If Pat Narduzzi felt more pride than joy after Pitt’s last game, no one should be surprised.

Winning the final game by rolling over Georgia Tech, 34-20, was no insignificant feat, but only when you consider the massive performance in the ground game — 317 yards, or 217 above Pitt’s average for the first 10 games.

Sophomore Vincent Davis beat the average by nearly 1½ football fields (25 carries, 247 yards, one touchdown). Incredibly, considering previous failures in the run game, he lost yardage (1 yard) on only one carry.

“For a little guy (5-foot-8, 175 pounds), that guy’s got a lot of power, a lot of quickness,” Narduzzi said.

The run game had been Pitt’s major weakness throughout the season. This time, it won the game.

Georgia Tech finished 3-7, however, so let’s not get carried away.

How about this for accomplishing something that really matters? Just playing 11 games, regardless of their outcomes, is worth celebrating.

While many college football games across the country were canceled or postponed, Pitt’s players displayed admirable diligence in warding off the coronavirus.

Only one game (Georgia Tech) was postponed, and it was played eventually. Pitt released its number of covid-related absences before every game, and five times there were none. In two others, there was only one.

Before the season, center Jimmy Morrissey revealed how he planned to live his life during football season.

“I’m going to stay away from Oakland,” he said, indicating he would make a straight line every day between his South Side apartment and Pitt’s training facility a mile or two away. “I’ll be a little hermit in my apartment. It’s just the price we have to pay.”

Said Davis: “It was tough, but we bought in, tried to keep our complaints to ourselves and just roll and rock out.”

Narduzzi made an interesting point about his players’ discipline Thursday night: “Maybe the details off the field are better than on the field,” he said. Looking at everything that happened this season, he’s right.

When Miami’s game with Georgia Tech, scheduled for Dec. 19, was called off, that left Pitt as the only ACC team that played all three of the conference’s Top-10 teams (No. 2 Notre Dame, No. 3 Clemson and No. 10 Miami).

The schedule was difficult, but Pitt (6-5, 5-5 ACC) made it look even moreso with one-point losses to No. 23 N.C. State and Boston College. There was enough talent in the locker room to win eight games — the 2021 NFL Draft should prove that — but it turned into the 11th consecutive season with five or more defeats.

The season went sideways in many areas, perhaps starting with the ACC opener, an unimpressive, mistake-filled 21-10 victory against last-place Syracuse at Heinz Field.

After studying all 11 games, it should be an easy call to declare quarterback Kenny Pickett the team’s most valuable player. He threw for 2,408 yards, ran for 145 (and many more that wasn’t recorded just to avoid the pass rush and make a play), and he finished third all-time at Pitt with 8,552 total yards. Only Alex Van Pelt and Tino Sunseri gained more.

Pitt people don’t talk about such things, but Pickett surely endured some level of pain in the season’s last month after ankle surgery kept him out of the Miami and Notre Dame games.

Defensive ends Patrick Jones II and Rashad Weaver also need to be in the team MVP conversation after combining for 27½ tackles for a loss. Pitt’s 46 sacks (97 the past two seasons) also should take partial credit for the 14 interceptions that lead the ACC.

But don’t forget Alex Kessman, who finished second to Chris Blewitt in all-time Pitt kick scoring (341 points) and third overall behind Tony Dorsett and Blewitt. With two extra points and four short field goals in the Georgia Tech game, he passed James Conner.

But that was the discouraging point of the season in the minds of many, including Narduzzi: Too many field goals.

Pitt worked into the red zone on 47 occasions, but managed to cross the goal line only 27 times. Those 20 failures add up to a lot of missed scoring opportunities.

Kessman was brilliant from long range — 12 field goals of 50 or more yards in four years — but nine of his 23 this season were 29 or shorter. Pitt might have lost the N.C. State game by settling for two short field goals in the second quarter.

“Was it play-calling? Was it execution?” Narduzzi said Thursday. “It’s always a little bit of both. It’s on everybody.”

The future?

There are several reasons to be optimistic, with Davis, wide receiver Jordan Addison (60 receptions for 666 yards) and linebacker SirVocea Dennis (14½ TFLs) returning.

Redshirt freshman Joey Yellen completed fewer than half of his passes while replacing Pickett in the Miami and Notre Dame games. Davis Beville and Nick Patti haven’t played enough to get a good gauge on their potential.

Just sayin’: Transfer quarterbacks Tom Savage and Nathan Peterman have worked out well in the past.

Thanks, in part, to the four opt-outs, Narduzzi had an unexpected chance to get long looks at several young players. He was supportive of his veterans, but in a sense appreciative at the same time.

“Gives other guys opportunities to go make plays,” he said. “Just an opportunity to move on to 2021 and, hopefully, it’s not a covid year.”

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