With about 10 minutes left in 4th quarter, I slammed down the laptop. Shoved it into my bag. Got myself composed, and started out of the press box. Stopping briefly, I bitterly asked someone — who I knew would stay for all of it, and go to the post-game — “Do me a favor, keep a running tally of how many times Paul Chryst utters the phrase ‘correctable mistakes.'”

I stalked out of the stadium. Trying not to think about the first 50 minutes of that mess. All I wanted to do was go meet back with my friends.

It was homecoming. For all the grief Pitt football can inflict, the ties that bind me to this school are about my friends. I went to Pitt at the end of the Gottfiried and the Hackett era. Football success was not exactly a part of my student experience. There has never been a lot of reveling in past football success when looking back on my college years.

We have kids. We have lives. We live in various other states. We came into Pittsburgh this weekend ostensibly for a football game, but that was just the cover we needed to tell our wives so we could just be around each other for a day. A date set out well in advance that we could all make sure to have the schedule cleared.

So that’s what we did that evening. Without any verbal consensus, we avoided all talk of the GT-Pitt game. We had a great night. Talking, drinking, a good meal, indulging in cigars. The times you can immediately appreciate, because the opportunities to all be together at the same time get harder each year. And we would be damned if a debacle on the field was going to take that from us.

But now, it’s my turn to talk it out.

I’m not going to waste your time or mine with a media recap. I’m tired. I’m frustrated. I’m angry. Still.

I checked out on that game well before I left the press box. I couldn’t muster the gallows humor nor the usual cynical jokes that have worked so well in busted games past.  I still feel that way, and that’s not a good thing.

I find the most frustrating thing about that game is that it was yet another game where the team simply wasn’t prepared to go out and play. FIU, Akron and this game. Players came out on the field and just thought they could do their thing without regards to the rest of the team or the opponent. Unprepared to play. Not sticking to their assignments. Showing no focus. Seemingly shocked when the other team doesn’t roll over for them. Over a third of the games this year we have seen that.

Either the coaches aren’t communicating to them, or they are tuning them out. It makes no sense, because this team is simply not that good to even start to think that way.

Pitt was predicted to be the lower-middle of the ACC as a whole. Somewhere in that jumbled middle of the chaos-storm of the ACC Coastal. And in that respect, that’s what they have been. On the whole, their record is mediocre. But the way this loss happened, feels so much worse.

Part of me wants to believe that I was as guilty as any Pitt fan for overestimating the talent on the team, underestimating opponents and expecting more. But, the way they lost to GT makes it that much harder.

Completely lost at times. Any and all signs of growth, just not there. Progress may not be a pure straight line, but this was something else. This was the kind of performance that makes everyone question everything. Unfocused, unprepared, unmotivated, disregarding assignments. It was every facet in that game.

I know that I would not be accepting any excuses about the coaches don’t play the game if Wannstedt was still in charge, so at this point that kind of excuse doesn’t work for Head Coach Paul Chryst. It’s his team. These are his players. It is 2/3 of the way through this season, and this is not a team that has improved in any noticeable way. Where is the development? Where is the better play that comes with having been through 8 games?

In the 2+ years with Paul Chryst as head coach, the team is still at a .500 record. L2, W2, L2, W2, L2, W2, L2*, W3, L1, W1, L2, W1, L1, W1, L1, W4*, L3, W1, L1.

(* — Carry over from bowl game to following season.)

Home: 10-8; Away: 5-8; Neutral: 1-1.

It’s not a team that sucks. But it sure isn’t a team that is good. It definitely doesn’t appear to be a team that has changed much since 2012. Inconsistency in effort and intensity from game to game. Overall mediocrity reigning.

To have performed like this on Homecoming makes it feel that much worse. After all the grief the fans — rightfully took — for staying away on the previous Thursday night. The fans showed up for this game. The team showed exactly why it has been so difficult to invest the time in attending.

I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if this same team goes out and gives a great effort on Saturday. Possibly even winning against Duke. It’s a noon start. Possibly cold and wet. Attendance will likely be Miami-esque. It makes as much sense as anything else.