Pitt football notebook: LT Jeff Persi returns to action vs. Notre Dame after 4-game absence

During Pitt’s eventual loss to No. 9 Notre Dame on Saturday, a player not seen in quite some time marched onto the field for his first game reps in six weeks.

It was Jeff Persi, the Panthers’ offensive lineman added in the offseason via the transfer portal (Michigan), who earned the starting left tackle gig coming out of fall camp.

Persi was a stalwart presence for the first four-plus games of the year but departed Pitt’s Oct. 4 win over Boston College with an apparent knee injury.

After recovering for a month-and-a-half, he returned to action vs. the Irish, albeit in a limited capacity, with coach Pat Narduzzi stating Monday that Persi is not at 100% health.

“We’re starting to work Jeff Persi back into the rotation now,” offensive line coach Jeremy Darveau said. “We’ll see how much he can handle. We wanted to take a little bit off him. We didn’t want him to really play a full game on Saturday. Obviously, he’s been out for some time, so you don’t want to just throw him out there and have him try to take every step when he hasn’t played football in a long time.

“… He’ll start getting a lot more reps. We’re counting on him to be a big part of what we’re doing at that left tackle spot.”

Darveau indicated that Kendall Stanley, a fellow transfer (UNC Charlotte) who took over at left tackle when Persi went down, will continue to play a major role at the position moving forward.

But left guard Ryan Carretta, himself a replacement after Keith Gouveia suffered a season-ending injury vs. Louisville, was forced to depart the Notre Dame game because of injury.

Stanley, who arrived at Pitt strictly as a tackle but began repping at guard once joining the program, could be rotated to the interior if needed, per Darveau.

“We’ll see what happens with Kendall, whether we play him inside or continue to play him outside,” Darveau said. “The week will tell how we’ll handle that.”

With the moving pieces up front, in a contest that featured significant overall offensive struggles, Pitt’s line had a rough game against the Irish. Quarterback Mason Heintschel was sacked four times, and the run game averaged only 2.8 yards per carry.

Darveau likened his unit’s performance to Oct. 18 against Syracuse, when it allowed a season-high seven sacks and Pitt went 4 of 15 on third down.

Against Notre Dame, Pitt was 0 for 13 on third down. Just one of those occasions featured a distance of less than 5 yards to gain.

On average, the Panthers faced a third-and-9 Saturday.

“Obviously, (Notre Dame) is a very talented defense,” Darveau said. “We knew they were a top-12 defense against the run. As far as challenges go, it goes back to where we were against Syracuse. We just didn’t perform on first and second down. We had (13) third downs, and (most) of them were third-and-5 or more.

“That’s a challenging position to be in both for players and playcaller, for coach Kade (Bell), to be in those situations. When it’s third-and-long, third-and-medium, we’ve got to perform a little bit better than we have been.”

DE health

Like Persi, Blaine Spires (Utah State) and Jaeden Moore (Oregon) were acquired from the portal to bolster Pitt in the trenches.

But the two defensive linemen have missed substantial time this year because of injuries.

Moore went down before fall camp ended, and Spires was sporting a cast on his hand to start the season.

Whereas Spires was healthy enough to play the first month but has missed four of Pitt’s last six games, playing sparingly vs. N.C. State and Notre Dame, Moore only debuted Nov. 1 at Stanford.

Moore posted a quarterback hurry in his first action vs. the Cardinal, but Spires missed that contest because of an injury and didn’t show up on the stat sheet vs. the Wolfpack or Irish.

Still, getting both defensive ends back at the tail end of the season could be impactful for Pitt’s rotation and particularly for Isaiah Neal, who’s pulled double duty switching between the end and his natural spot at tackle.

“They’re great athletes,” Neal said. “They help us so much just being able to play. They haven’t been fully active in terms of their rep count, but I feel like that’s going to improve as we keep playing a long season, just getting them back and active.

“But it helps tremendously. … We went and got these guys, and now we get to see and put on display what they can do to help us win.”