Pat Narduzzi reflects on 8 seasons at Pitt on the day Georgia Tech fires coach Geoff Collins

After Dave Wannstedt was fired in 2010 and in the four years before Pat Narduzzi arrived on the day after Christmas, 2014, Pitt football players called six men coach:

Three interims with one-game tenures, Michael Haywood, whose two weeks ended badly, and two others — Todd Graham and Paul Chryst — who never considered Pitt a destination job.

The future will tell us if Pitt is Narduzzi’s last job in what always has been a turbulent profession — he has a contract that will make him a multi-millionaire through 2030 — but it’s clear he has brought two elements to Pitt that its football program lacked for decades: stability and a championship.

Narduzzi on RI game and Geoff Collins’ firing at Georgia Tech. pic.twitter.com/dMjqn9pcKt

— Jerry DiPaola (@JDiPaola_Trib) September 26, 2022

He has his critics. Fans still bring up the late, unsuccessful field-goal try in a 17-10 loss to Penn State in 2019. Also, many wonder why he insists on putting cornerbacks on an island without serious safety help in defending deep passes.

But he wins games like almost no Pitt coach before him.

With the Panthers opening their ACC schedule Saturday night against Georgia Tech at Acrisure Stadium, the game occurs at a time when two distinctly different events are juxtaposed:

• The firing of Georgia Tech coach Geoff Collins on Monday.

• Narduzzi winning his 56th game Saturday, tying John Michelson (1955-65) for third in school history. Only legendary coaches Jock Sutherland (111) and Pop Warner (60) have won more. Narduzzi’s eight seasons represent the second-longest football coaching tenure at Pitt in the past 57 years (tied with Walt Harris).

Placing his name next to that of those three men is no trifling thing for Narduzzi, 56, whose father, Bill, was a graduate assistant under Michelosen in 1962, four years before Narduzzi was born.

“I knew this was his first college job,” he said. “I don’t know a whole bunch more. There’s not a whole lot of stuff in the books.”

Among the lessons he learned from his dad is the “we-not-me” mantra that he believes helps win games. He said 56 victories “just means I’m getting old.”

But he also takes genuine pride in telling people he’s the coach at Pitt.

“This is my job. My job is to come in here, rebuild it, create some stability as the head football coach here and win football games,” he said Monday when reporters pressed him on his time at Pitt. “What we try to do every week is go out and be 1-0. So you do take pride in it. That’s what Chancellor (Patrick) Gallagher and (former acting athletic director) Randy Juhl, when they hired me back in 2015, (expected).

“That’s what your job is and when you accomplish your job, that’s what you work for.

“This guy can’t do anything by himself. I haven’t made one tackle, one catch. We just get to watch them play on Saturdays. What I try to do every day is do the best I can do. That’s the truth, fact. Just try to lead.”

Narduzzi knows how difficult it is to win games in college football, a fact underscored by Collins’ firing after a 10-28 record in his fourth season.

“My thoughts go out (to Collins). It’s never easy,” he said.

Narduzzi and Collins shared a contentious handshake after Pitt’s victory against Georgia Tech in the last game of the 2020 season. The situation stemmed from a disagreement among players in the fourth quarter.

“You guys will talk about the handshake. But he’s a good dude,” Narduzzi said. “He was mad at the officials. He’s intense. He’s a good football coach.

“You never like to see that happen to anybody. I don’t care who it is. I don’t care what their record is. He has a family.”