Okay, I’m putting this to bed as early as possible for once. There’s little that can be gained by picking at this open sore all week. I figure, most are already wondering what horrors will come with Notre Dame, if Rutgers can kill Pitt with the pass. Considering that is practically all the Irish do on offense.

On the bright side, at least even Coach Wannstedt knows that.

On the idea that future opponents will look to pass more:

“Yeah, I would think so. I would. Notre Dame may throw it 60 times this week.”

On Notre Dame’s offense:

“We expect them to come out and throw the football. That’s what they’ve been doing. They have been throwing it and I think their quarterback is getting better. He’s got a lot of talent. Last year was a rough year on him but he’s gotten better. They have a lot of receivers who can make a lot of plays for him. He’s got a good supporting cast. They came out against North Carolina and ran the first 15 plays without a running back on the field. They went with four wide receivers and a tight end and throw it every down. They did that by choice. I expect them to come in against us and be balanced. They’ll probably run the ball and play-passes. It’s no different than they’ve been doing. They try to be balanced but they ran it 50 times last week against Washington for 250 yards. They are very capable of running the football.”

Oh, crap, he’s going to game plan off of what they did against an 0-7 Washington team, rather than every other game this season.

For the record, they ran for 252 yards against Washington. In the other 6 games they had a total of 607 yards on 187 attempts for a 3.25 average. Focus on the pass defense. Please.

So, since we are looking back first, what happened with Rutgers and the offense?

On trying different schemes against Rutgers:

“Most of what they did was play-pass. You could double cover those guys but to be honest with you I believed that they were going to come in and run the football. Every time we’ve played these guys they’ve run the football, played defense and played special teams. That’s how they beat Connecticut the week before. So we went in thinking that on first and 10, we needed to stop the run and we got hit by a big pass.”

On Rutgers Head Coach Greg Schiano’s game plan:

“I don’t know that what they did was his plan coming in. When they hit the first big play, they came back to it and had success. But that doesn’t have any bearing on it. You’re coaching with players you have and trying to utilize everybody you have. It changes every year and every game.”

Over to you, Greg Schiano.

On Rutgers’ running game against Pitt
Well, the plan going in was that we probably weren’t going to run it quite as much. Just because we had some things that we thought we might be able to do in the passing game. When that came to fruition, we kind of rolled with the hot hand in Mike. I thought we did some things — we ran the ball when we had to and I thought that there were some positives. Now, again when you’re playing against an experienced front and a strong front like Pitt has. We’re not at the point yet — physically — where we can manhandle people. We’re still young and we’ve got to get there. Right now, we’re not. I think we’re getting better, but right now it’s going to take a little time to really be the kind of running football team that can just overpower people.

So, you know. Stopping the run is a strength of Pitt’s this year. We haven’t really done a good job of running. So, why not throw the ball until they could stop us?

Back to Pitt. At least there were adjustments.

On defensive changes in the second half:

“We did a couple things differently. But really, when they were running those routes in the first half, they kept both backs in and the tight ends. They were sending two receivers out and it was maximum protection. They neutralized our defensive line – I think they only ran five or six running plays the whole first half so Scott McKillop wasn’t much of a factor. They blocked us up front on play-pass but not on third down. If you look at third downs, I think they converted five of 15 third down conversions. So when they knew it was pass and we knew it was pass, we did a decent job. We’ve been around the thirty percentile every week – which is pretty good. It was the first-and-ten play passes that cost us.”

Those other times. Well, not so much.

At least it was something that hadn’t happened in a while.

Rutgers quarterback Mike Teel had a record-setting day against Pitt’s top-ranked pass defense, throwing for 361 yards and six touchdowns in what Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt labeled “the most disappointing defensive performance since I’ve been here.”

Pitt hadn’t allowed 50 points since 52-31 loss at West Virginia in 2003. The last time Pitt allowed 50 points at home was in 1993, when the Panthers allowed 63 points in consecutive losses to Virginia Tech and Ohio State.

Rutgers’ 34-24 halftime lead grew to 48-31 by the start of the fourth, leading Pitt’s defensive captain to agree with Wannstedt’s criticism.

“We didn’t come out and play,” said linebacker Scott McKillop. “…It’s very disappointing.”

Small corrections. Pitt allowed 54 points to Ohio State at home in 1995 as well (Pitt also lost to Rutgers 42-24 that year). In 1996, Pitt gave up 52 points to Temple at home (to Temple?) but won 53-52.

Still, this was an achievement. Under Wannstedt, Pitt had only allowed scores in the 40s — Louisville (twice), WVU (twice), UConn, Virginia, Navy, ND and USF. Never before had the 50 point barrier been crossed.

I have to admit, I think Paul Zeise is more upset about Pitt’s loss than anyone else. Both in his Good, Bad & Ugly segment and the Q&A.

Like I wrote earlier in this — anyone who has watched Rutgers this year knows there are only two players on that offense who can hurt you — the two receivers. And thus every team has played some sort of deep zone and forced Teel to make tight throws underneath — which he is not very good at. And they also didn’t worry about the play-action stuff because RUTGERS NO LONGER HAS RAY RICE and their running game scares nobody. Again, let’s review — a team with no run game is able to play-action pass you to death — that tells me the defense was gearing up to stop what is a non-existent running game. And this much was unfortunately confirmed when you consider the coach said after the game he was expecting Rutgers to run the ball, not pass it. The fact that Elijah Fields can’t get on the field on a day when the secondary is providing the least resistance possible is amazing to me. I don’t know if the guy knows his assignments — the party line as to why he is not on the field that much — but I do know this — he can’t possibly be worse at covering receivers than what we saw on Saturday — and lining up to do that doesn’t require much thinking. Just when I think I’ve seen it all…….

Yeah, if you think you are pissed about the secondary and keeping Eric Thatcher out there, Zeise is right there with you.

Q: What is the obsession at Pitt with playing slow safeties who can’t cover? From Tez Morris to Sam Bryant to Eric Thatcher, it’s painful to watch these guys try to make plays against receivers. This staff has failed miserably at recruiting players who can actually cover.

ZEISE: At least all of those guys KNOW where they are supposed to be and they don’t miss assignments, so they automatically have to play because when the tape is graded, they all grade out very high in terms of missed assignments and mental mistakes, because they don’t make them. Of course, forget for a minute the fact that knowing your assignments is only one-half (and I’d say maybe less) of the equation — the ability to actually be able to get to where you are supposed to be and make a play once you get there is a the other half . If you ask me, give me a kid with a lot of athleticism and speed and size and all the measurables and some idea of what he is doing over a kid who knows the defense and knows his assignments like the back of his hand, but is a little too slow, a little too short or a little too small to make most of the plays you are asking him to make. There is a reason that Princeton, Harvard, Vanderbilt, Duke and Stanford aren’t the five best teams on the planet. Yes, I’m sure those kids, as smart as they are and as “blue collar” as they are, they don’t ever or they rarely miss assignments and get graded highly after games by their coaches. But when they play against kids who are bigger, faster and stronger, they usually get clobbered…

The November 8, Louisville game at Heinz Field is slated for a noon start. As Gorman notes, that puts four of the six Pitt home games this season at noon starting times.

I guess we can give AD Pederson credit. He said that if Pitt wouldn’t be televised, no noon start time.

You know, maybe it’s the dreary Monday. Maybe it’s the medication. I’m just having a hard time working up the requisite anger and frustration I should feel.

I’m in no mood to defend Wannstedt. I don’t think I’m numb to it all. Yet, I just have this self-pitying sadness about the whole thing.

The timing of these losses have been exquisite. I’m seeing some of the usual rationalizing stuff about how, if Stull hadn’t been knocked out Pitt would have come back. Or how Pitt is only 5-2 and can still win the Big East. All true. Yet, the hope has been beaten out of many and is barely hanging on for others.

Again that goes to the timing of each of the two losses. Both at home. Both on important home dates. Both with crowds over 50,000. Both after getting back into the rankings and national discussion. Both with the fanbase and even the local population ready to get behind the team completely. Fanbases can only take so much of that over time. But in one half of a season?

Well...

DAVE WANNSTEDT IS THE NEW TOMMY BOWDEN. The former Clemson coach “stepped down” a little less than two weeks ago, and we already have a successor to his letdown throne – Pitt’s Wannstedt. Few would have been disappointed if Pittsburgh lost two games this season, provided those losses were at USF and to West Virginia. Instead, Pitt has lost to Bowling Green and Rutgers, both of whom are 3-5. Pitt is on the same path as recent Clemson teams: If you find a reason to get a little excited, get ready to be wildly disappointed. Pitt’s 54-34 loss to Rutgers gets my vote as the most embarrassing performance of the season. Pitt made Rutgers look unstoppable. Mike Teel had thrown three touchdown passes all season; he threw five in the first half against Pitt. Kenny Britt hadn’t caught a touchdown pass this season; he had three before halftime. Rutgers hadn’t scored three touchdowns in a game against an FBS (i.e., Division I-A) team all year. The Scarlet Knights topped that with 10:43 to go in the first half. That should suspend any talk of a Big East title in Pittsburgh for the rest of the season.

Of course that could be unkind to Bowden. At least Tommy Bowden took Clemson to bowl games in his first 9 years, and actually finished the year ranked 4 times. Granted it set the fanbase up for bigger spirit crushing losses, but at least the hope wasn’t completely irrational.

In Florida they liken Pitt under Wannstedt to a classic character.

Ah, Pitt fans, we hope you are enjoying The Dave Wannstedt Experience. You must feel like Charlie Brown attempting to kick a football from Lucy’s hold. The Panthers had control of the Big East race right there in front of them, and struggling Rutgers yanked it away with a 54-34 rout.

Yes, and the media started believing as well. So much for that.

One day, we’ll all stop falling for Dave Wannstedt‘s tricks. Until then, however, we’ll continue to believe in his Pittsburgh Panthers, only to have them make fools of us time and time again.

Today’s “gotcha” moment came courtesy of Rutgers (Yes, the same Rutgers team that’s delivered so few noteworthy performances this season, we’re all still talking about Mike Teel‘s helmet-hitting habits and the tavern ruins unearthed during stadium excavations), which marched to a 54-34 win over the No. 17 Panthers.

It’s only been two weeks since Pitt reasserted itself as a top 25 team after beating South Florida (whose latest woes are chronicled below) and already, it’s lapsed back to its Week 1 ways and lost to an unranked opponent.

Pile on the Wannstedt. Pile on the Wannstedt.

2. Dave Wannstedt indeed still coaches Pittsburgh: Wanny is known throughout the land as the worst kind of coach: one who can recruit like crazy but then has trouble with the actual coaching part. Until Saturday, it looked like he had shaken that label.

Then Rutgers put up 54 points as Pitt made so-so Rutgers quarterback Mike Teel look like Dan Fouts. At one point, Teel had completed 13 passes and six of them went for touchdowns.

It’s going to be a fun week.

There aren’t 25 teams worth ranking. Maybe 20 teams legitimately should be in the rankings, but then it’s almost random. Teams with horrible warts, bad losses, just big problems. I actually found myself weighing a ranking of Virginia and Maryland. Neither team should be ranked, but I had one spot I had been unable to fill. Ultimately it feels like a crap shoot.

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Texas	—
2	Alabama	—
3	Penn State	—
4	Oklahoma	—
5	Georgia	—
6	Southern Cal	—
7	Florida	—
8	Texas Tech	—
9	Utah	2
10	Boise State	3
11	Ohio State	2
12	Oklahoma State	2
13	TCU	3
14	Ball State	3
15	LSU	3
16	Tulsa	7
17	Minnesota	3
18	Oregon	6
19	West Virginia	7
20	Missouri	1
21	Brigham Young	1
22	Florida State	4
23	South Florida	8
24	California	2
25	Notre Dame	1

Why does Pitt drop out and USF stay? Well, USF lost on the road and it was a close game.

Reasoned arguments always welcome. I drafted this late last night, so there’s a good chance I missed something obvious.