I’m not taking Syracuse lightly. I really am not. What is good about facing Syracuse is that this is Dave Wannstedt’s kind of opponent. A run first, pro-style offense; and rather straight-forward defensive schemes. In fact, that may be the best thing about Big East play for Pitt’s hopes — I mean beyond the overall putridity — plenty of pro-style, simple offenses.
He also said it is clear when you watch the Orange, “they are running the ball, they are very similar to us.” “They will use two tight ends, they will use two backs, they will use three receivers. But what we know is they are going to be physical.
“And, when you run the ball, it gives your defense a chance to play better because they are going to be more rested, you generally are going to have less turnovers and that will let you have better field position. And the play-action passing game opens up when you run the ball — and that is what they’ve done and they’ve reaped the benefits of it.”
Syracuse’s running game, like Pitt’s, is powered by two running backs, and both are very good. Delone Carter, however, has been more of the featured back, rushing 99 times for 524 yards (5.3 yards per carry) as the fourth-leading rusher in the conference.
The other tailback is Antwon Bailey (33 carries, 195 yards).
Here’s another similarity — penalties (hattip, Troy Nunes IAM).
Five games in, SU has committed the fourth-most penalties per game in the nation (9.2) out of the 120 Division I-A teams. On those 9.2 penalties per game, the Orange has cost itself an average of 73.6 yards per game, which is eighth in the country.
“When it comes down to it, if there weren’t little mistakes, there would be nothing to get better on,” junior right tackle Michael Hay said. “These are just things that we have to get better on. Nobody plays a perfect game. There’s no such thing as a perfect game.”
Even near-perfect, though, has been hard to come by for the Orange so far this season. SU has not had a game with fewer than five penalties, and it has accumulated double-digit penalties three times this year.
If you are planning to record or watch this game, allow plenty of overage on time because there are going to be plenty of stops.
Imagine that. Some football player declaring that there is no such thing as a perfect game. Somewhere in Pittsburgh, Coach Wannstedt’s ‘stache is twtiching.
As for watching the game, outside of Pittsburgh (Channel 5), the game is Big East Network affiliate-based or ESPN3.com. Cursory scanning shows Altitude, SNY and MASN are all listed as carrying the game.
With the ‘Cuse mainly a running team, Dom DeCicco will be playing more at the safety position. Odds that some linebackers other than Tristan Roberts and Greg Williams will see action? For some reason, I’m not optimistic.
Now the Orange are actually a 1 point favorite, home against Pitt. As much as that should be a slap in the face for Pitt — and an indictment of the way Pitt has played to date — ‘Cuse fans really do not know how to take this information.
The Jersey newspaper was critical of DW in that Graham gained 277 yards against FIU but only carried 8 times against ND. Good reason to be critical.
8)
The only thing Mr. Wannstedt should think that he knows is that he doesn’t know.
Sagarin has them over Pitt by 7 (with the home field advantage).
A 42 to 7 romp could only BEGIN to erase the taste of throw up from my mouth.
8 days until BB opens.
Thank God!
“The way we are going to orient tight ends is we’ll make sure we get them more involved on check downs,” Sunseri said. “Whenever a defense takes away those first and second reads, that’s when the tight ends and running backs come more into the passing game.
“We have a lot of explosive receivers, and we want to get them the ball. The tight ends are sort of a secondary read.”
I see the validity in this statement, really, I do. But, I can’t see our QB being able to get to his 3rd or 4th reads any time soon.
Hell – he has a hard enough time getting off the play’s primary receiver – hence his missing Baldwin being open so often.
What made the offense effective last year was that the TE, Dorin in particular, was often the first read. But that also required throwing into the middle, something Tino hasn’t done at all.
Maybe it’s a good sign as in “the coaches have told me I need to start looking in the middle of the field.” One can only hope, because it looks wide open most of the time as defenses cheat toward his tendencies.
I was told (passing second hand info here) by someone who saw a bunch of camp practices that Sunseri was having problem with short to midrange passes over the middle due to his height and being unable to see his targets. Now, I do wonder about that as I was also sure he’d get a lot of passes knocked down and that isn’t happening.
We’ll see though – that’s a lot of real estate not being used.
TX Panther – PITT will not abruptly fire DW as they would have to payout four years of a $1.4M per annum contract – no way we’ll blow $5.6M in this economy.
I can see Pittastic’s logic. I just don’t see it happening. If Wanny demonstrated one quality in his other HC jobs, it’s that he’s not a quitter. Some might also call that stubborn.
So regardless of all the Wanny must go arguments, I continue to the conclude that we’re stuck with him, so I continue to use my limited brainpower to suggest how Pitt wins with him. That’s all I ask. I don’t need to be “entertained.” I just want wins, because even grind-it-out, conservative football can be entertaining when your team is winning.
Friday, September 03, 2010
Read more: link to post-gazette.com
Pitt launches Pitt Panthers Television
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Read more: link to post-gazette.com
Who’s losing money? Scalpers maybe.
Sure the bandwagoners are jumping off and they’ll jump right back on with a few wins. They are the same people who always think the backup QB is the best choice, the next great coach is always waiting in the wings, the team should entertain them whether it wins or loses, etc., etc. In other words, they’ll NEVER be completely satisfied. I hope Pitt football continues to build LOYAL fans like most of the people here.
