We’re heading out the door to be with my family in Lebanon for Thanksgiving. I’ll post later tonight (probably). Just a few articles and things to get posted.
Puff piece on Palko’s season of transition.
The losing is hard on Palko. He’s not sure, but he doesn’t think he has played in a total of five losing games in all of his years in football. It’s especially difficult because Pitt started the season with such high expectations and a No. 23 ranking, back in the days when he was mentioned as a possible Heisman Trophy candidate.
Palko is dealing with it the best way he knows how — by working harder. On Friday afternoon, when there didn’t appear to be another player at Pitt’s South Side headquarters, he was studying film of West Virginia’s defense in a room adjacent to Cavanaugh’s office. It’s safe to say he’ll spend countless hours there between now and next season, gearing up for a senior season that Wannstedt predicted will be “sensational,” a belief shared here.
Palko finds great comfort in that quarterbacks’ room, not to mention great motivation.
It’s the Dan Marino room.
“I have to walk by his jersey every day,” Palko said. “Then, I have to look in the eyes of a guy who was an All-American quarterback here” — Cavanaugh — “and has a national championship ring. I definitely feel I have a responsibility to the position at this school. I want to keep the legacy going.”
Also a puff piece on WVU’s Freshman RB Steve Slaton. Slaton didn’t know much about the Backyard Brawl, as he’s from Levittown, PA. Which is right on the NJ border and is closer to Trenton than Philly. The Backyard Brawl just doesn’t get the run on that side of the state. Not many Hoopies over in Eastern PA and NJ.
A good piece on ESPN.com by Joe Starkey on the Brawl. It discusses Tony Dorsett getting tossed from the game in 1976, and preparations by Coach Wannstedt for this game.
Wannstedt used an old Majors tactic this week in practice, blaring the John Denver song “Take Me Home, Country Roads” — the West Virginia anthem — over the loudspeakers. As of Tuesday morning, anyway, Wannstedt had not gone to the extremes Majors did leading up to the 1973 game.
That was Majors’ first year at Pitt, and he was willing to try anything to reverse the program’s luck in Morgantown, where it hadn’t won since 1963. For starters, he had his defensive backs tape fly swatters (without the screens) across the insides of the tops of their helmets. The idea was to put them in a mind-set to stop the Mountaineers’ star receiver Danny Buggs.
“To kill Buggs, you know,” Majors said.
The coach also had his team drink only Mountain Dew at practice all week and played “Country Roads” ad nauseam — before, during and even after practice in the locker room.
“No bebop music, no jazz,” Majors said. “They showered pretty fast, they got so sick of that damn thing. We had a little humor in it, but it was serious business. We went down there pretty loose and confident.”
The Panthers won 35-7 in a game Majors calls one of his personal favorites.
That song is so easy to hate.
Finally a couple stories on Jovani Chappel announcing his verbal commit to Pitt.
“After I committed to Purdue, I decided to just take a trip to Pitt,” he said. “Once I did, I found out both schools were about equal in everything. With them being equal, I just had to go where my heart was. I had to pray on it. I found my heart was with Pitt.”
Chappel will graduate in December and attend Pitt in the spring semester. “They’re having an excellent recruiting class, which should make for a great future,” he said. “Plus, coach [Dave] Wannstedt is a great man. I think I’ll have a great player-coach relationship with him.”
Coach Wannstedt’s ties to Chappel’s high school coach apparently helped.
… It didn’t hurt that Trotwood Madison coach Maurice Douglas played for Wannstedt with the Chicago Bears.
“Coach Wannstedt was one of his head coaches,” Chappel said. “He thinks he’s a real honest, straight-forward guy who keeps his word. He thinks I’ll have a great player-coach relationship with coach Wannstedt.”
Interesting how those NFL ties are still helping.
