Sloppiness aside, Narduzzi has Pitt focused on Louisville

Pat Narduzzi isn't taking solace in the accolades Pitt could tout after its 21-10 win over Syracuse on Saturday at Heinz Field. Since the win, the team jumped up to No. 21 in Sunday's AP Poll, the highest ranking the team has gotten from the Associated Press in his tenure:

Noting the irregularities of the 2020 season, Narduzzi brushed off whatever meaning could be found in his Panthers being 2-0 after their sloppy win over Syracuse.

"I think there's only 40 teams playing," Narduzzi said via Zoom on Monday when asked about the ranking. "I don't look at the stats, I don't care. It's weird, I don't know how the whole year's going to go. The Big Ten is going to play. Is the SEC playing this weekend? I don't even know. I don't know how the AP Poll works, I don't know how the USA Today Coaches Poll works. It's the dumbest coaches poll I've ever seen. How many teams are even playing? Looked like six games had to be cancelled last week. We have to focus on our football team, get better every week and make sure our kids are healthy and safe. It doesn't matter what we've done in two weeks, it matters what we've done after eleven."

Despite the fact Pitt had several crucial mistakes, Narduzzi sees this week as an opportunity to feed off of his players' hunger to improve, knowing they should've played a much better game.

"There's always good from it," Narduzzi said when asked what teaching points could come from the win. "I didn't go home and pout. We got a win and those are hard to get against ACC opponents. As coaches, we expect that perfection but we're not going to get it. It's my job to get the team prepared mentally and physically to go out and perform as best they can. When they don't, obviously, I'm going to be mad, but then our kids come back hungrier next week. If we had blown them out, then I'd be worried about them thinking they can just blow everyone out every Saturday. There were some great plays out there. I always talk about the negative plays and remember all the plays that made me say, 'Are you kidding me?' The plays we excel, I know I don't have to harp on that."

And, after all, that's his job, right? 

Pitt could absolutely boast that they lead the NCAA in team sacks with 10, only tied by No. 1-ranked Clemson. That continues from last year, when the team had the highest average of sacks per game in the NCAA with 3.92. Narduzzi could point out that after two games, his Panthers rank sixth in points per game allowed, first in rushing yards per game allowed, fourth in passing yards per game, and third in total yards per game.

But at least from what he's saying, he and his players are looking at what they haven't done in their first two wins.

"I still think our best football is ahead of us," Narduzzi said. "I don't think the kids are particularly happy either, after watching the tape and seeing the situations we put ourselves in. The details weren't there. That game very well could've been 30-0 or 42-0. You leave some plays out there, but it's great to win a football game and still have a lot of things to clean up. That's why they call us coach and it's why we coach the game, to make things better. We're like the doctors of football and we have to fix them all. If nobody got sick there wouldn't be a use for doctors and if nobody made mistakes there wouldn't be a use for coaches. I'm very optimistic with the kind of football team we have."

The mistakes need to be cleaned up before Pitt plays its first ranked opponent in No. 24 Louisville at noon this Saturday at Heinz Field. It's the first time Pitt will be ranked while getting the opportunity to play a ranked opponent at Heinz Field since the program lost 45-44 to Cincinnati in 2009.

When asked if his players are paying attention to the significance of that, Narduzzi shrugged it off noting he wants his team to just focus on who they're playing.

"No," Narduzzi said. "I don't think they care or they even know. I'm not even going to mention [it]. We're worried about one thing right now, a really talented and athletic Louisville team coming to Heinz Field. Narduzzi got to watch Louisville after Pitt beat Syracuse, when the Cardinals lost to now-ranked No. 12 Miami 47-34 in their ACC opener.  

"Heck, yeah," Narduzzi said with excitement when asked if he watched Louisville's Saturday night game live. "I was home early for that game. Spent a lot of time watching it. If I didn't watch it then, I would watch the TV copies. I like to see every game you possibly can. You notice their speed. They're fast, their o-line is aggressive. We're going to have to work on some of their cut blocks on the back side for some of their wide zone. They love those wide zone plays. Defensively they're active, they're athletic and they can run."

Their offense is a four-headed monster led by Micale Cunningham who leads the NCAA with six touchdown passes and has the second most passing yards with 650. He's backed up by Javian Hawkins at running back, whose 235 rushing yards are fourth in the NCAA. And Louisville's receivers are headed by a dual threat in speedster Tutu Azwell and big-bodied Dez Fitzpatrick, both ranking among the top ten in receiving yards in the NCAA.

"Javian Hawkins is explosive," Narduzzi said when talking about Louisville's offense. "When he gets the ball, he looks like he's shot out of a cannon. That's another thing you notice besides the offensive line. You notice Hawkins running downhill, and he's flying. Micale Cunningham's a great player, he's got a great arm, can throw the deep ball, can run and makes good decisions for the most part. Obviously they're happy with him. He's a high-ranked ACC quarterback in the country and there's a reason why. He's athletic, the guy can do a lot of different things. Between him, Tutu and Javian, all those guys, we're going to have to wrap those guys up because they're explosive. A lot of weapons."

When talking about Azwell, Narduzzi went into how fast he is and how the team has to be ready for him, especially after Pitt's defense gave up its only touchdown on the season to Syracuse's speedy receiver Taj Harris on Saturday.

"Tutu Azwell is a great player. He's explosive and probably a 10.4 100 meter guy. Might be one of the fastest receivers we've ever faced. He's excellent. They'll try to get him matched up against Paris Ford and Damar Hamlin in the slot receiver spot. He's dangerous. We're going to need great eye control to stop Tutu."

Pitt also has several players that Louisville has to consider, including redshirt senior defensive end Rashad Weaver and redshirt junior linebacker Cam Bright, who were awarded best ACC defensive lineman and linebacker of the week, respectively:

Besides play execution, Narduzzi knows his team has to clean up the penalties. Pitt was penalized seven times for 70 yards against Syracuse, with one of those penalties giving Syracuse one of its 10 first downs in the game. Narduzzi noted that part of the problem could be nervousness in the team's early games, but also took the opportunity to take a shot at some of the officiating.

"To me, it's more nerves. I don't think they're sitting there saying, 'Don't line up wrong,' and then they line up wrong. The one [on guard] Bryce Hargrove, they called illegal procedure on him, but he does what he normally does. He was in a three-point stance, looked back at the quarterback for the indicator then slaps the center, and they called him for illegal procedure and it's like, 'What are we talking about?' So there are some things on TV that gets blamed on our kids, but not necessarily."

When asked if the complicated offseason is part of the reason for the sloppiness in his team's first ACC game of 2020, Narduzzi wouldn't attribute any struggles to anything related to COVID-19 or the different offseason schedule.

"I don't think anything of that," Narduzzi said. "We can sit here and say that as an excuse, and that's exactly what it would be, an excuse. It has nothing to do with it. We've had plenty of time to get stuff right. It's normal game stuff. What I saw Saturday is nothing different than I saw last year. We're always going to make mistakes. ... The detail stuff, the penalties, that's what really bothers me because that sets you back and that can cost you a game."

Those details will be part of the team's focus in preparation for Louisville. Despite facing a more high-flying offense than either opponent this season, Narduzzi said Pitt is going to play to its own strengths while making minor tweaks, rather than making sweeping scheme adjustments.

"They'll know how we play, and we're going to come at you," Narduzzi said when asked if his defense would change anything up this week. "But I wouldn't say we change anything. We installed our defense back in Fall camp and we kind of melt to you. We're going to adjust things with a big bucket of defensive things where you pull out different things to see what you like. It's really just tweaking your defense weekly to what we need to do to stop what someone does well. It's Tutu this week and it was Taj Harris last week. We took their best player out with just tweaking what we do. Sometimes we're field to boundary, sometimes we're right-to-left, that's just talking to our corners. What's the plan this week? I don't know, but we'll have it figured out."

Specifically, Narduzzi knows the offense has a lot to prove moving forward and that it's all about execution.

"Offense has to execute," Narduzzi said. "You watch the tape and you see one guy didn't do this, whether it's a chip of a defensive end or a tackle inside on pass protection to give Kenny time. Kenny missed a couple throws as well, he wasn't perfect. It's just making plays and not having penalties. I think we've got a great football team and can do great things, but we have to execute and pay attention to the details. When we go back and look, we practiced well last week. But we almost practiced so well that it scared me. We'll find out what we do this week practice-wise."

• Talking further about Pitt's effort to limit Syracuse receiver Taj Harris, whose 69-yard touchdown catch made up the most of his 72 yards on three catches, Narduzzi and defensive captain Hamlin noted after the game that the touchdown wasn't on Jason Pinnock, and Narduzzi followed that up with praise on Monday.

"I give credit to Jason Pinnock," Narduzzi said. "He locked down Taj Harris. Taj we knew lined up on their right, our left, and that was part of the adjustment. We moved Marquis [Williams] to the right side and Pinnock to the left. Jason locked him down the entire game anytime he had him one-on-one."

Narduzzi also offered praise for Williams, the redshirt sophomore, who made five tackles against Syracuse.

"Marquis did a great job," Narduzzi said, eventually referring to Williams by his nickname. "I was really excited for 'Quis. He played really well and made tackles when he needed to make tackles. He covered well and played pretty darn good."

• Redshirt senior kicker Alex Kessman went 0-3 on field goals against Syracuse and is now 0-4 on the season. Narduzzi noted that they're going to try some back-to-the-basics with him and said he still has faith in his kicker.

"We've noticed a couple things here, and he had opportunities," Narduzzi said of Kessman. "We'll get it fixed coach-wise. I don't know how many of you all play golf, but sometimes you can think too much about this or that. Or you can try to think about your elbow straight, or are your hands different, or your feet, shoulders, head down, all those things you have to do in golf, there's so much to do at that position. Sometimes you have to wipe it clean and start fresh. That's what we'll do with him this week and I think we'll get it right."

"I have a ton of faith in Alex," Narduzzi continued. "He's a mature, smart kid that gets it. He's the last guy that wants to let anyone down. I told him, 'I'm not sweating it, because I got faith in you.' I know he'll get it fixed. The great thing is it didn't cost us a loss. He's out there getting his practice in and when he's not doing well he's no different than a guard or a corner not doing well. He didn't execute properly, so I've got a ton of confidence he's going to get it done and I'm not worried about it."

Narduzzi also went on to say his offense shouldn't need Kessman as much because they're supposed to be in the business of scoring touchdowns.

"We had three times we had to send our kicker out there," Narduzzi said. "We can all point at the kicker, but there's those fingers point back at us. How about we score touchdowns when we're down inside the 20-yard line? I want touchdowns, I don't want field goals. I don't want to send our kicker out there, I want to send our offense out there and celebrate in the end zone. That's our goal. We don't say that our goal each week is to kick a bunch of field goals, it's got to be to execute in the red zone and score. We didn't score enough on our short fields."

• Sophomore running back Vincent Davis made his first start against Syracuse, totaling 66 yards on 17 carries. Davis held onto his official starting position on the depth chart heading into this week, but Narduzzi said it's still a battle for who will become the dominant back.

"Vince did a nice job," Narduzzi said. "But nobody's taken that thing over and said, 'I'm the guy.' It's a work in progress still. [Todd] Sibley Jr. did a nice job when he was in there, A.J. [Davis] did a pretty good job when he was in there. There's so many things going on protection-wise and football-wise, we're just going to continue to see who's that guy back there."

Narduzzi noted that despite not having a dominant player in his backfield yet, his team does benefit from the diversity of talents between the five they use.

"Daniel Carter is that physical one. If you stood them right next to each other. If you stood them right next to each other, one would be as thick as this podium and the other would be as thick as this microphone. They're two different paced guys. Vince has got a lot of quick-twitch and a lot of wiggle to him and Daniel will run through your chest."

• Narduzzi said his offensive line played better against Syracuse, even if the results didn't appear that way. Playing an ACC opponent brings its own challenges, and that leads to better grades than just beating up on an FCS program like Austin Peay.

"The O-line graded solid," Narduzzi said. "I think Carter Warren graded out at 'winning' and the rest graded out 'high average.' They all graded out as 'winning' against Austin Peay. Obviously when the competition steps up, obviously it's a little different. All those grades are subjective. They did some nice things. But forget grades, as a whole, our offensive line played better Saturday than the week before. There was more physical play, guys stayed on their blocks, they sustained, I was much happier this week with our offensive line than I was the week before."

One player who got playing time but didn't have a good game on the line was backup redshirt senior offensive tackle Keldrick Wilson. 

"Keldrick wasn't as clean as you like," Narduzzi said. "They showed him a new front he hadn't seen before and he didn't have a good answer for it. He didn't play great or have a winning effort, but he's still young and new and it's a different speed for him. But he's athletic, he's tough and he'll bounce back."

• Pitt's offense got a spark from true freshman receiver Jordan Addison, who I wrote about immediately after their win over Syracuse. But Narduzzi also took time to praise senior transfer receiver D.J. Turner, who finished with five catches for 48 yards, bringing his season total to seven catches for 124 (team high) yards and a touchdown.

"D.J.'s somebody Kenny [Pickett] can rely on,"  Narduzzi said. "He had [five] catches and two really nice ones that weren't easy balls to catch but he came up with them. If the ball was thrown behind him he still says, 'sorry coach I had to get that.' He's making those plays for us that weren't made before with the tough catches. There's not going to be perfect throws all the time, hopefully they still make a play."

• Narduzzi said that after Calijah Kancey's 1.5 sack game he's going to get more reps at defensive tackle in the shuffle of players Pitt uses at the position.

"We rotate those guys through and Calijah had a heck of a game," Narduzzi said. "He's explosive, but we want to see him do that everyday in practice as well, so if you guys could pass that message on. It can't be a sometimes thing. I don't want to hear about gamers. I've had guys not practice very well but tell me, 'coach I'm a gamer.' But guess what, we're not going to find out about being a gamer if he doesn't get in there." 

"He's gotten better every week," Narduzzi continued. "Calijah is a football player, we know he's explosive and he has an ability to get to the quarterback. He dragged some people Saturday and just chucked them away. He'll get better, he's just still a baby and learning how to practice. He's learning from the older guys and it's just a matter of fitting into that culture and just the way we practice every single day. He's going to be a great player for us. Based on Saturday, his reps will increase, but so will his practice habits."

• Pitt will wear a new look, all black uniform to honor the city of Pittsburgh's history with the steel industry. You can see their preview of them here:

"All the steel in this city's history and with the Cathedral, I think it's a neat theme," Narduzzi said of the uniform. "I don't think our kids really know what they're putting on. But it's Pittsburgh through and through, it's the steel city, and we have to go out and play with some pride with those things on."

• Some of the younger players Narduzzi said he's focused on this week include freshman running back Israel "Izzy" Abanikanda and freshman defensive end Dayon Hayes out of Westinghouse High.

"Izzy is one of those guys at tailback I want to see have a great week in practice in explode," Narduzzi said. "I want to get Danny Maraga involved more as well. [Kamara] Bengally is a guy who's athletic and he's a got a good chance to be a good football player. We'll see what Dayon Hayes' got. He got reps last week and we want to see where he is, but with Rashad Weaver and Patrick Jones out there, it's tough to get young guys in there."

• Pitt announced Monday an official noon kickoff time against North Carolina State for Saturday, October 3rd at Heinz Field: