From Dave Wannstedt’s press conference earlier today.
On Coach Wannstedt’s prior knowledge of the Big East Conference:
I just followed Pitt, I didn’t really pay too much attention to the conference. And then there have been so many changes in the last year since I’ve been here with Louisville, Cincinnati, South Florida. There have been changes. I guess you could say it’s new for a lot of reasons.
On the conference title being up for grabs:
Everybody’s sitting there right now saying, ‘Oh boy, we’ve got an opportunity to win this thing.’ And by the way, people have played (conference games already). West Virginia and a couple of the teams are undefeated, have two wins, three wins, and can say that with probably with a little more confidence. We don’t have much room for error. We’ve got to go out and definitely play well and just take it one week at a time.
On playing against Rutgers coach Greg Schiano:
Greg worked for me at Chicago, and I helped get him in down there with Butch Davis at Miami. Greg and I are good friends. There was a time with our defensive staff — at the Cowboys and the University of Miami — there was myself, Butch Davis, Dave Campo. I was the coordinator. Butch was the defensive line coach. Campo was the secondary coach, and Norv Turner was the offensive coordinator. And there was a point in the NFL where Dave was the head coach at Dallas. Butch was at Cleveland, and Norv was at Washington. If you coach long enough and you’re around good people – good people are going to end up in head coaching positions. The business part is separate from the personal.
On Rutgers:
Well on offense, behind Notre Dame, they are the second-most talented offensive personnel that we’ve faced. They’ve got an outstanding back that we know is an All-Big East candidate. They’ve got receivers that have got speed. The [Tres] Moses kid can make big plays. [Clark] Harris, the tight end, is an outstanding player. They’ve got a senior quarterback that’s been a two or three-year starter in [Ryan] Hart. They’ve got a very good group. Then you look at them on defense, and they’re led by [Ryan] Neill. We all know who he is. They’ve got I think 12 sacks already. Neill’s got four and a half, and I think [Val] Barnaby has got four on the other side. They’ve got good talent. They’ve got big-play ability on offense. We’re watching the films, and I can see why they would be optimistic. I think they’ve got one freshman playing at safety. And if you look at their depth chart for the rest of their team, they’ve got seniors and juniors. They’re a somewhat veteran team. These guys have been together and played together for two or three years. They’ve got a lot of Florida guys. I think they’ve got like 30 guys from South Florida.
Coach Wannstedt also said that Pitt is close to having a couple more kids make verbals, and that recruiting is not suffering from the slow start (phew!).
As should be known, the Rutgers game is on Friday night, on ESPN2 at 8pm. The bad news, the broadcast crew will be the same abysmal group as the Ohio game: Dave Pasch with the play-by-play, Rod Gilmore and Trevor Matich with uh, color (or simply stating the obvious and the stupid, respectively)and Stacy Dales-Schuman on the sideline. The game notes are out from Pitt and Rutgers (PDF).
Another piece of information, the Cinci-Pitt “Ohio River Riv”– I can’t do it. It isn’t a rivalry. It shouldn’t have a trophy. It’s a Big East game and that is it. Any how, the game has been set for 2pm on Saturday October 8. There is no TV broadcast. A couple extra hours of tailgating if you are going, though.
