Hilarious quote from Ryan Appleby after finding out the shot came too late.

“From where I was sitting, if I was the ref, I would have called it good,” said UW guard Ryan Appleby.

Replay and evidence be damned. To be fair, I think he was referring to the initial call. Not actually that the refs should have called it for the Huskies on replay.

No Huskies strongly disagreed. No one said they were robbed. But that didn’t stop the sting.

“It’s like somebody stepping on your chest,” Dentmon said. “You figure that you’ve done something good, and you’re happy. The moment they take it away it’s like everything went bad – everything.”

The Huskies did make progress from where they had been, even as they fell short and are in deep s**t with regards to making the NCAA. There was the claim that UW made defensive progress. Afterall, Pitt didn’t finish with 50%+ shooting. Reality was something different. Pitt started out with poor, poor shooting — 7-25 — but then hit 7-8 to finish the half. Plus Pitt shot nearly 61% in the second half (14-23).

Obviously that replay was the dominating theme of stories on the game.

If you think I’m going to bitch about Pitt managing to get a 1 point win on a trip to the Pacific Northwest against a team with potential and just doesn’t lose at home — especially in non-con games — then you are crazy. Washington may not be a great team, or even a ranked team. They are, however, a good team and got back their sharp-shooting 3-point threat in Ryan Appleby who helps stretch any defense to free up Brockman and their front court.

There was a bit of deja vu in watching Washington when they would play their game. Especially watching Brockman kick it out on a double team to an open shooter on the perimeter. Thankfully Pitt was able to take them out of that game in the second half by getting them to play too fast.

The first half was painful. It simply looked like Blair, Young and Biggs were just tossing the ball up around the basket. Not actually taking shots. Way too many wild shots, by getting trapped too far under the hoop and looking for calls to bail them out. I’m not complaining about the officials. I think they had it right not to call those. Slightly more personal fouls may have been called on Pitt (16-13), but Pitt still got to the line more (20 to 10 on attempts).

Late in the first and through most of the second half, Pitt played and shot a lot better. Their selection improved and they really worked the ball better to the open man — even as they increased the tempo. The pace/tempo by Pitt to this point has been great to watch. Not because they speed it up, but because so far they have shown an ability to play at any pace — when they can’t impose their own on the opposition.

As bad as Fields played in the Duquesne game, he was excellent in this one. He shot well and made a lot of good decisions. Ramon is definitely missing the old style and having Aaron Gray to free him up for spot-up threes. He’s still struggling with that change.

I have been trying to catch up with reality after a long break away over Thanksgiving. That has meant a bit of neglect here on one of the most important weeks for Pitt football. I’m feeling a bit of guilt, so it’s time to kick off a little hate.

The ‘Eers are in the hunt for going to the BCS game. They benefited from the Big East scheduling them to have 3 of their final 4 games at home. Something most teams in a national title hunt would happily welcome. What team wouldn’t want to come down the final stretch and be in front of a home crowd? Apparently the team with a buckskin-clad mascot and like to stress their hale and hearty constitutions are a wee bit put off by having to play so many games in the cold. Seriously?

WVU athletic officials have brought this matter to the conference’s attention, according to coach Rich Rodriguez. He believes the fans deserve a better shake. “I would have preferred to have more Big East home games during the season in the month of October,” he said a week ago. “I think it’s the second year in a row we’ve had more games in November and December.”

Would he? Really? He would rather have more road games at this point for the comfort of fans? Fans who would otherwise be pissed at not having their team at home very much as they approach heading to the BCS Championship? Personally, while I grudgingly admire the coaching of Rodriguez — developing players for his system, teaching them and becoming the Yoda of the spread option — I think Rodriguez is more than a little bit of a whiner who would be complaining if the team had only one home game in November.

My fellow Fanhouser and unfortunate WVU alum, John Radcliff (who wrote the post linked above) has seen Mountaineer Stadium lose its edge in the last couple years. So, he seems to believe that it is the moneyed alum are responsible for bitching to the WVU officials.

Perhaps. Like I said, Rodriguez is a whiner by nature it seems. Whine, whine, whine.

Coach Rich Rodriguez is not exactly giddy about playing a game amid hunting season.

Not so much deer-hunting season — and a host of West Virginians and Western Pennsylvanians partake in that — but rather the period for tracking down prospective Mountaineers still in high school or junior colleges.

“This is the third year in a row West Virginia has missed a week” of the recruiting period, Rodriguez said yesterday. “When we only have six weeks of a recruiting-contact period, losing a week hurts.”

…

“I see a lot of people doing it,” he added of a rivalry finale. “I just don’t like playing it in December. Playing it this late, I don’t know if it’s that fun for our fans out there.”

Pathetic. Mountaineer fans not liking the cold. WVU officials complaining about too many home games late in the season. And a coach always complains about something.

Ahhhh. I feel better.

The title suggests plenty to cover, so let’s go.

During the last year or two, Pitt fans have been a bit upset at the Big East for making our conference home schedules so uneven. One year we’ll have the loaded side with Louisville, WVU, and Rutgers. Before this season we thought that the opposite year’s BE home games would be bad — not anymore (or at least this year).

We knew South Florida was going to be good, but I don’t think anyone could have predicted them to be “Top 5 good”. Cincinnati has seemingly come out of nowhere to become a ranked team with a great coach who knows how to get his players to play well. With this rotation we also get to see UConn, who might not be amazing but a team we seem to make into a National Championship caliber squad. Add in Syracuse, a team that we should be happy to play just because it might allow us to actually see a win at home, and it’s not all that bad. Now we just need to get that non-con schedule improved just a bit (or a lot)…

Speaking of the Pitt-Cinci game on October 20, kickoff is set for noon. TV coverage will be on ESPN Regional (WTAE locally) as the Big East Game of the Week.

This week’s game against Navy allowed Chas to talk with Adam from Pitch Right. The questions deal with Pitt’s numerous injuries, Pat Bostick and the offense’s troubles, our inability to do much of anything on first down, and a prediction. Good stuff.

Some fun from hoops alum Aaron Gray: at Chicago Bulls fan night, the rookies sang to the fans. A clip of Aaron’s performance can be found on OnlyTheBulls.com. (Sorry, my computer won’t let me embed the vid in this post — blame my somewhat outdated Dell.)

While perusing the Pitt online store, I came across this.

The description:

New for this season, our alternate home Vegas Replica Football Jersey by adidas

Expect to see them on the field some time this year (hopefully not Wednesday on national TV).

Update: Left in the comments by Tony in Harrisburg…

Solid stuff right there.

Okay, the Pitt-Duke game at Madison Square Garden has Pitt making some tickets available to the big boosters, but the general ticket sales will start next week.

Pitt was allotted 3,000 tickets, which it plans to sell to Panther Club members. If tickets remain, Pitt will open sales to its season-ticket holders for all sports and to alumni association members Oct. 22, but not to the general public.

Duke is selling tickets through its Web site (www.goduke.com). Associate athletic director Mike Cragg said Duke’s ticket sales are usually restricted to Duke alumni and donors for neutral-site games, although he did not know the specifics for the Dec. 20 game or whether Pitt fans would be able to get tickets through Duke.

For now, it appears Pitt fans must wait until Madison Square Garden has its general sale. MSG is expected to begin selling tickets to the game next week. Fans can call Ticketmaster or go to msg.com to purchase tickets at that time.

Even though the game is being played at a neutral site, Duke is the de facto home team. The Blue Devils were given the majority of tickets to sell for the game.

Duke has an arrangement with MSG to play in New York or New Jersey every year. This is the fifth consecutive year Duke is playing at Madison Square Garden or the Meadowlands.

So there’s your ticket update for that game.

Over at College Basketball FanHouse I took a look a brief look at all 16 Big East schedules. The Pitt schedule snippet is here.

Another Big East topic I just put on FanHouse seems worth mentioning here.

Last month the Big East changed hosting organizations as it looks to get into more broadband multimedia stuff. They went with a company called JumpTV that is has really done a solid job with soccer content worldwide. Actually sounds like a good strategy.

The problem for the Big East is that all the media rights for football and basketball were granted to ESPN until 2013 under the latest contract. That’s why, even for football games that ESPN regional doesn’t even broadcast, no one else can pick up or show. Including the member schools on webcasts. ESPN holds the rights and as a policy doesn’t release them. I’ve pointed out how shortsighted this approach was back when the contract was announced.

That means most live events or even sporting events you could watch later on your computer are limited to field hockey and soccer. The best they offer for the marquee sports are highlights, audio broadcasts of the Big East game of the week, the weekly audio teleconferences between the media and Big East coaches (formerly free) and video interviews from the media day events. Oh, and the press conferences during the Big East Tournament. Whee.

For the full package they want people to pay $79.95 a year. Or $9.95 a month. You can buy football or basketball specific packages for $25. Yet the actual live or even archived video football/basketball game content is nil and won’t be changing for some time.

Quite the waste. It’s also worth noting that the Big East still doesn’t get online dealings. I actually made an effort to contact the Big East to find out more about the program. Whether, perhaps, there was any attempt to work out something with ESPN to loosen the restrictions. You would think with a new program and a questionable price point they would want to do what they could to sell and promote this to the hardcore junkies who actually spend a fair amount of time with online and broadband content. I actually waited a few weeks before doing the post hoping to give the other side of this.

Instead, silence. No response. Not even bothering with a form e-mail. It’s like they are just now realizing how stupid their deal on this front is and don’t really want to let people know about how little they offer.

Well, I mowed the lawn, did grocery shopping, cleaned the garage up just a bit. Generally just wanted to put this off. I mean, what can be said? Pitt looked, played and was absolutely pathetic and incompetent. I only got about halfway through the Dave Wannstedt press conference on video before clicking it off in disgust. I don’t know what I was expecting him to say that would make me feel better about things, but that wasn’t it.

Oh, hell, let’s get to the Virginia side of this.

Fan and media dissatisfaction with Al Groh was rising after last season and the season opening loss to Wyoming really raised it. Now, UVa is 4-1 and the complaints are a little more muted. Yet, there is noting that the opposition hasn’t exactly made it difficult.

Pliable Pitt did its best to render those questions all but moot. So inept were the Panthers in the first half, the visitors gave away the ball as easily as they gave in to U.Va.’s offense.

Against Pitt, Jameel Sewell, who was so clueless against Wyoming, looked like a left-handed Vince Young, standing poised in the pocket and adroitly moving around rushers to carry the ball on foot.

It was the biggest crowd at Scott Stadium this season, but Shayne Hale and Cameron Saddler from Gateway didn’t make it to the game for their recruiting trip. Small comfort, since they Hale already had Pitt off his list. More useless information, this was the third straight game for Groh and Virginia against teams with former NFL HCs (Butch Davis — UNC and Chan Gailey — GT).

Virginia QB Jameel Sewell obviously looked good against Pitt. Imagine that, a mobile QB looking good against Pitt.

Aside from that fumbled punt return, Vic Hall for Virginia had a good night.

Virginia fans were able to return to their tailgates early and in a good mood last night.

A half-filled Scott Stadium with four minutes to play means one of two things.

The late-game reaction of Virginia’s players, some that coincided with handshakes, hugs and high-fives, proved the reasoning without forcing a fan to peek into the night toward the stadium’s scoreboard.

Of course, many of those seats were still vacant when Virginia raced out to an insurmountable lead during the first 14 minutes of the game.

The quick start – Virginia scored 27 in the first quarter – coupled with a fourth-quarter resurgence, lifted the Cavaliers to an expected win over Pittsburgh by an improbable margin, 44-14, in front of a season-best crowd of 60,888.

…

“They were ready to jump in with both feet. This isn’t a stick-your-toe-in-the-water team,” Virginia coach Al Groh said. “They were very ready to go tonight.”

The game was over quickly, even to Virginia fans.

Here’s how bad it is for Pitt, the game isn’t being taken for a deep meaning in Virginia.

Sometimes you don’t ask questions or explore too deeply. You simply take what the football gods and a generous opponent provide and say, “Gracias.”

Virginia had one of those nights. How else to explain a game in which the Cavaliers essentially delivered the knockout blow before the first north end zone, hillside human tumbleweed.

To be sure, there were a few anxious moments in the second half of the Cavaliers’ 44-14 victory against Pittsburgh. After all, this is Virginia we’re talking about, not Southern Cal or LSU.

And U.Va. coach Al Groh’s decision to execute a fake field goal for a touchdown with less than six minutes remaining in a 23-point game sure didn’t appear professionally courteous, especially for a couple of ex-NFL paisans. But we’ll leave that for Chairman Al and Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt to hash out behind the snack bar.

You know what, I don’t care about that. It may have been a bit bush, but so what? It was up to Pitt to stop them.

Moving to the Pittsburgh media, with the Steelers playing in Arizona, the columnists won’t be getting to this until maybe Wednesday. That’s okay, the beat writers jumped in for the deserved criticism of this team.

When Pitt hired coach Dave Wannstedt after the 2004 season, he promised to take the Panthers back to the Johnny Majors Era. So far, it looks as if he has delivered on that promise.

The only problem is these Panthers are starting to look a lot more like the 1990’s version during Majors’ second stint as Pitt’s head coach than the team that won the national championship in 1976.

That’s not a good thing as that second Majors stint marked one of the darkest periods in the university’s 117-year football history.

Yet for the second consecutive game, the Panthers (2-3) did their best imitation of those dead-teams walking…

Hard to really disagree.

Gorman went with the white flag from the opening play position.

Just when its 20-point loss to visiting Connecticut last week appeared to be a low for the Pitt football program, the Panthers (2-3) plummeted even further with its third consecutive loss and second in embarrassing fashion.

“The way we played does not mesh with how I feel, but I don’t believe we’re as bad a football team as what we’ve showed in the last two weeks,” Wannstedt said. “But – and that’s a big but – we are where we are right now. We haven’t given ourselves a chance, in my opinion, to show what type of team we are or what type of team we can be.

“I have been on one-win teams in college and the National Football League. I have been on undefeated teams in college and Super Bowl teams. We are doing everything in practice and preparation that championship teams do. Our kids are working as hard as any team I’ve been on.”

Well, then it is on the coaches.

This one wasn’t about being overmatched. Pitt was simply sloppy, committing costly turnovers and 11 penalties for 139 yards, which has become a recurring theme this year.

Worse, the Cavaliers (4-1) came in allowing more points (19.8) than they were scoring (19.2), but managed to score four touchdowns in the first 21:08 on drives consisting of only 39, 51 and 26 yards.

That rendered the debut of quarterback Pat Bostick and tailback LeSean McCoy in same starting backfield essentially meaningless. Virginia led 27-0 before Bostick, making his first career start, even attempted his first pass.

Gorman has some more stuff on his blog.

“They were executing. That was what they were doing all game. All the credit goes to them. They picked us apart,” McKillop said. “On our end, we’ve got to step up. When we go to the sideline, we’ve got to listen to coach Rhoads’ adjustments and we’ve got to go out there and apply them to the field.”

It’s not that Pitt has a poor game plan, just that the Panthers aren’t executing. At this point, the Panthers coaches ought to distance themselves from the word, especially with talk of putting them on the firing line.

Wait, someone is claiming that Rhoads understands the concept of adjustments?

And, based on McKillop’s comments, it already sounds like the Panthers are tuning out their coaches. Or, at least, they are starting to wonder if this season is a lost cause.

“There’s definitely going to be some doubt with our team, but the most important is we have leaders on our team who are going to have to step up and not have separation on our team, people forming groups and having a mutiny against everybody,” McKillop said. “We’ve got to stick together as a team. Everyone’s got to come in and push through this adversity.

“Right now, there’s been no finger-pointing with this team. We’re sticking together. Coach Wannstedt is preaching what he’s always preaching: ‘Trust. Accountability. Desire.’ We’re sticking to that.”

Well the players may be wondering. The fans pretty much have accepted this has become a lost season.

Just looking about at stories before the 7pm game on ESPN-U.

Gorman talks to former Pitt coach Mike Gottfried who will be doing color for the game tonight.

Smizik points out that after this season, Coach Wannstedt will only have two years left on his 5-year contract. So that makes this game vital if he expects an extension. Actually, that’s part of why this whole season might be vital. Honestly, there’s no way — regardless of how the season goes — an extension will (should) even be considered until 2008 gets underway. I’d rather “risk” a slow start to recruiting then extend a contract foolishly.

Virginia media takes notice  that Pitt will be starting a freshman at QB.

The Virginia O-line is big and good at opening holes.

Big recruiting night for Virginia. Including Shayne Hale and Cameron Saddler from Gateway (Monroeville).

Another story on the theme of payback by Virginia for last year. Oh, and as a key to the game — go after Pat Bostick.
Virginia beat writers have a man-crush on Jeff Fitzgerald. That or their tired of writing glowingly about Chris Long.

Coach Wannstedt speaks positively about Bostick starting.

Beat writer in Virginia tries to figure out how Pitt can win after knowing why Virginia can win.

Still has to happen this weekend. After everything that has happened this past week, I actually still think Pitt has a chance.

Virginia has squeaked a couple out, and find themselves atop the ACC Coastal Division. Still, their offense is not in great shape. They have serious issues of depth and talent at WR.

As a group, UVa wideouts caught four passes in a 28-23 win over Georgia Tech last week. They also had four drops. The tight ends, by comparison, caught 12 passes.

“We certainly would welcome any production or any firepower we can get there,” Virginia head coach Al Groh said. “Obviously, the (touchdown) Staton Jobe came up with the other day highlights what that can do for a team.”

Covington wasn’t an explosive receiver in the mold of a Kevin Ogletree or Deyon Williams, but his nine receptions led UVa’s wideouts. Jobe, the other starter, has eight catches for 104 yards.

Maurice Covington is out for the Pitt game with a wrist injury.

Also likely out for the game is the Hoos left offensive tackle who was hurt late in the GT game.

Offensively, they will be running the ball a lot with Cedric Peerman. Obviously the passing game won’t exactly be a vertical game, with the TE’s being the main targets. The real danger for Pitt will be containing Sophomore QB Jameel Sewell, is also a threat to run the ball — a terrifying prospect for the Pitt defense. He’s been sharing the QB duties with Freshman Pete Lalich who is a better pure passer and has shown promise.

On defense, they may have two of the best DEs in the country (definitely in the ACC) in Jake Long and Jeffery Fitzgerald.

All he did last season was lead Virginia with 5½ sacks, tie for the team lead with 12 tackles for losses, rank second with two interceptions and finish third with 64 total tackles — as a freshman.

But even though Fitzgerald got his due as a unanimous freshman All-American, he won’t be the first name in defensive ends at Virginia for at least another year.

That’s because he plays across from senior Chris Long, he of the famous father and the media-guide cover, the projected first-round NFL draft pick whose average of 1½ sacks per game this season is second in the nation.

I’m sure the Pitt O-line is looking forward to the challenge of trying to keep Bostick upright.

Oh, and of course, the Cavs haven’t forgotten last year.

“They kind of embarrassed us on national TV,” defensive end Jeffrey Fitzgerald said. “So we kind of have that in the back of our minds, to try to get back and bounce back from that. We’re just looking forward to going out there and showing them that last year was not indicative of this season.”

The game on September 29 in Charlottesville is going to be a 7pm start and shown on ESPNU.

“Overall we will face one of the nation’s most challenging schedules,” Pitt Head Coach Jamie Dixon said. “This is the most demanding non-conference schedule we will play in my nine years here. When looking at strength of schedule and our road games last year, our schedule was considered the nation’s most difficult. Once again, we have positioned ourselves to have the highest rated strength of schedule in the country.”

Coach Jamie Dixon, on the the Pitt 2007-08 basketball schedule.

“This will be the most challenging overall schedule we will play in my eight years here,” Pitt head coach Jamie Dixon said. “The Big East will again pose a tremendous challenge. I’m excited about our non-conference schedule as well. Last year our strength of schedule was ranked 30^th out of 327 teams in the country. We have put ourselves in a position to have one of the toughest, if not the toughest overall schedule in the country.”

Coach Jamie Dixon, on the Pitt 2006-07 basketball schedule.

Someone in the Pitt Athletic Department really needs to look at past press releases before they draft the statement for Coach Dixon.

Two basketball posts in one day right in the middle of a football week — get over it. The full 31 game schedule was released today, including that headliner against Duke at MSG.

Wednesday, Oct. 31 PITT-JOHNSTOWN (Exh.)
Sunday, Nov. 4 INDIANA (PA.) (Exh.)
Friday, Nov. 9 HOUSTON BAPTIST
Saturday, Nov. 10 NORTH CAROLINA A&T
Sunday, Nov. 11 SAINT LOUIS
Thursday, Nov. 15 MISSISSIPPI VALLEY STATE
Friday, Nov. 23, BUFFALO
Tuesday, Nov. 27, BOSTON U.
Saturday, Dec. 1 TOLEDO
Wednesday, Dec. 5 at Duquesne (ESPN-U)
Saturday, Dec. 8 at Washington (FSN)
Saturday, Dec. 15 OKLAHOMA STATE (ESPN)
Thursday, Dec. 20 vs. Duke (ESPN) Madison Square Garden
Saturday, Dec. 29: at Dayton (ESPN2)
Wednesday, Jan. 2: LAFAYETTE (ESPN-U)
Sunday, Jan. 6: at Villanova
Wednesday, Jan. 9: at South Florida (ESPN2)
Saturday, Jan. 12: SETON HALL
Monday, Jan. 14: GEORGETOWN (ESPN)
Saturday, Jan. 19: at Cincinnati
Wednesday, Jan. 23: at St. John’s
Saturday, Jan. 26: RUTGERS
Wednesday, Jan. 30: VILLANOVA (ESPN2)
Saturday, Feb. 2: at Connecticut (CBS)
Thursday, Feb. 7: WEST VIRGINIA (ESPN2)
Tuesday, Feb. 12: PROVIDENCE
Friday, Feb. 15: at Marquette (ESPN)
Thursday, Feb. 21: at Notre Dame
Sunday, Feb. 24: LOUISVILLE
Wednesday, Feb. 27: CINCINNATI
Saturday, March 1: at Syracuse (ESPN)
Monday, March 3: at West Virginia (ESPN)
Sunday, March 9: DePAUL (WTAE)

Sadly I couldn’t make it out to Pittsburgh for FanFest or any of the practices this time. Hard to believe that the first college football games are in less than a week. The Big East will kick off on Thursday with 3 games as official ESPN programming filler — games on regional, ESPN360 (expect more of it) and ESPNU.

Add another Pittsburgh columnist to the conventional wisdom pile of wait until 2008 just before the start of 2007.

None of that will add up to a breakthrough campaign, but we should finally get a glimpse of how Wannstedt intends to win big in 2008 and beyond.

This year will be about taking the formula from the chalkboard to the trenches.

In doing so, Pitt will turn a significant corner.

That’s reason enough to be encouraged, if not overly optimistic.

If that wasn’t enough, there was this gem.

If the front four can generate consistent pressure, it’ll allow defensive coordinator Paul Rhoads to blitz when he wants to rather than when he feels he has to.

Oh, god no. If Rhoads is allowed to only blitz when he wants to, then we’ll never see it. Really, that’s just an indictment of how little Prisuta knows about Pitt and Rhoads’ tenure/philosophy. He doesn’t blitz. He doesn’t like it. It has never been his thing.

The scrimmage on Wednesday was quite limited contact and a lot of players resting, so it didn’t reveal much.

The scrimmage wasn’t much of a workout for many starters, as a handful were rested due to various bumps and bruises. Starting tailback LaRod Stephens-Howling had just one carry, but it went for 44 yards.

Not to mention banged up lines — and it’s still a week until the first game.

Still, Pitt needs some of its starting linemen such as tackles Jeff Otah (hamstring) and Jason Pinkston (shoulder) and guard Joe Thomas (shoulder) to get healthy in a hurry. The same goes for senior defensive end Chris McKillop (elbow, hamstring).

“Our line is at a disadvantage right now,” Wannstedt said.

From the Zeise Q&A today.

Q: Will Pitt get a marquee victory against Louisville, West Virginia or Rutgers this year?

ZEISE: If I knew answers to questions like that, I’d retire tomorrow and move to Las Vegas and become the next Ace Rothstein. I will say one thing that has been disappointing about the first two years of this new regime is that the Panthers have failed to beat a team they weren’t supposed to beat. They haven’t pulled any upsets, so that would be a great sign of progress if they could knock off one of those teams, or even Virginia or Michigan State. This team needs to beat a team it isn’t supposed to beat this year.

[Emphasis added.]

To follow that up, what only makes it worse is that Pitt has lost 2 games in those first two years that it shouldn’t have (Ohio in 2005 and UConn in 2006). You can argue that but for a play here, a stop there and they would have been wins — and Pitt would have gone to a minor bowl each year — but its still hard to excuse letting it come to that in the first place in those games. It feeds the feeling that the team has underachieved so far.

Part of a sign of progress will be at least beating all the teams Pitt should this season –EMU, Grambling, UConn, Navy, Cinci, Syracuse and either Virginia or Michigan St. on the road. Pitt needs to show something tangible in the wins and losses this year. There has to be more.

— A “marathon” negotiating session last week led to former Panther Darrelle Revis getting a deal done with the New York Jets. Aside from 1st overall pick JaMarcus Russell and Revis, every other 1st round pick had been signed. Revis has a bright future ahead of him, and SI’s Peter King lists him as a CB on his “All-Future Team.”

The Cleveland Browns thought enough of him to have him ranked as a top-five player in the draft this year — and the Jets thanked their lucky stars Revis was still there at No. 14. He’s got excellent cover skills and is a willing tackler.

— CBS SportsLine predicts Pitt will finish sixth in the Big East over UConn and Syracuse.

6. Pittsburgh: Which way you headed, Wanny? Without a proven quarterback and six new starters on defense, Dave Wannstedt is on the hot seat. Watch roadies at Virginia and Michigan State. They will be an indicator of his future.

Pitt and Cincinnati in the 5/6 spots seem to be a toss up. And the comment about Wannstedt being on the hot seat is a bit premature; but it got some talk in the discussion thread.

— Sports Illustrated devoted this week’s issue to previewing college football. They also have Pitt coming in at #6 in the BE with a 5-7 overall record and 2-5 in conference. Not a ton of love there — but they do give a nod to Oderick Turner who is going to be a little more widely known since he’s our top receiver right now.

— Both PSI and Kevin Gorman report that freshman offensive guard Chris Jacobson badly hurt his right knee and will need surgery. The procedure will like take place next week and though he will possibly miss the whole season, Wannstedt did not entirely rule him out for the rest of the year. Obviously, redshirting him is looking like the smart option.

— Beano Cook was a guest on Mark Madden’s show on ESPN Radio 1250. Cook, who Madden calls the “Pope of college football,” says Pitt’s home schedule is the worst it’s been since World War II. That’s not a joke — Beano knows. He also says that LeSean McCoy will see a ton of playing time this year and will make an immediate impact. I found it funny when Cook, at a young 75 years old, referred to McCoy as “Shady.” He also says McCoy will be Pitt’s running back for 3 years before jumping to the NFL.

I don’t know, maybe I’m just not getting enough sleep. It’s hard to be a sportswriter in the late summer when the baseball team sucks and there’s no training camp. So I’m willing to pardon a little stupidity.

While I had been a bit distracted, last week Bob Smizik wrote a piece ripping into Pitt’s home football schedule this year. To some degree, everyone has. Pitt fans and ticket-holders (including myself) have been mocking a lousy, uninteresting home schedule where the marquee game is against Navy. And that was moved to Wednesday night to make it a real pain. It’s such an easy target, no one can resist trashing it and pitying the fans who actually get season tickets.

Since it was Smizik, though, he did it in a way that ensured pissing off Pitt fans. He started by imagining an ultimatum from Penn State for a 3-for-2 deal. It was a lazy column, that didn’t involve much work. Frankly, typical Smizik effort, but hey there are only so many ways to complain about the Pirates by the end of July.

A good amount of the irritation, though, seemed to be from being reminded of it — by Smizik. The overall schedule is fine, but there is nothing about the home slate that makes anyone think they need to circle the dates. Not really sure why the Big East has put Pitt with such an unbalanced Big East schedule with Louisville and WVU (and to a lesser extent with Rutgers) as both being either home or away in the same year. It could be argued that it gives Pitt a better chance at the Big East title in even numbered years, but that presupposes a lot of foresight by the Big East and that Pitt will be in a position to challenge in those years.

Then Paul Zeise got in trouble for comments he made regarding Michael Vick, dog fighting allegations and suggesting that Vick would have been better off committing rape rather than doing dog fighting. Rape was apparently the wrong crime to compare. Everything else is acceptable.

Plus, Vick could have been accused of murdering a stripper, blowing up a shopping mall or funneling his Nike money to Al Qaeda, and people wouldn’t have been even 1% as outraged as they are about the dogfighting allegations. You can get away with just about anything these days; just don’t tick off dog lovers.

Suggesting rape or pedophilia seem to be about the only comparisons not allowed.

The funny thing is that Zeise probably wasn’t wrong. Anyone else remember when Sebastian Janikowski was arrested for possessing the date rape drug, GHB? What was he planning to do with that? He never suffered major repercussions for that, professionally.

Buried in the news piece about the Big East basketball schedule was something that really bothered me.

The Duke game is tentatively Pitt’s only neutral-site game, but that could change as Pitt officials are working with Duquesne to get the annual City Game moved from the Palumbo Center to Mellon Arena.

If the two sides can reach an agreement on moving the game, it would mark the first time the game was played at a neutral site since 2001. That marked the end of a run of 12 consecutive City Games that were played at Mellon Arena.

Nooooo!!!!

I absolutely hated Pitt games at the Civic Arena. Horribly removed from the action. It literally sucked the life out of basketball games there. Now Pitt wants to bring that atmosphere back even for one game? Don’t they remember how lousy it was?
I get that playing at the Palumbo Center isn’t exactly lucrative for Pitt. That the small gym is cramped and doesn’t produce much revenue for Pitt. It’s good that the school hasn’t gone Penn State and canceled the game or even demanded a 2-for-1. This is just a bad idea.
The Civic Arena creates all sorts of annoyances and inconveniences. From having to figure out the re-accommodating of season ticket holders and the resentments it would cause when the seats suck because of the bad sight lines and detached feel. To the smaller turnout by the students.