No real news, but a puff piece on two freshmen wide receivers — Greg Lee and Terrell Allen — who stand great chances to end up as Pitt’s #1 and #2 WRs for 2004. Allen was the more heavily recruited and bigger fish from South Carolina, but was injured when an opportunity to be the #2 receiver in place of Princell Brockenbrough occurred.
Lee has played well when given the chance, and looks to be the leader for the #2 receiver position even if Fitzgerald returns for his Junior season.
Brockenbrough will be hard pressed to keep his job. He has good hands and speed, but is sloppy on his routes and despite his good hands tends to drop a lot of easy passes because he is looking upfield or for the hit before he has the ball.
Allen has thrived in the second half of the season as a kick returner. He has shown great cutting and bursts of speed.
Other Notes
Column from Mike Prisuta on how the Continental Tire Bowl is more important to Coach Harris than it is to Pitt. It makes a good point:
…the Continental Tire Bowl can provide for Pitt, specifically for coach Walt Harris, something that would go a long way toward healing the wounds opened up by Toledo, Notre Dame, West Virginia and Miami.
Redemption.
Harris could use a little of that right about now, and his recent record in bowl games suggests he’s capable of grabbing enough of it to temporarily quiet the wolves growling at his door.
…
Wins such as those are very effective.
I think he overstates things when he suggests that it would “go a long way toward lessening the disappointment Pitt has endured since coming so close to the BCS and yet winding up so far away.” It won’t do that, and there will still be plenty of “what ifs” to contemplate. It will, however show that Pitt can win against a good team (other than Virginia Tech) that is equal or perhaps considered better than Pitt.
I think it will also be an important message to show just how much the team is still with Harris. They come out flat and play poorly, and everyone will know Harris couldn’t get this team to rebound from their bad games against Miami and West Virginia.