Pitt's collapse hits new low with more coaching, quarterback blunders

NEW YORK -- How does Pitt build for its future?

Start spreading the news. That question has to be answered by Pat Narduzzi in this final two-plus weeks of the 2023 season. The systems hang in the balance and the threads are unraveling by each ticking second of the remainder of the worst season in his tenure as head coach.

An ugly game. A messy order of events. A 28-13 Syracuse victory over the Panthers in the midst of commemorating the 100th anniversary of the first football game played in the Bronx borough of New York City. It would have made the players that took the field 100 years ago proud.

"It's a smattering of things," Narduzzi said. "You look at it and it's never one thing. It's 11 guys on the field at one time, and we didn't run the ball well enough, and they did. ... Our team is together in the locker room, I guarantee you that. We're on a short week. Thursday night, Boston College, that's where our focus goes. We've got practice tomorrow. Tomorrow's Tuesday already. We'll be back to work early tomorrow morning and getting ready."

Of course, though, those players 100 years ago were still learning how to revolutionize a relatively new concept known as the "forward pass." 

This is nothing new to Pitt, whose offense sputtered time after time and, if not for this sequence of plays made by Bub Means and Konata Mumpfield, could have been considered at a total loss for the umpteenth time this season.

First, it was Christian Veilleux's strike to Means for a 67-yard gain to the Syracuse 13-yard line. Then, it was Veilleux's threading to Mumpfield for a 10-yard score to give Pitt a 10-7 lead with 2:30 left in the first half.

Other than this, Pitt produced a whole lot of "meh" and much more "oh, no, why?" from this offense. Again. From Frank Cignetti Jr. and his system of play calling. The yardage total at the end of the game was 269 for the worst scoring and total offense in the ACC.

The "meh" and the "oh, no, why?" extended to Narduzzi and his systems.

Take, for instance, the conclusion of a series early in the second quarter. Pitt lined up for a 50-yard Ben Sauls field-goal try, only for a false start on center Terrence Moore to negate the try that would have flown wide right of the uprights. Narduzzi kept his field goal unit on the field, only to pull them off late and burn a timeout to swap for his punt unit. That Caleb Junko wobbled 37 yards to the goal line, where two Panthers gunners failed to keep it from rolling into the end zone.

It was the lesser of the many evils portrayed in a football game that had a bunch of evil afoot. Pitt football rarely is eye candy, but this brand of Pitt football has become hard to digest despite results. It's simply ... boring. And, it takes warts along with being boring.

This Veilleux pick-six, secured by Jayden Bellamy and taken 23 yards to the house, is a prime example. Veilleux stared down Kenny Johnson and didn't force Bellamy to have to make a tough play on the ball in the slightest:

Those will happen, but they happened far too often Saturday. Veilleux turned it over three times with two fumbled handoff exchanges included, and Syracuse scored touchdowns off of all three instances. Pitt turned it over for the fourth time in the second half on a Rodney Hammond fumble with 4:21 remaining, but Syracuse ran the clock out to the end of the game.

"I thought it was a great game plan," Jake Kradel said. "Coach Cig and the coaches, they had us ready. I repeat myself by saying we have to execute, but we just do. That's the truth of the matter. We can't turn the ball over four times and that's on the players and we've got to take care of the ball. Wins will come if we take care of the ball and execute."

Veilleux was pulled with 14:19 to play in favor of Nate Yarnell after he completed 13 of 22 passes for 161 yards, a touchdown, an interception, and his two fumbles.

Narduzzi did not outwardly commit to Veilleux as the starting quarterback for Thursday's game against Boston College.

"I don't know. We're going to look at the tape and find out," Narduzzi said.

Meanwhile, this Syracuse team that took the field opposite Pitt is floundering. It won its first four games of the season and lost the next five to follow entering Saturday. It started Garrett Shrader at quarterback, who missed last week's game with an injury and lacked a noticeable zip on his passes on this Saturday.

Shrader is a mobile quarterback, and Dino Babers was content with letting him be one. Shrader rushed 14 times for 96 yards and a touchdown. 

But, Orange tight end Dan Villari -- a former quarterback at Michigan -- led the way in fun from the backfield. He added 17 carries for a team-high 154 yards and a touchdown. Orange running back LeQuint Allen carried the ball 28 times for 102 yards.

Syracuse rushed for 382 yards and passed for 17. Everybody in this building knew they were running it at all times from the jump, except for the one calling Pitt's defense. The Orange's rushing output was the most in a single game in Babers' eight years at Syracuse against a Football Bowl Subdivision opponent.

Just like on this 21-yard touchdown run to give the Orange a 14-13 lead with 7:24 left in the third quarter.

And this 27-yard touchdown run from Villari to give the Orange a 28-13 lead with 14:19 to play.

"Obviously they didn't plan on passing," Narduzzi said. "I'm not sure Shrader could throw it. He hadn't played for the last couple of weeks. Didn't even know he was going to go today. Had no idea who the starting quarterback was. You work for (backup Carlos) Del Rio(-Wilson) and everybody else, and you don't know what's really going on. They did a lot of stuff that we had not practiced. But we tried to adjust as we went. Obviously tackling has something to do with that and we'll watch that and see who missed and where we executed wrong, but 66 rushes -- they were on the field for a long time -- and we didn't tackle well enough."

The Pitt defense was not going to replicate its stalwart effort in the 2022 matchup against Syracuse, but better was still expected in supplementing an offense that was not going to go anywhere any time soon.

Better had been expected from this defensive line full of super seniors. This line was in the pipeline that saw Patrick Jones, Rashad Weaver, Jaylen Twyman, and reigning ACC Defensive Player of the Year Calijah Kancey get selected by the NFL since 2020. 

The Panthers had owned Syracuse in recent memory in the trenches. The Orange rushed for 25 total yards in the 2022 game, and Pitt held Sean Tucker -- now an NFL running back and the third-leading rusher in Syracuse history -- to 71 rushing yards in total in three games in his career.

The case couldn't have been any more different Saturday. The Orange rushed for 103 yards in its first two drives -- 75 on the opening drive -- and kept pouring it on throughout the game. This Panthers defensive line doesn't have Kancey to make up for deficiencies anymore. Aside from a Dayon Hayes forced fumble and a recovery by David Green, this defensive line hardly had any other punch to it. This defense prided on sacks and stuffing the run underwent a drastic change with the loss of Kancey, and it has made very few positive strides through 10 games.

"It's definitely frustrating, especially because it bleeds the clock, keeps the offense on the field," Javon McIntyre said. "Definitely frustrating, but we know as a defense and as a whole we're going to come together and find a way to stop the run, especially next week. ... We keep our head up with the love for each other in the locker room. We've all got love for each other so we all know what we're capable of as a team."

Of course, the final two games to conclude the season -- against Boston College in a short week and at Duke -- are likely not going to look much different.

That's not to say, though, that a head-start for 2024 cannot be accomplished. 

Veilleux and Yarnell are still learning how to play his position and will have the entire offseason to grow and develop. It is becoming increasingly likely this staff undergoes changes before the time the 2024 spring game arrives. The systems in place can be tweaked, just as they likely were to a degree even with Narduzzi having zero turnover to his coaching staff entering 2023.

The transfer portal window and the National Signing Day in December will be significant, as they always are, but this needs more than a Band-Aid to be put back together. There is not a time like the present to get it started.

Before it's too late.

"We, obviously, as coaches, have to put them in position to make plays," Narduzzi said. "... Very comfortable with what we had and what we were doing. There's no doubt about it. We're always comfortable going in with our offense, defense, and special teams game plan. Sometimes it works, sometimes they don't. That's where we've got to look, as coaches, to make sure they work all the time."

THE ESSENTIALS

• Boxscore
• Live file
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• Scoreboard
• Schedule
• Standings
• Statistics

THE HIGHLIGHTS

THE INJURIES

• Out for the season: G Ryan Jacoby (leg), OT Matt Goncalves (foot), DB Rashad Battle (foot).

THE SCHEDULE

Pitt (2-8, 1-5 ACC) is on a short week, as Boston College (6-4, 3-3) visits Acrisure Stadium for the Panthers' final home game of the season at 7 p.m. Thursday. I will have you covered.

THE CONTENT

• Visit the Pitt team page for more from Yankee Stadium.