I know, I keep coming back to the non-con. That’s because I am really, really pissed about this. So I keep thinking about it, and remember other things. Like the fact that part of how the NCAA seeding committee rationalized dropping Pitt to a #3 seed and sticking them in Milwaukee to play Wisconsin in the second round was the non-con.

When the head of the committee Bowlsby, the AD from Iowa was being interviewed that was one of the first questions. His defense was Pitt’s non-conference schedule dragged them down and losing to UConn 2 out of 3 times. He ignored Pitt’s Big East schedule and winning the Big East regular season — impliedly suggesting that for Pitt, the conference regular season wasn’t important.

Every year at NCAA Tournament time, the talk always turns to who played a good non-con and who took the cheap way out. The last couple years, we have seen the seeding committee reward teams that play a tough non-con and punish the ones who take the weak route in the seedings. Pitt was all but told to toughen up the non-con or look for the same thing again. Way to pay attention.

Remember about a week ago, when the news surfaced that Pitt and Penn State, might renew the rivalry. Guess who is doing his best to kill that:

Q: Is there an interest in renewing rivalry with Pitt?

PATERNO:There are a lot of reasons for not playing it. One of which is that Pitt decided to go their way. All of those years when they weren’t in the Big East, we couldn’t get them to play us in basketball. It’s a two-way street. I tried to get them all into a league and if Pitt had been willing to go along with the league, we would have had a Big East arrangement that probably would have been better for a lot of different people. That and the fact that when we go to play Pitt at Pitt, they double the price for our fans. It’s not the same price (as other games). At one time you had to buy two tickets in order to get to see Penn State play Pitt out there. We would love to play Pitt if they would come here 2-1 and not because we particularly want that, but we think that would be a fair way for us to give them the same kind of money. It’s not really a good arrangement for us. Now having said that, which I know that next part of this is not going to get printed, I’d love to play Pitt. I grew up here when Pitt and Penn State were big rivalries. I’d love to play Pitt. I have all kinds of friends at Pitt. Suzy Broadhurst, whose husband, Jim, has been marvelous in fundraising at Penn State, some of the trustees in Pittsburgh?we have more alumni in Allegheny County than Pitt has in Allegheny County. I think it’s natural. We should play it. But there has got to be an arrangement. We have to have six home games. We have a women’s basketball team in Italy, we have a men’s soccer team in Brazil, and that is great. We have 29 sports and we have two-thirds of the budget that Texas has and Texas has 19 sports. And that all has to come out of the revenue that we can produce out of football because the University doesn’t give us a nickel. Anything that we do has to be based on “can we have six home game? Can we satisfy the fact that we have become a national school that we have tremendous pressure to play in different parts of the country?” We are playing Boston College. Syracuse is getting back on the schedule. Notre Dame is getting back on the schedule. You would think Pitt would be a natural, West Virginia would be a natural to get back on the schedule. But there are a lot of things involved in it. It’s not just a question of picking up the phone and saying “let’s play.” I think some people have to make some concessions to us because of the problems that certain games would create for us. It has nothing to do with competition, it’s got to do with how you finance the operation you have.

I don’t even feel like tackling the number of lies, half-truths, spin and plain bull s**t in there. Suffice to say that he took more time rationalizing this than any other question in the press conference.

Okay. Quick and dirty.

Palko named the starting QB last night. Luke Getsy was apparently very upset and even Harris doesn’t know if he’ll stay at Pitt. No reason for Getsy to transfer yet. If the O-line is as bad as last year, he’ll be starting because Palko will be out for at least a game with a concussion.

Wide Receiver Greg Lee was surprised by the decision. He thought it was too close to call and would play out into next week.

The QB starter may be named but a bunch of others are still up in the air. This includes tailback, fullback, a cornerback, wide receivers, and of course injuries on the lines have a bunch of questions.

Coach Harris considered last year’s paper thin defense to be an “aberration” for the entire year. So that means he expects the D to be better this year (And how much worse could they be?).

Joe Bendel does his breakdown of the team and the challenges. Bottom line, is a 6-5 regular season and losing its bowl birth to finish an even 6-6. Right around what most expect.

Post-Gazette beat reporter Paul Zeise, does his first Q&A for the new season. Nothing that surprising, but even Zeise, a beat writer who has to deal with the guy almost daily, notes Harris needs a good year:

Q: How secure is Walt Harris? Will eight or nine wins save his job?

ZEISE: The seat that coach Harris is sitting on is certainly getting warm but I’m not sure there is a magic number for him remain at Pitt. I know three wins would put him in big trouble, but the other end of the scale (7 or 8) is not so cut and dried. Harris runs a clean program, the team wins enough and the kids go to class and he doesn’t put up with a lot of off-field nonsense. That goes a long way towards keeping the administration happy, further than most people know. Season ticket renewals, however, have not been quite as good as the university had hoped and that’s a factor as well. The bottom line is Walt needs to have a good season, how good is not quite as clear.

My feeling .500 or better he stays. 5-6 or lower, and a change will have to be made.

Finally, Pitt has its 7th recruit. Rashaad Duncan from Belle Glade, FL. He’s apparently a diamond in the rough, according to this breakdown from Bob Lichtenfels from Panther Report.

Sorry, I know I still haven’t done the news round-up for Pitt football, but I have a few moments and I am still bugged by the non-con.

I note that Pitt’s web site still hasn’t put out an official press release on the non-con. Interesting. They had no problem trumpeting the Big East schedule even though the actual dates and times weren’t ready. The actual time and dates are supposed to come out next week. I’m guessing at that point Pitt will put out a press release trumpeting its “full” schedule as being very difficult and will even resort to the same pathetic we-have-games-against-teams-from-3-major-basketball-conferences spin again.

If Pitt is too embarrassed by the non-con to release it separately on the site, then even they now what a joke it is and can’t give a legitimate defense of it. And, “look at what team x or y does” is not a defense.

Thank Christ almighty, college football is back. And just in the nick of time. I’m not sure how much more baseball I can take, let alone the completely inane Olympics.

Throughout last season, I picked 60 college football games against the spread (as all three of you who regularly read this site may remember). I tended to stay within my two favorite conferences (the Big East and the Big Ten), but occasionally ventured outside for big, national games. Despite my obsessing over college football to a greater extent than almost anybody I know, my final season record was a depressingly neutral 29-30-1 (heck, I would have rather gone way under .500… then I could at least make money betting against myself).

Given that my record was so grey, I suspect that nobody out there cares if I start picking again this season or not. So what the hell. I need something to do over my lunch hour…

THE SUCKER BET BOWL (The University of Southern California (-17.5) at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute, Cracker Barrel, and State University): This year’s Black Coaches Association game isn’t going to be much of a contest, and ESPN2’s simultaneously broadcasted “Behind The Scenes” crap doesn’t look too promising either. I’m hoping that Pete Carroll will keep it interesting by firing off some cheap shots at the NCAA for the way they completely butchered the Matt Williams situation (and made the wrong decision to boot). But either way, I’ll stay up to the end anyways, because my wife says I’m an addict.

FoxSports’s Fearless Predictions (or should I say “Fearless Prediction,” since there’s only one game this weekend) didn’t take the Trojans to cover the 17.5 point spread. Really, since USC could pretty much score as many points as it wanted to in this one, whether or not they’ll cover is more a matter of how soon they call off the dogs. Sure, Virginia Tech should be able to put a few touchdowns on the board against USC’s defense. But they won’t be able to keep it close, even without Williams.

I think USC will win by three or four touchdowns, so I’ll take the sucker bet and give the 17.5.

Hail to Virginia Tech taking a good, swift asskicking in their first game as a member of the ACC.

Very busy today. Personal matters. Lots of stuff at both papers, but I have no time to do a write-up.