bounce back that year and went 3-7-1.
Pitt took better players to Athens and got upset. It is simple as that. It happened as upsets often do. Pitt committed 3 turnovers and Ohio U cashed two of them in for quick scores. Pitt also had 10 penalties. There were so many three-and-outs I lost track of them. Pitt punted 8 times and many of these came after Pitt failed to make a one first down. The defense played well after a shaky start against Notre Dame but the offense was down right awful.
It appears the coaching staff put a game plan together in which wanted to establish the run. However, on the first offensive series offensive lineman starting going down and the game plan proved to be worthless after that. Mike McGlynn, John Simonitis and Dominic Williams were all injured at one point or another.
Dave Wannstedt has put together a good coach staff. If this group has learned anything is that other colleges also have good coaching staffs. You better bring you “A” game every week or you run the danger of getting beat. Charlie Weis, Frank Solich and Bill Callahan can coach too.
Ohio U coach Frank Solich did a very good job of playing field position football and daring the Pitt offense to beat him. Ohio U often did not even try to score in the second half. They had the lead and kept kicking Pitt into a position where they had a long field to work with. Ohio U also protected the football and did not have a turnover. They also had only 5 penalties. This is a great recipe for pulling an upset of a team with superior talent. Watching Frank Solich pace the sidelines in the second half reminded me of Wayne Hardin who coach at Temple and Navy. He often was undermanned and just tried to hang around to find some way to beat you late.
Perhaps there was too much hype going into the Notre Dame game. We may look back at this season and find that Notre Dame is much better that we thought going in to the season. They look very good on offense right now. Time will tell how well their defense holds up. The loss to Notre Dame may have taken some steam out of the Pitt team and staff. They then were faced with a short week to prepare for Ohio U. Before the season started Rivals.com called the Ohio U game your classic “trap” game. They said Pitt was primed for an upset with a road game sandwich between Notre Dame and Nebraska. I wonder how many of us thought when we read that article, “You know they may have a point.”
The good news is that we now have a 12 game schedule. There is still time to salvage something of this season. These first few games are non-conference games. There is still time to bounce back and grab a bowl bid.
Unfortunately Lincoln, Nebraska is probably not the place to start your climb out of a very deep hole. Only 2 unranked teams have won there in 18 years. They will have a sellout crowd for the 271st game in a row. Nebraska coach Bill Callahan is in his second year. So far his offense has not gotten untracked. The Huskers are 2-0 but have not impressed folks. They do appear to have enough at home to give Coach Wannstedt a 0-3 start at Pitt. Hopefully tomorrow’s game will begin the bottoming out process and they can start to start to move forward with a more favorable schedule over the next few weeks.
Pitt has won 25 games the last three years. They do not have top 15 talent but there is enough talent on this team to win their share of the last 9 games. Most teams either get better or they get worse. Teams that get better usually avoid injuries and have some success. Morale gets better and the team improves. Other teams often cannot seem to avoid injuries. Young players do not step up. They go into a spiral that is difficult to pull out of. Pitt will get their chance next week against Youngstown to see which category they fall into.
It will take Dave Wannstedt three years to get players that fit his style. However, his staff must find ways to win some games with the players they have. There are no free agents on a wire service to pick from. Most colleges are like Pitt. They have some very good players. They have players that will play in the NFL. They also lack the type of depth you would love to have. Approximately 100 other Division 1 coaches have the exact same problem as Pitt has. Only a small handful of college teams are loaded at every position. The scholarship limitations make it very difficult to have veteran back ups at all positions. All schools will play at least five freshmen.
When you looked at the schedule prior to the start of the season you always recognized Pitt could get off to a 1-2 start. The possibility of Coach Wannstedt getting off to a bumpy start always existed. The upset at Ohio U has made the situation more difficult that most might have forecasted.
Crazy things can happen even to very good coaches. Two years ago Bob Stoops at Oklahoma was almost universally proclaimed a coaching genius. He was ranked No. 5 in the country in some preseason polls. He promptly lost at home to TCU and then was in a dogfight with Tulsa last week. Well into the fourth quarter he had all he could handle from this Conference USA team. This week his star player runs into problems for failing to go to class.
Pitt is No. 95 in the country in offense right now. They can’t run or pass. Until they can establish some kind of offensive identity it is hard to pick the Panthers. In addition the offense is banged up. Tim Murphy and Dominic Williams may not play. Rashaad Jennings is also injured. Coach Wannstedt said he expects to use Brandon Mason and LaRod Stephens at tailback (some). There is a lot of uncertainty upfront and at running back right now. In addition the staff desperately needs a wide receiver to take some of the pressure off Greg Lee. We like Nebraska by a score of about 24-10 this week. Pitt may need another week to see the light at the other end of the tunnel.
Some odds and ends
The Tennessee State Library and Achieves is the recipient of the personal and professional papers of Johnny Majors. He was a former Tennessee All-American and later a head coach of the Vols. The Exhibit entitled “It’s football time in Tennessee! John T. Majors: A Tennessee Football Legend As a Player and as a Coach.” opened September 10th and runs through January 15th, 2006. John Majors donated his papers and memorabilia for the exhibit in Nashville.
Some recruiting talk
It is our understanding that guard Trevor Ferguson was in Pittsburgh this summer and based on his workouts with other Pitt basketball players it probably became apparent that he was not going to see much early playing time. This may have contributed to his decision not to enroll but we hear there were also some serious health issues in his family that was the major factor.
We are going to shy away from talking about individual football recruits this week (and maybe next). Pitt will be on the road for the second week in a row so there are no visitors. It appears they will try to bring in a few for the Cincinnati game in early October.
The Ohio U game was played on Friday so the chances are very few recruits saw the debacle. I am sure they are aware Pitt lost and the negative feedback will surely reach them. If Pitt can put together a winning streak starting with Youngstown the shaky start could be a distant memory by late October. The staff may still get to take their own version of a “Mulligan” but you won’t want to try this one too often or eventually you will be facing many of the same recruiting problems Walt Harris did.
Pitt has verbals from 17 players. They must work very hard to keep these guys on board. Some of their best recruiting might be with those that have already committed. The staff has been working the phones hard to insure they keep what they have. They will pick up enough players to round out the class if they just hang on to this group. You have to wonder if the early losses will not somehow lead to Pitt taking the full compliment of 25 players. There are sure to be a few bruised egos in the weeks ahead.
One of the big differences I witnessed in recruiting this year was this staff made quick decisions. If they saw a player they thought could help them and the player had a positive attitude towards Pitt they went after him very hard. Notice I did not say they identified the best players. They saw players they thought could help them. If they players had a positive attitude towards Pitt they put on a full-court press.
Of the first 17 players that verbally committed 14 were recruited by Bob Junko, Charlie Partridge or Curtis Bray. These are all coaches off the old staff. Dave Wannstedt’s outgoing personality is a huge help to these holdover coaches but so is the ability of this staff to make quick decisions on recruits. Only time will tell if they made the right decisions but so far they certainly have collected a lot more stars. We also know they are working very hard to make sure those stars do not come off the commit list.
The War Room is targeted towards our premium customers. We ask that all information reported in the War Room MUST stay right here! That’s the way this deal works. When this information is repeated outside of the Between Fifth and Forbes forum it only cheapens the price of yours and every other die-hard who have purchased premium services. The War Room is one of our more popular features...thank you all for keeping the information on this board.
Let’s face it the loss at Ohio University was down right brutal. It has to be one of the worst half dozen loses since Dave Wannstedt was a student at Pitt back in the earlier 1970’s. An Associated Press writer compared it to the loss to South Florida in 2001under Walt Harris (Pitt bounced back to go 7-5 that year) and the loss to Temple in 1984 under “Foge” Fazio. Pitt did not bounce back that year and went 3-7-1.
Pitt took better players to Athens and got upset. It is simple as that. It happened as upsets often do. Pitt committed 3 turnovers and Ohio U cashed two of them in for quick scores. Pitt also had 10 penalties. There were so many three-and-outs I lost track of them. Pitt punted 8 times and many of these came after Pitt failed to make a one first down. The defense played well after a shaky start against Notre Dame but the offense was down right awful.
It appears the coaching staff put a game plan together in which wanted to establish the run. However, on the first offensive series offensive lineman starting going down and the game plan proved to be worthless after that. Mike McGlynn, John Simonitis and Dominic Williams were all injured at one point or another.
Dave Wannstedt has put together a good coach staff. If this group has learned anything is that other colleges also have good coaching staffs. You better bring you “A” game every week or you run the danger of getting beat. Charlie Weis, Frank Solich and Bill Callahan can coach too.
Ohio U coach Frank Solich did a very good job of playing field position football and daring the Pitt offense to beat him. Ohio U often did not even try to score in the second half. They had the lead and kept kicking Pitt into a position where they had a long field to work with. Ohio U also protected the football and did not have a turnover. They also had only 5 penalties. This is a great recipe for pulling an upset of a team with superior talent. Watching Frank Solich pace the sidelines in the second half reminded me of Wayne Hardin who coach at Temple and Navy. He often was undermanned and just tried to hang around to find some way to beat you late.
Perhaps there was too much hype going into the Notre Dame game. We may look back at this season and find that Notre Dame is much better that we thought going in to the season. They look very good on offense right now. Time will tell how well their defense holds up. The loss to Notre Dame may have taken some steam out of the Pitt team and staff. They then were faced with a short week to prepare for Ohio U. Before the season started Rivals.com called the Ohio U game your classic “trap” game. They said Pitt was primed for an upset with a road game sandwich between Notre Dame and Nebraska. I wonder how many of us thought when we read that article, “You know they may have a point.”
The good news is that we now have a 12 game schedule. There is still time to salvage something of this season. These first few games are non-conference games. There is still time to bounce back and grab a bowl bid.
Unfortunately Lincoln, Nebraska is probably not the place to start your climb out of a very deep hole. Only 2 unranked teams have won there in 18 years. They will have a sellout crowd for the 271st game in a row. Nebraska coach Bill Callahan is in his second year. So far his offense has not gotten untracked. The Huskers are 2-0 but have not impressed folks. They do appear to have enough at home to give Coach Wannstedt a 0-3 start at Pitt. Hopefully tomorrow’s game will begin the bottoming out process and they can start to start to move forward with a more favorable schedule over the next few weeks.
Pitt has won 25 games the last three years. They do not have top 15 talent but there is enough talent on this team to win their share of the last 9 games. Most teams either get better or they get worse. Teams that get better usually avoid injuries and have some success. Morale gets better and the team improves. Other teams often cannot seem to avoid injuries. Young players do not step up. They go into a spiral that is difficult to pull out of. Pitt will get their chance next week against Youngstown to see which category they fall into.
It will take Dave Wannstedt three years to get players that fit his style. However, his staff must find ways to win some games with the players they have. There are no free agents on a wire service to pick from. Most colleges are like Pitt. They have some very good players. They have players that will play in the NFL. They also lack the type of depth you would love to have. Approximately 100 other Division 1 coaches have the exact same problem as Pitt has. Only a small handful of college teams are loaded at every position. The scholarship limitations make it very difficult to have veteran back ups at all positions. All schools will play at least five freshmen.
When you looked at the schedule prior to the start of the season you always recognized Pitt could get off to a 1-2 start. The possibility of Coach Wannstedt getting off to a bumpy start always existed. The upset at Ohio U has made the situation more difficult that most might have forecasted.
Crazy things can happen even to very good coaches. Two years ago Bob Stoops at Oklahoma was almost universally proclaimed a coaching genius. He was ranked No. 5 in the country in some preseason polls. He promptly lost at home to TCU and then was in a dogfight with Tulsa last week. Well into the fourth quarter he had all he could handle from this Conference USA team. This week his star player runs into problems for failing to go to class.
Pitt is No. 95 in the country in offense right now. They can’t run or pass. Until they can establish some kind of offensive identity it is hard to pick the Panthers. In addition the offense is banged up. Tim Murphy and Dominic Williams may not play. Rashaad Jennings is also injured. Coach Wannstedt said he expects to use Brandon Mason and LaRod Stephens at tailback (some). There is a lot of uncertainty upfront and at running back right now. In addition the staff desperately needs a wide receiver to take some of the pressure off Greg Lee. We like Nebraska by a score of about 24-10 this week. Pitt may need another week to see the light at the other end of the tunnel.
Some odds and ends
The Tennessee State Library and Achieves is the recipient of the personal and professional papers of Johnny Majors. He was a former Tennessee All-American and later a head coach of the Vols. The Exhibit entitled “It’s football time in Tennessee! John T. Majors: A Tennessee Football Legend As a Player and as a Coach.” opened September 10th and runs through January 15th, 2006. John Majors donated his papers and memorabilia for the exhibit in Nashville.
Some recruiting talk
It is our understanding that guard Trevor Ferguson was in Pittsburgh this summer and based on his workouts with other Pitt basketball players it probably became apparent that he was not going to see much early playing time. This may have contributed to his decision not to enroll but we hear there were also some serious health issues in his family that was the major factor.
We are going to shy away from talking about individual football recruits this week (and maybe next). Pitt will be on the road for the second week in a row so there are no visitors. It appears they will try to bring in a few for the Cincinnati game in early October.
The Ohio U game was played on Friday so the chances are very few recruits saw the debacle. I am sure they are aware Pitt lost and the negative feedback will surely reach them. If Pitt can put together a winning streak starting with Youngstown the shaky start could be a distant memory by late October. The staff may still get to take their own version of a “Mulligan” but you won’t want to try this one too often or eventually you will be facing many of the same recruiting problems Walt Harris did.
Pitt has verbals from 17 players. They must work very hard to keep these guys on board. Some of their best recruiting might be with those that have already committed. The staff has been working the phones hard to insure they keep what they have. They will pick up enough players to round out the class if they just hang on to this group. You have to wonder if the early losses will not somehow lead to Pitt taking the full compliment of 25 players. There are sure to be a few bruised egos in the weeks ahead.
One of the big differences I witnessed in recruiting this year was this staff made quick decisions. If they saw a player they thought could help them and the player had a positive attitude towards Pitt they went after him very hard. Notice I did not say they identified the best players. They saw players they thought could help them. If they players had a positive attitude towards Pitt they put on a full-court press.
Of the first 17 players that verbally committed 14 were recruited by Bob Junko, Charlie Partridge or Curtis Bray. These are all coaches off the old staff. Dave Wannstedt’s outgoing personality is a huge help to these holdover coaches but so is the ability of this staff to make quick decisions on recruits. Only time will tell if they made the right decisions but so far they certainly have collected a lot more stars. We also know they are working very hard to make sure those stars do not come off the commit list.
The War Room is targeted towards our premium customers. We ask that all information reported in the War Room MUST stay right here! That’s the way this deal works. When this information is repeated outside of the Between Fifth and Forbes forum it only cheapens the price of yours and every other die-hard who have purchased premium services. The War Room is one of our more popular features...thank you all for keeping the information on this board.
