Defense spares sloppy Panthers in 21-10 win vs. Syracuse

A win's a win, right?

That certainly could characterize Pitt's 21-10 victory over Syracuse on this Saturday at Heinz Field, one that opened the ACC schedule and raised the No. 25-ranked Panthers' record to 2-0.

Leading the way was a defense that allowed only 171 yards over 58 plays, an average of 2.9 yards per play for Syracuse, along with two turnovers and seven sacks during the game.

"Oh, gosh, their ability to get the quarterback," Pat Narduzzi said after the game when asked about what impressed him about his defense. "I don't know how many sacks we had, but the kids stayed in their lane. We had seven, so we're short from last year. So they did a better job protecting. And we missed a couple too. We let him go and they had a couple. But just the pressure and really the coverage. Obviously when you're getting sacks, the coverage is good."

Those seven sacks were up from three last week against Austin Peay. Leading the way for Pitt this week was redshirt senior defensive end Rashad Weaver, who returned after missing last season due to injury and this season's opener because he tested positive for COVID-19.

"I felt like a little kid on Christmas," Weaver said after the game when asked how he felt coming back to play. "Last night I was sitting with my eyes closed for 30 minutes trying to go to sleep. I couldn't. Then I finally fell asleep and woke up at 3:40 in the morning energized hoping it was seven o'clock. I was very eager, I tried to control it as best I could but I couldn't." 

Weaver recorded 2.0 sacks, one solo and two assists, while also leading the team in tackles with seven.

"I thought he looked outstanding," Narduzzi said of Weaver. "I thought Rashad coming back, it was great to get him and Keyshon [Camp] back, and they practiced all week. It was good to get both of them back. And I'm sure we'll watch the tape and say there's a lot of things he could have got better at, but he's so smart and made a lot of plays today."

Weaver's teammates noticed too, including defensive captain and senior safety Damar Hamlin.

"I love playing with Weave," Hamlin said, using Weaver's nickname. "Just having him out there brings a different confidence. He's a game changer and having him out there brings a force and a presence. I can't wait to keep playing with him."

The defense finished the game with 13 tackles for loss and only allowed one touchdown on a 69-yard pass and field goal after being given a short field.

"It felt great," Weaver said of the defense's performance. "We're a defense that wants to be great. We're disappointed in the first half. We personally felt they shouldn't have scored. We'll just continue cleaning up. We think we were pretty good today, but we want to be great and great defenses don't make mistakes."

It wasn't just Weaver making big plays for Pitt's defense. Even redshirt freshman Calijah Kancey got in on the action with 1.5 sacks to go along with his 2.5 tackles for loss and four total tackles.

Here's an assisted sack where Kancey teamed up with redshirt senior linebacker Phil Campbell to finish off redshirt junior quarterback Tommy DeVito in the second quarter. Campbell sneaks behind a very aggressive stunt from entire Pitt front, while Kancey finds the weak spot on the front side of Syracuse's offensive line:

Weaver talked about seeing younger players like Kancey making plays and how it fired him up.

"Those young guys, you love to see it," Weaver said. "Us older guys, we're at a point that when we see the younger guys who might not be starting you get more excited for them than you do for yourself. I know when I'm gone and I'm tuning into Pitt games I want to know they're in good hands. When Calijah was getting sacks I was jumping up and down more than I was on my own sacks. It feels good to see that."

The defense only had one blemish on the day when it surrendered a 69-yard bomb from redshirt senior backup quarterback Rex Culpepper to junior receiver Taj Harris after DeVito came off the field with an injury. 

Culpepper went to Harris on a deep pattern on what was obviously a busted coverage over senior cornerback Jason Pinnock. You could tell he was expecting help when he willingly gives up inside leverage on the deep route like he's passing him off to someone, except nobody is there and Harris an easy score to put Syracuse up 10-7 in the second quarter:

Both Narduzzi and Hamlin would confirm after the game that Pinnock was not at fault for the only touchdown Pitt has allowed this season.

"Jason Pinnock played lights out as well," Narduzzi said. "I've been impressed with that guy. That guy's playing, he's playing his tail off, and that wasn't, that touchdown we gave up obviously was not his fault."

"Just a missed assignment," Hamlin corroborated after the game. "It was something we knew soon as it happened that we would clean it up and it wouldn't happen again. Wasn't as clean as we like so we'll work on that in practice and do better next week."

It definitely didn't happen again. The only other score the defense allowed was after the offense gave Syracuse the ball on a dropped backwards pass turned into a fumble recovery at their own 14. Syracuse would start three drives inside Pitt's 40 yard line during the game, with two of those chances coming in the first quarter.

"We just keep our mentality and never quit and never stop no matter the situation," Hamlin said of the defense being backed up several times. "We handled a lot of bad field position situations and we kept it rolling."

Pitt's offense and special teams didn't keep it rolling too much. Kenny Pickett finished the day completing 25 passes on 36 attempts for 215 yards and two passing touchdowns with an interception and a rushing touchdown while being sacked three times.

The interception came in the red zone when the offense had a chance to give Pitt its first double-digit lead on the day. Pickett misread the coverage and tried a pass to redshirt senior Lucas Krull that was intercepted by sophomore linebacker Mikel Jones:

"They were in man and the kid did a good job of coming off and making a play," Pickett said after the game via Zoom. "I didn't see him. I crossed him out early in the progression because of what I saw, but I have to be better there. I can't turn it over in the red zone. It'll be something that I learn from and move on."

Pickett wasn't the only Pitt player with miscues. Krull dropped three different passes in his first appearance for the program after transferring from Florida.

"You don't want to talk to him too much during the game," Narduzzi said when asked about his thoughts on Krull. "He dropped one, came back and caught one, then he drops another one that was right there. I don't need to beat him up, he'll beat up himself over that and we just got to get him on the JUGS and keep working it. But maybe first game being the guy and we expect him to make those plays."

Alex Kessman might've had the worst day for the program as he went 0-for-3 on field goal attempts and has yet to make a field goal through two games. There was also a botched snap that led to a field goal attempt not even being kicked at the end of the first half.

"We had -- one was a, you know, a hold problem and three," Narduzzi said when asked about the special teams problems. "We'll look at the tape and just try to figure out what he's doing wrong. And I believe going into the game, he was 6-6 against Syracuse, all time. And the noise wasn't very much out there. They're screaming from the sideline. Like I said, I got to do more. We got to bring a whole team up when we do field goal period and just scream and shout and whatever, I don't know. But we just didn't execute. Like I said, to not execute and still win the game is a positive. We got a lot of faith in Alex. Again, he started off slow last year and then just heated up. So we just got to figure out what his issue is and we got a lot of faith in him."

Pitt also got very sloppy in its penalties, committing seven that were accepted for a total of 70 lost yards.

"It was a lot uglier than I would like it to be and I told the team afterwards," Narduzzi said in reflection of the team's penalties and mistakes. 'Just disappointed more with just the penalties that we had, just some stuff that you don't expect to happen at all. Hargrove has a 15-yarder after a first down, we get a holding call after a quarterback back scramble. We get a turnover down on the, whatever, inside the 20-yard line and we spin the ball, we get 15. We, the next series, we stop them, thank God. Next series we got a guy jumps over the punt wedge, I guess, which, again, you can't do it, and it's a freshman. But just things like that that just can't happen. I just told them championship teams don't do those things."

It seemed like there were several times when Syracuse gave Pitt the best chance to put them away, but the Panthers wouldn't take advantage. Pickett's interception came after a turnover on downs forced by Pitt's defense. After only allowing one big play through a half of football and giving the offense two opportunities to score early in the second half, Pitt looked like they wouldn't be able to put Syracuse away.

"I think that's the disappointing thing," Narduzzi said. "And, again, we kind of kept them in the game. We could have knocked them out early in the third quarter. We gave them opportunities and, again, defense stood up and survived. Special teams, still disappointed in our field goal team. And again, a lot of things I'm disappointed in, but I'm happy we got the W."

But then the defense came to the rescue.

On the ensuing drive after Pickett's interception, the defense brought pressure that forced a poor throw on a busted screen from DeVito that Paris Ford would dive to intercept. It would be Ford's second interception in as many games:

"We do turnover drills every day in practice," Hamlin said when asked about the turnover. "Just being able to affect the game like that and get the ball back to our offense. We just try to do that as much as we can. I tell Kenny every time they come off the field that we're going to get him the ball back. We're trying to get a turnover every possession."

The interception sparked the Panthers back to life and Ford got to celebrate with Pitt's turnover dunk hoop on the sideline:

"We had it last year," Weaver said when talking about seeing Ford's dunk on the sideline. "We were breaking it, bending it, I need to get in on it. I told them if I get a strip sack I'm putting my whole elbow in there like Vince Carter and we'll need a new one. We'll continue to use that and we'll look to do it more times than we did today."

After that, Pitt never looked back.

Pickett would lead a touchdown drive that would be capped with a 17-yard pass to sophomore receiver Jared Wayne, and that touchdown would be the final score of the game.

Pitt finished the game with a strong showing on defense, but with lots of questions left to answer about the identity of the offense and whether the special teams unit can be reliable moving forward. After scoring on six consecutive touchdown drives against Austin Peay, the offense only scored on three of their 13 drives agains Syracuse.

"I think I told you guys the other day, Tuesday was so good that I had to yell at them for something just to yell at them because it was so clean," Narduzzi said recapping how he felt about his team. "But we just didn't come out and execute. And, again, give Syracuse credit. At times they made some plays, but you make your best improvements, maybe we'll make our best improvements from ACC 1 to ACC 2. The great thing is you get a win and we can go coach them hard on Sunday when we watch that tape and fix a lot of things."

They'll need to fix a lot of things before they faced their first ranked opponent in No. 18 Louisville next Saturday, also at Heinz Field.