Defense that is. Coach Wannstedt’s post-double practice day press conference had him a little bothered by the run defense. Something that was a problem last year.

On Pitt’s running defense and passing defense:

If we can get people in passing situations we’ll have a chance. We have to find a way to stop the run. I was not happy at all with our run defense today. It wasn’t nearly good enough. There were too many third down and fours and fives. We’ve got to find a way to generate more third and longs. We will.

He had plenty of good things to say about the freshmen. The running back situation looks more like a committee every day.

From Matt Hayes at The Sporting News.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet your Notre Dame guinea pig: Paul Rhoads. Pitt’s defensive coordinator will be the first coach to defend new Irish coach Charlie Weis’ offense–an offense that will be vastly different from the West Coast scheme former coach Tyrone Willingham used the past three years. The objective of Weis’ attack: spread and stretch. Spread the defense, forcing it to cover sideline to sideline, and stretch the defense by taking shots on deep routes. Rhoads says his staff has looked at game tape from Weis’ New England Patriots offenses to get an understanding of the scheme for the September 3 opener at Pitt. Pitt also has looked at last year’s Notre Dame-Pitt game to break down specific player tendencies. The problem: The Irish had 438 yards in a 41-38 loss last year. Speaking of the Irish, count Rhoads among those who believe QB Brady Quinn will thrive under Weis: “He has a ton of talent, and he’s still developing.” . . .

On the flip side, of course will be how Pitt’s revised defense will appear. Pitt is expected to be faster up the middle of the d-line and play a more aggressive defense. The corners won’t be playing off so much to permit the receivers easy catches. The more I find myself thinking about the 1st game of the season, the more I conclude that last year’s results, style, everything — mean absolutely nothing in this game. Both teams are going to be very different in how they play.

Bruce Feldman lists his top-10 gamebreakers for the last 20 years.

1. Deion Sanders, FSU. No one is even close when it comes to the theatre and drama of owning the moment. The Godfather of all gamebreakers.
2. Barry Sanders, Oklahoma State
3. Michael Vick, Va. Tech
4. Tommie Frazier, Nebraska
5. Marshall Faulk, SD State
6. Rocket Ismail, ND
7. Desmond Howard, Michigan
8. Charlie Ward, FSU
9. Randy Moss, Marshall
10. Larry Fitzgerald, Pittsburgh

Just Missed the Cut: Champ Bailey, UGa; Charles Woodson, Michigan; Matt Jones, Arkansas.; Beau Morgan, Air Force QB; Antonio Bryant, Pitt WR; Hart Lee Dykes, Oklahoma State WR; Terry Glenn, Ohio State; K-Jana Carter, Penn State; Eric Crouch, Nebraska; Ricky Williams, UT; Donovan McNabb, Syracuse; Joe Hamilton, Georgia Tech QB; David Allen, K-State; Napoleon Kaufman, Washington; Peter Warrick, FSU; Tim Brown, ND; Deuce Palmer, ‘Bama; Tremain Mack, Miami; and Wes Welker, Texas Tech.

I never thought of Antonio Bryant as a “gamebreaker.” He came on as a force in 2002, but that was a surprise and seemingly out of no where. In 2003, when he was expected to be a gamebreaker, he was out for almost half the season with injuries — opening the door for Larry Fitzgerald to appear on the scene.

Feldman also notes another story on recruiting sites and their interactions with recruits.

Most Division I teams are covered by Rivals.com and Scout.com, the two predominant Web sites when it comes to college football recruiting.

When a player is being pursued by a university, he can expect to get a call from both sites that cover that particular school. The two such sites concerning Nebraska football are huskersillustrated.com (Rivals) and bigredreport.com (Scout).

“If it came out you were interested in Michigan, you’d get a call from both (Michigan Web sites) the next day,” Holt said.

And the questions that came from these Web reporters?

Almost always the same, Holt said.

” ‘What’s your top five?’ ‘What’s your strengths as a player?’ They always ask that one. ‘Have you been to any camps?’ “

Rivals.com comes off looking better and has quotes from their general manager, Bobby Burton, than Scout.com. Of course, Scout.com is now with Fox Sports, so who knows what is going to happen. What just keeps seeming clearer is that there is going to be some major fighting coming regarding internet recruiting sites, and probably rumblings of some sort of regulations.

Pitt Athletic Department put out a press release on Kendall’s performance at the U-21.

University of Pittsburgh junior forward Levon Kendall earned all-tournament team honors after leading Canada to a Bronze Medal finish Sunday at the FIBA Under-21 World Basketball Championships. Canada’s Bronze Medal marked the first time a Canadian age-group team has medaled at a FIBA World Championship event.

In its first-ever appearance at the Under-21 World Championships, Canada defeated Australia 79-74 to earn the Bronze Medal. The victory completed an outstanding tournament for Canada, which dropped its semifinal game Saturday to Greece, 74-61.

Kendall led Canada into the medal round after he scored a tournament-high 40 points in a 93-90 overtime victory over the United States on Friday. In the win, Kendall hit 16 of 22 field goals (2-2 3-pointers), pulled down a game-high 12 rebounds and dished out three assists in 42 minutes. The Canadians erased a seven point deficit with three minutes to go and Kendall sent the contest into overtime with a game-tying basket with 25 seconds remaining.

Amazing what one stunning game can do for a guy’s profile. From miserable tournament to being named as one of the 5 best players in the tournament.

Andy Katz has more on his blog (Insider Subs.)

Levon Kendall a 40-point scorer? Don’t look for it against UConn or anyone else in the Big East.

Against Team USA in the Under-21 World Championship? That’s a whole different story.

Kendall dropped 40 on the United States in Canada’s shocking overtime win in the medal round quarterfinals Friday in Mar del Plata, Argentina. Kendall’s encore was the 15-spot he posted against Australia in Canada’s surprising bronze medal victory Sunday.

His college coach was impressed … and surprised.

“I don’t think he’ll score 40 for us,” Pittsburgh coach Jamie Dixon said of the 6-foot-9 sophomore forward who averaged 3.5 points and 2.5 rebounds in 13.9 minutes a game for the Panthers as a freshman.

“It’s tough to score 40 in those [tournament] games, especially when he had been averaging around seven points a game,” Dixon said.

USA coach Phil Martelli put Charlotte’s Curtis Withers on Kendall, but nothing seemed to matter, as Kendall scored at will. It was shocking, since Kendall had scored just 30 points in Canada’s four previous tournament games (and then only had eight points on 2-for-10 shooting in a semifinal loss to Greece). Still, that one performance helped propel Kendall to the all-tournament team, essentially recognized as one of the five best players in the tournament.

That’s some heady company for a role player at Pitt who will be counted on heavily to replace Chevy Troutman next season.

“He was going to play the four for this team — he’s a four-man but we had to play him at the three last year,” Dixon said. “He’s always been confident. Nobody had heard of him when we signed him. I think we beat Santa Barbara for him. But he’s been a good player and he backed up an all-league guy.”

Dixon said the perception was that the Panthers would be weak at the power spots this season. But if Kendall can replicate his performance in this tournament, the Panthers could be solid, with Kendall and 7-foot sophomore Aaron Gray.

The Panthers get back fifth-year senior point guard Carl Krauser and have solid returning guards in Ronald Ramon, Antonio Graves and forwards John DeGroat and Dante Milligan. If Kendall is a legit scorer, the Panthers could be much more of a player in the Big East this season.

I really don’t know how Kendall will ultimately do with Pitt this season. He will get the shot at starting at power forward, but I expect him to be pushed. He will have to be much better on defense to keep the job. Even in the U-21, he often got himself in early foul trouble. My feelings on Pitt, very, very preliminary though they are. This season Pitt will go anywhere from 6-10 to 10-6 in the Big East.

Canada won the bronze at the U-21. Levon Kendall was the leading scorer in the win over Australia. He had 15 points on 6-17 shooting, 9 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 steals and 2 turnovers in 25 minutes.

Winning the bronze was the first time Canada has medalled in a FIBA-sanctioned event since winning the silver at the Munich Olympics in 1936.

The American squad (and those following were still in shock over losing to Canada). From Andy Katz (ESPN Insider Subs.):

It was Pittsburgh reserve forward Levan Kendall, who lit the Americans up for 40 points in 42 minutes. In the past five games, Kendall didn’t crack the top 30 in scoring in the tournament. He scored just seven points against Israel, four against Greece, nine against Argentina and 11 against Australia. He averaged a mere 3.5 points in 13.9 minutes in 22 games for the Panthers last season.

Get the picture?

“He was shooting 31 percent and averaging eight points prior to this,” Martelli told ESPN.com by phone from Argentina. “He was backing guys down and shot running hooks and banking in 3s. It was just one of those things.”

Martelli had Charlotte’s Curtis Withers, he of a 2-for-11 night, on him.

The Canadians essentially challenged the U.S. at every chance in this game.

“Every time they scored it was like a nine-point play instead of a two-point play,” Martelli said.

But how does this happen? If the U.S. was going to lose, the thought was it could occur in the semifinals or finals with the possibility that Australia, or maybe host Argentina or even Lithuania would clip the Americans. But Canada?

“There were a lot of things, it’s a really, really long trip and you have to factor in the players’ maturity level,” Martelli said. “They’ve hung in there for a whole trip but this is a different game. This isn’t an excuse but the way J.J. [Redick] and Allan Ray were guarded they would have shot double-digit foul shots in the college game. It’s not an excuse because we knew what we were getting into. We had to sustain our concentration, our focus and that’s challenging for a young team away from home.”

Sounds like an excuse. And since when do American players and coaches complain about physical play in basketball?

You know, I started to think that my observations last night of Coach Wannstedt might be warming up to (or at least accepting out of necessity) the idea of using more than one running back in the backfield might have been a bit of wishful thinking on my part. Looks like it was actually close to reality (broken clock, twice a day, correct). According to the beat reporter notebook.

Running backs coach David Walker said, “We’re going to have to be a running back by committee, I don’t think there’s much question about that and the guys understand that. We don’t have a Hershel Walker in our backfield and that is no disrespect to the guys we do have. We just don’t have a clear guy who is so much better than the competition that it is a no-brainer.

“So we’re going to be running back by committee. That way we’ll be fresh in the games and be able to play extremely hard and guys will be able to compete throughout the whole year. It is a very healthy situation for us.”

The key player in the mix is Tim Murphy, who could end up as the starter at either fullback or tailback. If he moves to fullback, that means the starting tailback job would likely be Rashad Jennings‘ to lose.

“Rashad is doing well, but don’t forget, there are a number of freshmen and there are some veterans like Brandon Mason and Raymond Kirkley who will have a lot to say about this before the season gets here,” Walker said. “Everyone is competing and they are all pushing each other so the players that are the most productive over the next few weeks are the ones who will play.”

The notebook piece also observed that the defense seemed to have a little more of the advantage in practice. Not terribly surprising. The defense may have players shuffled, but there are more returning starters on the line and in the secondary. The defensive edge, was also echoed in this collection of quick observations and quotes.

Freshman Running Back LaRod Stephens(-Howling) gets a positive piece on his performance in training camp.

The one area where there has been some disappointment has been in the receiving corp. Greg Lee being out with his sore shoulder (no longer in a sling, though) was supposed to give some of the other receivers a chance to step-up. So far no one has shown any consistency. The closest appears to be Redshirt Freshman Marcel Pestano.

Receivers coach Aubrey Hill said Pestano could be on the verge of breaking out.

“He made some plays in the spring,” Hill said. “We’re looking for that total consistency. He has taken that approach these first few days and has been very consistent. We look for him to do some good things this year.”

Pestano played a lot of roles — quarterback, running back, receiver — on the scout team last fall. The season off gave him time to hunker down in the weight room and bulk up from 165 pounds to 190 pounds.

“When spring (practice) started, I was fourth on the depth chart,” Pestano said. “I had a couple big plays. Other guys were making big plays, too, but I was consistent. Coach kept moving me up the ladder.

“I knew I wasn’t ready for it last year. Now, my mind’s right, and my body’s ready. We’ll see what happens.”

Terrell Allen, once again, seems to be having some injury issues.

A few articles on Dexter Davidson committing to Pitt. This is the most detailed piece, with probably the best quote.

“It factored in a little bit,” Davidson said. “The tradition played a big part of that, and Dan Marino is a big part of Pittsburgh’s tradition. If any day I could be in that situation, Pittsburgh would best set up for that kind of success.”

Davidson chose the Panthers over scholarship offers from Brigham Young, Kentucky and Rutgers. Davidson said Louisville, Ole Miss and Tulane were showing interest. Davidson originally was planning to wait until his official visit to Pitt for the Notre Dame game to decide.

“They’ve got the nation’s top tight end (Franklin’s Nate Byham), a top-five wide receiver (West Allegheny’s Dorin Dickerson) and a great defensive lineman in (Baldwin’s Jason) Pinkston,” said Davidson, who was recruited by defensive ends coach Charlie Partridge.

“Their recruiting class is something special, something I want to be a part of.”

[Emphasis added.]

There isn’t much in this article not already covered other than a note at the end indicating that Aaron Smith is going to commit to Pitt on August 27. It has previously been reported that he is still deciding between Pitt and Maryland (keep those handwritten notes coming).