When he was asked how he has grown over the past four years, Jimmy Morrissey smiled and rubbed his chin with pride.

“I can grow facial here now, as you guys can see,” Pitt’s senior center said Tuesday over a Zoom call with reporters.

Of course, there’s more to Morrissey’s collegiate career than the need to shop for shaving cream.

He was a walk-on from La Salle College High School in the Philadelphia Catholic League who desperately wanted to play major college football. Pitt offered him the opportunity — but only as a tuition-paying walk-on — and he eagerly grabbed it.

“I took a chance with the advice of my mom and dad,” he said. “Luckily, it worked out for me.”

He sat out the 2016 season while redshirting, but he earned his scholarship the next year at the end of training camp. He has hung onto it through 45 starts, missing only the last three games of 2018 with a broken ankle.

He is a two-year captain, reigning All-ACC center after allowing zero sacks in 2019, holder of a degree in finance and marketing and a projected third- or fourth-round choice in the 2021 NFL Draft.

Yet, something’s missing.

He hopes to get a chance to find it Saturday in Death Valley, where Pitt is scheduled to play No. 4 Clemson.

This is the third Pitt-Clemson game of Morrissey’s career, but he has been a spectator for the first two. That makes No. 3 personal.

As a walk-on, he was OK with missing the first one in 2016. Sitting in room 613 of Sutherland Hall, with roommate Michael Vardzel and a dish of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, he watched Pitt upset Clemson, 43-42.

“We were very happy,” he said. “I remember everybody in my dorm room yelling and screaming.”

Two years later, the injury forced him to miss the ACC championship game against Clemson.

That one hurt. “Heartbreaking,” he said.

Clemson had four defensive linemen chosen in the following NFL Draft, three in the first round. Morrissey, 6-foot-3, 305 pounds, wanted to test himself against the best.

“That was the No. 1 game I was looking forward to that year,” he said. “I knew that was a big game for me to put my name on the map for as long as it goes for NFL teams looking at me.

“It was crushing. It was probably one of the worst things that ever happened in my life.”

But when the ACC reconfigured its schedules in the midst of the pandemic, Pitt was given a trip to play Clemson, a school that has won every ACC championship since 2015.

It will saddle Pitt with games against two of the top four teams in the nation, including No. 2 Notre Dame.

But Morrissey sees it as a gift. “I’m excited to go down there,” he said.

His sister, Ciara, is a junior there and probably will be the only Clemson student rooting for Pitt. Their parents, Jim and Shivaun, will be there, too. Morrissey said they haven’t missed one of his games since first grade.

The reality is Pitt (5-4, 4-4) is a 24½-point underdog (down from 26 ½), but none of that matters to Morrissey. He remembers how his 2016 teammates, who also were 5-4, believed they could upset Clemson.

He said he feels a similar vibe this week.

“The biggest thing I remember from that week,” he said, “is after our offensive unit meeting on Sunday night, when we went over the game before and we touched on Clemson real quick, it was really everybody who walked out of the room had a belief we were going to win that game.

“I think you see that in this team, too. We have a lot to prove.

“You hop on that plane to go down to Clemson, S.C., to win. You’re not going down there to lose. Every day, I show up (for practice) because we’re going to win this weekend.

“I’m not showing up just to practice, show up and give Clemson a fun win for them. We’re going down to beat Clemson.”

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