Pitt went into 2020 with a starting safety pair that projected to be one of the best in the country in Paris Ford and Damar Hamlin. But Ford's opting out in the middle of the season opened the door for a new playmaker in the secondary who's still getting his feet under him in redshirt sophomore Brandon Hill.
The 5-foot-11, 195 lbs. redshirt sophomore out of Apopka, Fl. quickly made his presence felt last season with an interception he returned for a touchdown against Florida State in his first career start, clinching the Panthers' first road win of the season and snapping a four-game losing streak.
After only two starts last year, he's become an asset to the Panthers' defense by leading the team in tackles (20), interceptions (1) and pass breakups (2) through four games. He's still learning, but when asked Wednesday how much those games last season helped, Hill wasn't shy about getting his feet wet.
"They were very important," Hill said of the games he started in 2020. "They allowed me to get the reps I needed to develop myself and chemistry with my teammates. That got better during spring and summer camp and we're ready to have a great season."
"He's still growing and maturing," safeties coach Corey Sanders said of Hill on Tuesday. "He's still seeing a lot of things for the first time, so he's not quite a veteran yet. If you've seen Brandon last year to this year, he has gotten more comfortable in his coverage. He's also a very fast kid. He chased down that long run against Tennessee."
Sanders ran down Tennessee quarterback Joe Milton III on a 54-yard quarterback draw that caught the Panthers off-guard. Milton, a fast runner himself, had the angle to get to the end zone until Hill broke on the play and ran him down to make the stop. That effort kept Tennessee out of the end zone on a drive that would eventually result in a field goal in a big 41-34 win for the Panthers in the second week of the season.
That speed for Hill has been a major asset for the Panthers' defense as he continues to get acclimated as a starting safety.
If you walk around Pitt's practice facility in the UPMC Rooney Sports Complex, you can see the fastest speeds reached by players from the Panthers' most recent game flashed on TV screens. Against New Hampshire, Hill was the fastest player being listed as reaching 22.93 miles per hour. That's faster than Jordan Addison's 21.85 miles per hour he reached on a short pass he took 47 yards for a touchdown in one of his three scores on the day.
For a comparison, Raiders receiver Henry Ruggs III was recorded hitting 21.42 miles per hour in his 61-yard touchdown against the Steelers when they visited Heinz Field in week two. That's the fourth-fastest time posted by any NFL player this season according to the NFL's Next Gen Stats. Both Addison and Hill still clock in faster than the fastest NFL player recorded this season, which was Trenton Cannon at 21.7 miles per hour on a 68-yard kick return for the 49ers.
"It's always friendly competition," Hill said when asked about the listed speeds for the Panthers. "The receivers and defensive backs joke around about it but it's about practicing hard so that we are used to flying around all the time and in the game, things slow down for us. If we're going 100 miles per hour in practice then it translates during games so that everybody is flying."
"I wouldn't say I'm the fastest," Hill continued. "We have a lot of fast dudes but I'm definitely up there. In my opinion, Jordan Addison right now is the fastest or Marquise Williams."
The next-fastest players listed from the New Hampshire game was fellow safety Erick Hallett II at 21.93 miles per hour and Williams at 21.04 miles per hour. It's part of what Pat Narduzzi preaches on defense with playing fast, aggressive and locking in on a player's assignment so that each play the Panthers have eleven men flying at full speed to make life hard for opposing offenses.
"Me and Erick have a great relationship on and off the field," Hill said of Hallett. "We look at each other across the field every play. We work on how we communicate and talk off the field so that we can better know each other on the field."
"His best growth has ben how comfortable he is in coverage now," Sanders said of Hill. "You also can see him directing things better. Him and Erick working together has been great and Erick has been phenomenal directing the team and talking overall to make sure we're on the same page."
Pitt's defense needed to send a message against an obviously inferior opponent in New Hampshire last week after it gave up 44 points to Western Michigan the week before in the Panthers' only loss of the season. It was the second week the Panthers gave up more than 30 points in a game, and something the defense needed to rectify.
"Of course," Hill said when asked if there's a chip on the shoulder of Pitt's defense after giving up 44 points to Western Michigan. "That's not the kind of image we want to put on TV as a Pitt defense. We took that on the chin, but now we've worked on correcting it and now we have to keep it going."
But now, Pitt doesn't get an FCS opponent like New Hampshire to pick on. Georgia Tech may be 2-2, but it's coming off a 45-21 beatdown of No. 21 ranked North Carolina last week.
"This is going to be a tough battle," Sanders said of Georgia Tech. "They just got after North Carolina so now we have to lock in and control what we control. As the first ACC game the intensity will ramp up naturally."
Georgia Tech has two athletic quarterbacks in Jordan Yates and Jeff Sims who can both make plays with their legs and create opportunities to throw the ball if not contained in the pocket. It's something Narduzzi made sure to highlight in his Monday press conference, and something the Panthers are well aware of during preparations this week.
"Their offense can get going fast," Hill said of Georgia Tech's offense. "They've been on the road these past games, so we have to come out like we did last week to start early and finish fast. They'll look for explosive plays on the ground and we have to stop the run. It's going to be about intensity and physicality."
That's where Hill's speed comes into play for the Panthers. Not just flying around to stop any runners, but keeping up with Georgia Tech's playmakers who might work to break open if either of the Yellow Jackets' quarterbacks extend plays.
Pitt's defense struggled against the run-pass-option offense that Western Michigan used two weeks ago. Part of how Narduzzi's plans for the Panthers to do better against Georgia Tech's use of such concepts is to better train the eyes of his defenders to stick to reading the keys being coached to them.
For Hill and the secondary, those eyes are all about reading and reacting to their coverage assignments rather than trying to watch the quarterback, and trusting the Panthers' defensive front to handle that.
"Coach Sanders has definitely harped on our eyes," Hill said. "Once your eyes get to the quarterback, you tend to drift off your receiver. Lock your eyes onto your man. You need to see your target so you're not running blind out there. That way you know where you're going and you're reading your keys."
"As a defensive back, when I see a quarterback scramble you want to stay in coverage and lock on to your man," Hill continued. "Short routes can turn into long routes and long routes can comeback to be short routes when they roll out. We have to keep our eyes on our men and trust our front seven to get after the quarterback."
But how does Pitt coach such a thing? According to Sanders, the Panthers' coaching staff tracks where the eyes of each defender go during each play and go over with them how efficiently they're reading their keys.
"Those stripes," Sanders said when asked how the staff coaches the players' eyes. "We always watch on film where the stripe on the helmet is pointed. It's a big thing. We mark and grade our guys on eye evaluations. For example, if they had nine opportunities on a receiver's breaks, were they 7 of 9, 8 of 9, or 9 of 9? We grade that every day to make sure it's a strong emphasis and they don't get lazy with their eye focus."
By using the stripe of a defender's helmet, Sanders and the Pitt coaches are noting where the focus of each defender is on each play. That delves right into what defensive coordinator Randy Bates said last week about Pitt's defensive players sticking to their assignments and not coming off them even if they think they're helping a teammate.
It's not all that new of something to chart, but Sanders did note there's been an increased focus on that part of the Panthers' coaching after a few games.
"We have been doing it," Sanders said about tracking Pitt defenders' eyes. "But we've turned it up more on tracking it. We had a few things that got us early on so now we focus on it daily. It's always something we have to be hard on our guys about."
That sounds a lot like Narduzzi emphasizing that as a coaching change early in the season to help Pitt's defense make less mistakes. The Panthers will get to see if such changes make any impact in their first ACC game against Georgia Tech Saturday at noon in Atlanta, Ga.
