Pitt 1996 team where we gave up 38 ppg? (4-7), or 2016 team giving up 37 ppg (4-4)? Note: Subtracting Villanova this year since we did not play a FBS school in '96.
Which Pitt Team Was Worse?
- Thread starter SVPanther
- Start date
Seriously? This team is world's better than that team. If you wanna talk strictly defense, maybe there's an argument. But there's a whole other side of the ball. This offense can singlehandedly win games, the '96 team all around was just embarrassing.
This team has been competitive in every single game (even Miami until the team started to play giveaway and forgot how to tackle). That '96 team results were:
Sat. Aug. 31 West Virginia L 0–34
Sat. Sep. 7 Kent State W 52–14
Sat. Sep. 14 Houston L 35–42 OT
Sat. Sep. 21 No. 7 Ohio State L 0–72
Sat. Sep. 28 No. 10 Miami (FL) L 0–45
Sat. Oct. 5 Temple W 53–52
Sat. Oct. 12 Syracuse L 7–55
Sat. Oct. 26 Virginia Tech L 17–34
Thu. Oct. 31 Boston College W 20–13
Sat. Nov. 16 Notre Dame L 6–60
Sat. Nov. 30 Rutgers W 24–9
Sat. Aug. 31 West Virginia L 0–34
Sat. Sep. 7 Kent State W 52–14
Sat. Sep. 14 Houston L 35–42 OT
Sat. Sep. 21 No. 7 Ohio State L 0–72
Sat. Sep. 28 No. 10 Miami (FL) L 0–45
Sat. Oct. 5 Temple W 53–52
Sat. Oct. 12 Syracuse L 7–55
Sat. Oct. 26 Virginia Tech L 17–34
Thu. Oct. 31 Boston College W 20–13
Sat. Nov. 16 Notre Dame L 6–60
Sat. Nov. 30 Rutgers W 24–9
I have to agree. Defenses are pretty similar (which is depressing) but 2016 offense is much, much better.
This team has a fair chance to go 7-5, which in the end is still better than multiple Pitt teams in the last 30 years.
And you still can't convince me that the talent level on this year's team is that bad.
Worth noting, I'm willing to bet that offenses are more prolific now than in 1996.
As I noted a few weeks ago, for as much praise as the offense has received here, they are ranked something like 60th in scoring offense.
regarding that '96 team, I have one of these "stories of Pitt football" books and was reading it over the weekend.. Walt had a quote about that '96 team (He coached the buckeyes at the time) that basically said, that coaching staff did not have that team prepared to even compete, basically something to that effect.. really a strong quote from an opposing coach..
Yes that's a good point, definitely needs to be taken into account. You never saw offenses like you do now back then.
Wow....there is no comparison between now and 96. The 96 team won against a few BE bottom dwellers (Rutgers, Temple), a MAC team (Kent St) and a BC team that suspended 13 players a week later for betting on their games...something thought to have factored in our close win over them. The 96 team got boat raced five times, beat soundly by VTech, and lost at home in OT to a bad Houston team. I was at the WVU game to open the season and knew pretty much from the start that we had a bad, bad, bad team and most games were out of hand early.
This year we have beat a cupcake (Villanova), a bottom level CAA team (Marshall), a decent ACC team (G Tech) and an ACC bottom dweller (Virginia), along with a PSU team that we now know to be a pretty good team. Miami beat us soundly but other than that, every loss has been down to the wire. At no point this season did I feel like we didn't have a chance to win until the last quarter against Miami.
Defensively the teams probably have a lot in common but the teams are no where near comparable as our current team actually has an offense. 96 is probably the low point since the national championship year. Hope was totally lost that year which makes what Walt Harris did in 1997 that much more amazing.
This year we have beat a cupcake (Villanova), a bottom level CAA team (Marshall), a decent ACC team (G Tech) and an ACC bottom dweller (Virginia), along with a PSU team that we now know to be a pretty good team. Miami beat us soundly but other than that, every loss has been down to the wire. At no point this season did I feel like we didn't have a chance to win until the last quarter against Miami.
Defensively the teams probably have a lot in common but the teams are no where near comparable as our current team actually has an offense. 96 is probably the low point since the national championship year. Hope was totally lost that year which makes what Walt Harris did in 1997 that much more amazing.
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I was at that pitt / wvu game, first carry was a td run by Amos. That wvu team was pretty good, started out like 7-0 before having a punt blocked by the canes last play, then they lost to cuse the next week. They were gator bowl team in 96.
We did play two top 10 teams that year in the buckeyes and the Canes.. Not sure if the Irish were ranked that year either but eers were good as were the Orangemen.. That Va tech game was actually close, til the very end.. We played decent that game, at hokies. Just got away from us at the end..
What I hated back then after being such a bad program was the administration let the program die yet was still filling the non-conference schedule with teams Pitt had no business playing.
you mean like Division 1 football teams? We are seriously lucky Majors didn't put this program into D1-AA classification.. We were closer than most people believe..
Could have substituted tOSU with another MAC school. There is five wins that season.
Texas and tOSU in 1994 and '95.
Texas and tOSU in 1994 and '95.
Yup, you make some good points, though I think the Orangemen were a good bit better than WVU that year given their records and the fact that Syracuse beat WVU solidly in Morgantown. And I was mistaken, the Houston team wasn't bad. So we didn't lose to any bad teams and only really beat terrible teams (plus BC amidst the cheating scandal).
In 96 we played one truly elite team (OSU) and we will do the same next week at Clemson. I assume we lose to Clemson, though anything is possible and it will hopefully remain somewhat competitive. So I'll judge 96 vs 16 on the next 5 down where we were 0-5 in 96 (WVU, Syracuse, V Tech, Notre Dame, Miami) and 1-4 in 16 (PSU, Ok St, North Carolina, V Tech, Miami). Those five are actually pretty comparable when you look at end of season rankings in 96 vs the fact that four of the five this year are currently top 20 teams in the AP poll. I think 96 WVU and 16 Miami are comparable if Miami takes care of business with their easy remaining games and finishes 8-4. Of those five in 96, V Tech was the only non-blowout where in 16 the only game that wasn't close was against Miami and even then it was close until the 4th.
I spent too much time looking all of that up but I still feel like the 16 team is light years ahead of where we were in 96.
Maybe the most depressing loss of my decades of being a Pitt fan given the talent we had, though Toledo did have Bruce Gradkowski who was having a terrific year. We still should have beat them handily and taken care of a lousy ND team a few weeks later.
Just when you think this board could not get any worse, a post like this comes out.
yeah, I was at that wvu / cuse game, they took it to the eers.. Funny is that the eers got the gator bowl bid over cuse despite losing to them, just due to being able to sell more tix.. I think that was the game that WVU converted a 3rd and 40 on a draw to Amos.
He does? Jury still out on that for me. Would a clear mind not help his corners out there that stink ? I think a clear mind adjust to his talent , but that's none of my business
Our recruiting after that year was better than it is now, don't forget that. I would take 97 recruits over 17s
The dumb in this fanbase is amazing. This university deserves a winner. This fanbase deserves Rice.
What class would you rather have. 97 or 17, look at them before you give your standard blue and gold responses
What commitments were on board from the 1997 recruiting class at this same time (first week in November) in 1996?
How the f' do you know how this class is going to turn out considering signing day is 3 months away, and nobody knows how these kids will develop?
that was the class of Purifoy and Williams, correct? Those two were pretty big recruits.. Can you give us the list of '97
LOL, me too. Cant find it, tried a few different searches.. I'd be curious to see that list. Looking at that 97 team, Walt's first one. I tell you what, there are multiple positions that were better on that team than this year's. QBs, WRs, RBs, Dbs.
I MISS WALT..
Here's a good reference to the offensive and defensive depth charts for 1997:
http://digital.library.pitt.edu/cgi...31735062136175;page=root;size=s;frm=frameset;
so does the OP, who has had a bug up his butt ever since the whole Walt thing went down over 10 years ago. Hence the reason for his threads. some people just can't let it go.
stupid post. First you can't subtract Nova because had it not been nova it would have been some other crap G5 school, which would have been a easy win. Second their has only been one game so far where we weren't tied or winning with 5 minutes left. The 96 team got blown out against anyone decent. Finally offenses didn't score anywhere near the level they do now back in 96. There are probably 60 FCS teams that give up over 30 points a game. TEams score a lot in modern college football.
Majors was not clinically senile in 1996. he was simply drunk.
I am not one of these types but I am starting to really he believe he is one of the most under rated coaches in our history.. We had some dang good teams with him..
Now that is a good question? Seems to be a lot of people on this forum that can see into the future. Funny how they can't seem to hit the lottery.
Walt saved this football program. Simple as that. That doesn't make him Bear Bryant or anything like that but it certainly counts for something.
Walt did more with less. He was under appreciated. If Pitt had kept him, then we would have continued winning for a few more years after he left. We would have transitioned from Palko to Flacco at the QB position.
Brandon Williams and Purifoy were in '98 (Walt's second class).
That '97 class had a lot of Jucos and under-recruited projects. Ponko was Fab 22 but was a preferred walk-on. Bryan Knight was recruited as a WR. Khi Downey, Jeff McCurley and Joe Conlin all were solid. Barlow was arguably the star of that class and was a Fab 22 and City League POY. The other highly recruited kid in that class was Victor Strader from Penn Hills, who started multiple years on one of the better teams of that era, played in the Big 33 and had some big time offers. I don't know if either was as highly thought of as Paris Ford at this point.
Arrington and Ron Graham were the most coveted local players in that class.
That '97 class had a lot of Jucos and under-recruited projects. Ponko was Fab 22 but was a preferred walk-on. Bryan Knight was recruited as a WR. Khi Downey, Jeff McCurley and Joe Conlin all were solid. Barlow was arguably the star of that class and was a Fab 22 and City League POY. The other highly recruited kid in that class was Victor Strader from Penn Hills, who started multiple years on one of the better teams of that era, played in the Big 33 and had some big time offers. I don't know if either was as highly thought of as Paris Ford at this point.
Arrington and Ron Graham were the most coveted local players in that class.
Hopefully you just mean defense and not the whole team. This defense is worse, but the team is much better.
