You would think that at the one quarter point in the season we’d have a solid idea of how good the team is and how well the primary players are producing.  It seems not to be the case this season for PITT.  Granted we are 3-0 going into Saturday’s noon game against the Iowa Hawkeyes at Heinz Field but really doesn’t feel like 3-0 given who the wins were over.

Delaware and FIU are both teams that PITT should beat handily even if the PITT team isn’t that great and in essence we did that, so for an optimist that is OK.  Beating Boston College up in Boston is on a different degree of difficulty level and the Boston College Catholics, err…I mean Golden Eagles, pretty much looked like a lost team out there for the majority of the game.  But they did have a couple of big plays early for scores and recovered an onside kick at the end of the game so at least there was some tension during that game.

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Reed and Justin with their usual thorough postings have sucked all the oxygen from the room (primarily Reed, this week but every week brings something different from both of them). Oddly enough, I think I’m glad Reed hasn’t gotten a Twitter account or I wouldn’t have anything to say at anytime. Time to hit the links and final thoughts that I may have.

Maybe it is teams from Miami. I don’t know, but that first quarter gave me odd flashbacks to the Miami-Pitt game last year. Where Pitt looked completely unprepared and the Hurricanes jumped all over Pitt. The Panthers tried to recover in that game, but never was able to dig out of the hole in which they put themselves.

That wasn’t the case on Saturday. Obviously there was a significant talent difference, but I like to think that this team is a little different in attitude. With all the talk of how the team is taking on part of Head Coach Paul Chryst’s personality, the even keel probably came through as Pitt did not try to go for the homerun plays on offense or defense. They refocused, and did what they should have done from the very beginning.

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Last week, some hack wrote about Pitt’s success in the red zone and the result against FIU was two turnovers in the first two red zone possessions. As recommended by readers, this week something negative shall be written.

Trey Anderson came in for a series in the early fourth quarter in a situation that once against perturbed Pitt fans. If you listen to Paul Chryst’s press conference, it won’t take a mind reader to see why: Chryst was not happy with Voytik’s play and pulled him for a series to calm his nerves. A quick second look at the game and it’s obvious Voytik was not finding open receivers and he would not let plays progress properly as the game wore on. In fact, there was a fine line between good Chad and bad Chad: the touchdown pass to Boyd late in the second quarter. (more…)

(This is a weekly series of articles entitled “Monday Morning Quarterback”.   I will try to post them two days after the football games are played so as to have our wilder emotions under control by then.  It will be my take on the positives and the negatives we saw happen and a chance for commenters to agree or disagree and to add their own thoughts.)

PITT travelled down to hot and humid Miami to play the Florida International University (FIU) Golden Panthers on Saturday and, after some worry-making moments, came out with a win by the score of 42-25. PITT fans, the media and maybe even the players themselves for a bit, went into the day feeling as if this was going to be a cakewalk but it wasn’t.  FIU played a pretty tough game given their lower stature in the FBS division.

POSITIVES

What first comes to mind is that our defense did a good job for the third straight game.  Don’t let the 25 points FIU had fool you, one TD was a long and freaky tipped ball reception that took FIU down to our three yard line and another two points were on a safety.  Other than that we kept FIU from scoring another TD for 40:40 minutes of game time when they scored with 5:49 left to play.  That is some solid defense.

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“The Glass is Half Full”

Well, yesterday we saw some things in a PITT football game that I’ve never seen in my lifetime, including one lightning delay of 50 minutes, two 1^st quarter fumbles inside the opponents red zone by the same PITT star RB and three combined team safeties resulting in six points.

Two of those things help PITT to dig a hole against FIU that they had to scramble around to get out of. But they did and came out with a 42-19 win which, on the face of it, isn’t that impressive given the opponent’s perceived lack of talent.

But then if you look closer as the game unfolded you see that it was a game that, after that rocky start, PITT had a good handle on. I’ll also disagree that the kids weren’t up for the game or were ‘sleepwalking’ as some say.

Let’s look at what transpired in the 1^st quarter.

On PITT’s second series of the game, after the teams swapped punts, we started our own 20 yard line and moved the ball via the air and the ground 74 yards in eight plays, which is 9.3 ypp. Each play gained positive yardage and it was only the Conner fumble at the FIU 6 yard line that stopped us from scoring.  Is that a crappy start to the game?  I don’t think so, the offense clicked very well.

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A lot of running around this morning. Wife and daughter off on their own thing. Morning soccer for the boy falls to me. Hitting the grocery store (thank goodness Ohio allows growler service in them). Grabbing a quick lunch to take home and settle in for the expected massacre.

The game is on FoxSports1. If you have DirecTV it is channel 219. Not sure on the other services. This means no ESPN3.com coverage, so start digging around for this channel.

If you don’t flick away by the end, you will get to see former coach/player Dave Wannstedt on the FS1 college football show afterwards. Wonder if he’ll have anything to say? I caught a bit of him last week in anticipation of the Michigan State-Oregon game. Eh.

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It’s that time of week again.  Hours before game time and we fans are ready, willing and nervous to sit for three hours watching PITT football.  Maybe some time when dreams come true we’ll be able to wake up and feel no trepidation whatsoever that PITT will win the day in solid fashion.  But until then we look at these games from every angle possible and, because we are PITT fans, find a chink in the PITT armor that will somehow let a loss shine through.

That’s how we roll.

Even with all that I can’t see a way PITT loses this football game.  I see ways we can be embarrassed by a way too close score or a very sloppily played game that will really make us doubt the team and the program, but a loss – no.  It isn’t even that PITT is so damn strong that there is no way FIU can keep us from moving downfield and scoring points, we can all understand an off day even though things have been steamrolling in that area for us.

Nor is it we get burned for a few stupid blown coverage TDs or have miscommunications in the defense that will allow more points by FIU then they should ever in a million years put up against a FBS team. Hell, we can even handle overconfidence by the kids while they look toward Iowa next week that might make us kneel and pray this afternoon.

No, it is that somehow the tides of fortune will suddenly reverse themselves on a whim and we’ll botch things down in Miami.  You say that can’t happen?  Tell that to the six players that were stupid enough to get caught doing something against the team’s disciplinary policy and found themselves in street clothes against Youngstown State in 2012.  Oh, by the way, what does 48-14 remind you of?  I’m telling you – not only did those games happen but being the PITT fans we are we came to accept the hand of fate involved in those and many other strange losses.

Again, that’s how we roll.

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(Note: This is a follow up article to the topic of discussion we all have been having about James Conner playing on defense)

  In a separate post’s comment section  our long-time commenter Wbb and I have been bandying back and forth about the coaching staff’s experiment of planning to play SO James Conner at Defensive End at certain times this season.   This has been an interesting and contested topic of conversation since the 2014 Spring Practices when the move was semi-formalized and talked about publicly.  We PITT fans will remember that Conner played a few downs on defense during the Bowling Green bowl game where he got in but had no tackles.  Let’s look at where the staff stands on that now and what we might see in the future.

In a nutshell the staff’s intent of having Conner play DE was to insert him on defense during situation specific needs, mostly 3^rd down passing plays, where he could use his size (6’2″ & 250 lbs), his speed (4.4) and his strength to rush the QB.  This isn’t that farfetched as Conner played DE very well while at McDowell High School in Erie, PA.  Supposedly he was recruited by PITT to play that DE position, although I don’t believe that.  Just because a recruiting site labels a player “DE” doesn’t mean that’s what he is.

The fact that Conner ran for 1,680 yards and 21 touchdowns on 155 carries, an impressive 10.8 yards per carry, his senior year at McDowell was the factor in Chryst’s decision to place Connor at RB as soon as Conner set foot on campus and to keep him there in the backfield all of last season.   Personally, I think Conner was always targeted to be Chryst’s ‘Big Back’, like those he had at Wisconsin, all along.

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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.

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Pitt is headed south for a matchup with the Golden Panthers of Florida International and as Chas mentioned earlier, there’s not a lot of important information to discuss. FIU is a team in rough shape; they’re one of the worst teams in FBS and have a true freshman starting at QB. To be blunt, if Pitt isn’t comfortably ahead in the 4^th quarter it is cause for concern. The goals for the game are 1) health 2) comfortable win and 3) get backups good in-game experience. Anything beyond that is a bonus. Another statistically great game from James Conner would be a boon to his Heisman whispers.

With that said, it feels a bit prudent to look ahead a little. Pitt’s next two BCS opponents, Iowa and Virginia, have key games this week. Iowa plays in-state rival Iowa State and Virginia faces off against the newest ACC member, Louisville (Louavuhl). Thus far, Iowa appears to be a team that is trending lower than expectations and Virginia is exceeding them. (more…)

I am sure the players, coaches and announcers are completely focused on the upcoming opponent this Saturday.  But I can’t say I am. There is no way to really describe FIU as a legitimate threat. They are a complete mess from the top of their athletic department down.

You can see the utter lack of concern for this week in the stories. They are almost bye week stories. Talking about individual players. The mindset of the team. A complete dearth of discussion of the actual opponent. And, well, I’m fine with that.

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Over at the Trib, Jerry DiPaola optimistically riffs a bit on the work that Pitt football has to do even after the win on Friday night.

A successful team’s goal is to take a lead into the fourth quarter, get the ball and refuse to let it go. Pitt couldn’t do that.

Pitt recorded only one first down after taking a 30-14 lead with 9:53 left on Chris Blewitt’s third field goal. Among the missteps:

• A holding penalty as James Conner ran for a first down.

• A botched snap between quarterback Chad Voytik and center Gabe Roberts, who replaced injured starter Artie Rowell. Voytik recovered, but Pitt eventually punted.

• Allowing a nine-play, 64-yard touchdown drive. The Eagles missed the 2-point conversion or it would have been a one-possession game for the final 43 seconds after kicker Alex Howell recovered the onside kick.

“That wasn’t a good finish,” Chryst said. “We have to be able to close out games better.”

The mistakes give him clear teaching points, something he looks for every day. They also may help keep his team focused. Pitt is 2-0 for the first time since 2011.

“We have some (good) things we can build on,” he said. “You like that and appreciate that. But we also have a lot of things that we can keep working on to clean up. That part’s good, too.”

Arguably the team did not start out strong as well. The offense was a little shaky at the start — especially in pass protection. Voytik may not have been sacked in the game, but he was not exactly getting a lot of time to make reads. That is the one area I believe the O-line needs to improve. No problem with that run blocking, but protecting the QB is still a bit nerve-wracking.

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One of the most impressive parts of the offense thus far has been red zone efficiency. Through two games, the offense has scored a touchdown on all 12 red zone possessions. Pete Roussel of 247 pointed out that this is not a trend unique to Pitt just this season. Paul Chryst offenses have been remarkably efficient in the red zone. (more…)

(This is a weekly series of articles entitled “Monday Morning Quarterback”.   I will try to post them two days after the football games are played so as to have our wilder emotions under control by then.  It will be my take on the positives and the negatives we saw happen and a chance for commenters to agree or disagree and to add their own thoughts.)

Coming off a nice win against a fellow ACC member team in Boston College we PITT fans are feeling pretty good right about now.  The only long lasting problem that arose during the game is when Artie Rowell, our Center, went down for the season with a torn ACL.  Other than that it looks and feels like the team will have nothing but positive ramifications of that win.

POSITIVES

The one thing we can all point to is that, unlike sometimes in past season, we soundly beat an opponent where the odds were close and we were playing in their backyard as it were. Yes, the 30-20 score aside we beat the BC squad up and down and bettered them in every phase of the game.  This wasn’t a pushover team either.  They will win more than they lose this season so for me a real positive is that we didn’t feel overconfident coming of a big 62-0 the week before.

Another good thing that happened is that James Conner had two monster games in a row.  Last season he had a singular two game set where he ran for over 100 yards and that was against New Mexico State (119) and then Duke (173).  Other than that he was way less productive during the regular season having done this for yardage: 27, 1, 28, 3, 35, 102, 26, and 22.  Does anyone actually think we’ll see that type of low production again from Conner this year? Not me.

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First off, what a fun game to watch!  Things clicked on both offense and defense and mistakes were kept to a minimum.  That is the recipe for winning football games and that is just what we have seen in our two games so far. The fact that last night it happened against a higher caliber team than last week’s opponent is cause for a bit of relief also.

ON OFFENSE

Right off the top of my head I have to acknowledge the fantastic job the offensive line played last night.  They opened up space at the line of scrimmage for Conner to get through so that he could bull his way around in the second level. They protected Voytik very well giving up zero sacks and gave the young QB some time to make decisions on passing plays.

Since an offense is really only made up of two things, running and passing, that good work they did was critical.  Plus they did it with injuries and shuffling of players.  The fact that in their third year Chryst and Hueber have big, talented bodies to plug-n-play on the line shows me all I need to know about Chryst’s OL recruiting.   In just two full recruiting seasons he’s brought in more OL talent than I can remember in a long time.

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