On Saturday, September 13^th our PITT Panthers will take on the FIU Golden Panthers on their home turf in Miami, FL at FIU Stadium (20K seating).   FIU, a university with 37,475 students, is in Conference USA (CUSA) and has a 1-1 record at this point in the season.  They lost their opener to Bethune-Cookman 14-12 then went on to beat a NEC member school in Wagner University by a score of 34-3.  FIU is coached by an old NFL head coach Ron Turner who took over from Mario Cristobal a year ago.  In Turner’s first season with FIU they posted a 1-11 record and just missed getting into a bowl game.

The Golden Panthers are returning 10 starters on offense and seven on defense. They are coming off a poor 1-11 year in 2013 where their losses were by an average score of 37-10!  Phil Steel’s forecast for them is four wins and eight losses and you can see that they have a way to go to be competitive at this level of college ball.

So far this season FIU looks like a team with two identities, a poor offensive team with a solid defense to go along with it.  On defense they are ranked pretty well nationally with: 6^th in Scoring defense (8.5 ppg); 9^th in total defense; 17^th in passing defense (134.5 ypg) and 26^th in rushing defense (91 ypg).  That is some fine defensive play even considering the level of competition they had.

But, in sports as in life you have to take the good with the bad and that will be their pretty putrid offensive product.  Nationally they are: 96^th in passing offense (186.0 ypg); 103^rd in scoring (23.0 ppg); 110^th in rushing (95.5 ypg) and were 117th in total offense.  Another poor showing is their current 22% 3^rd down conversion rate and with that there shouldn’t be more than a handful of times the FIU offense stays on the field after a 3^rd down try.

We don’t have room to scoff at their passing offense rankings as ours are set firmly at 119^{th (}101.5 ypg) with Voytik himself sitting at 115^th in passing ypg (97.5) – funny enough that is the same amount of ypg that FIU’s QB E. J. Hilliard  has.  Our passing efficiency is much better at 44^th (144.2) and Voytik’s one INT to four TDs helps to makes up that efficiency grade.

Hilliard at QB is the proto-typical drop back pocket passer with a bit of a strong arm but we should easily get pressure on him early and often. He’s 6’3” tall and 175 lbs and has been starting at QB in spots since 2012 having taken over full time in 2013 when FIU’s regular QB went down with an injury in their third game of the season.  There isn’t really much to say about Hilliard except that he appears to be a below average college QB.

However, he wasn’t the starter in the Wagner game, that was handled by QB Alex McGough, who as a true freshman making his first career start, hit TE Jonnu Smith for a 41-yard touchdown to cap a three-play, 52-yard drive on FIU’s opening series. McGough connected with Cory White for a 1-yard score and the Panthers led 27-3 at halftime.

Jonnu Smith is their primary receiver so far and is in his second year with the FIU squad and playing well with 11 receptions for 147 ypg and a very respectable 13.4 ypc.  He played as a true freshman WR last season where he grabbed was asked to put on some weight, from 210 to 230 (6’2”), and move over to be a TE this year.

Their #1 running back and in his first year starting, also as a true FR, Alex Garner, has taken over the starting spot only because of a string of injuries and dismissals to the other RBs above him.  That said he’s started both games and currently has a 6.8 ypc on the season (27 for 184) but hasn’t scored a TD yet.  Not super scary but we should never underestimate any kid who’s carrying a 6.8 ypc into our game.

FIU’s defense, as written about above, shows pretty well as long as you take into account the competition they have had so far.  Last year they gave up 576 yards to Maryland; 390 to UFC and 464 to Louisville, all of which can be explained away by the difference in the conference levels of the opponents.  But get this, against smaller schools they gave up 556 yards to Middle Tennessee; 558 to Marshall and 431 to Florida Atlantic.  Make your own assumptions about how well they will be able to stop us on Saturday.

There aren’t a whole lot of issues to discuss regarding PITT that haven’t been beaten to death over the last five days.  We all would like to see Chad Voytik get a chance to get 20+ passes unless, of course, that is being done because we are behind. He needs the repetitions each and every game before we get into the ACC schedule in a big way.

I’d like to see Chris James spell Conner on 1^st and 2^nd downs as was the game plan discussed by the staff before the Delaware game. I can see why they would stick with something that has been working but we do need our backups to be ready to go in an instant.  Ideally, we get out to a big lead and sit Conner down; BTW I don’t care too much at all about his rushing numbers I care about positioning this team in the best way to win future football games.  It would be nice to see a second half of play with only James, Bennett and Ibrahim in the backfield.

Also, spare the ‘if Conner rushes for 2,000 yards it will help our recruiting’ nonsense. What will help our recruiting is winning as many ball games as possible.  We’ll do that by having depth at every skill position including QB and WRs.  Sit down Boyd as soon as possible also and get Anderson a series or two under center.

You can see that I’m thinking blowout here with big 1^st half leads and many touchdowns.  That may or may not happen.  Overall this is a hugely one sided match between two teams with vastly different program sizes and talent on the roster.  Even though we all know that nothing is a fact in sports until the games are actually played if PITT loses this game something stinks to high heaven on the Southside.

NOTES:  Here is an indispensible guide to the 2014 PITT football program, the 2014  Preview from the PITT Media Guide.   Lists everything you need to know and I borrow from it regularly.

DL Coach Inoke Breckterfield has had his defensive line players engage in some fun drills in preparation for Saturday.  He had to mail order the parrot feathers and the puka shells from the Islands.  I wonder which budget that came out of?