Pitt Take 5: Pondering the offensive line and key losses on defense

Amidst covid outbreaks, cancellations and reconfigurations, most of us wondered if there would be a college football season this year.

But Pitt has been preparing almost without interruption most of the summer, and the scheduled opener is only 15 days away. The season will start one week late, but that’s a minuscule price to pay under the circumstances.

Here are five topics to consider as Pitt gets ready to meet Austin Peay on Sept. 12. (Austin Peay reached the FCS quarterfinals last season, but is best known for basketball player Fly Williams, a high-scoring streetballer from Brooklyn who in the 1970s inspired fans to chant, “Fly is open. Let’s go Peay.”)

1. Run the ball

That’s been the theme of training camp over the first three weeks, and no one knows that better than junior left tackle Carter Warren.

“Our boys have been stressing we have to run the ball,” Warren said. “We have to be good at it if we want to win championships.”

One of the keys to the season will be how the offensive line comes together. Three starters return, including one who was first-team All-ACC. This could turn in a strength before too long.

Pat Narduzzi admitted line coach Dave Borbely gave the line a C grade after the 123-play scrimmage last Saturday. But Borbely is a perfectionist — what line coach isn’t? — and there’s still time to improve.

“Of course, he yells at us,” Warren said of Borbely. “He just tells us the mistakes we made. We can’t make them again.”

There is some depth, with Carson Van Lynn pushing Warren and Gabe Houy (Upper St. Clair) and Keldrick Wilson, a transfer from Hampton (Va.) University, competing at right tackle. Guards Jake Kradel (Butler) and Blake Zubovic (Belle Vernon) are in the mix, too.

Warren, who has lost 5 pounds from 320, is eager for the start of the season. “I’ve come a long way,” he said.

Warren added that the unit is starting to develop cohesion.

“I feel like when we take the field, it’s one band, one sound,” he said.

2. What about the defense?

No one thought that would be a question so close to the season, but the defense that shared the lead in sacks per game last season (3.9) lost six important players from last year’s unit. That includes two losses that were unexpected as recently as a month ago.

After cornerback Dane Jackson was drafted by the Buffalo Bills, tackle Jaylen Twyman opted out and cornerback Damarri Mathis was lost for the season with a non-football injury. The linebacker group is rebuilt, but with holdovers Chase Pine, Cam Bright and Phil Campbell III. Mathis’ situation hurts the most because it was so avoidable.

Still, ends Patrick Jones II and Rashad Weaver and safeties Paris Ford and Damar Hamlin are elite. Said Narduzzi of Ford, “Paris is beautiful.” (Who knew Pitt’s coach was such a romantic?)

“Two first-rounders,” Warren said of Weaver and Jones. “It doesn’t get any better than that.”

But there are no guarantees. Pitt led the nation in sacks in 2009, too, but failed to stop N.C. State and Russell Wilson, West Virginia and Cincinnati in its only three losses (by a total of 11 points).

3. Morrissey sets the tone

Former walk-on Jimmy Morrissey is a welcome sight on the field and when he enters the practice facility in the morning.

“I look at Jimmy as another coach,” Warren said. “He tells you the right and wrong, the dos and don’ts. He has the answer to a lot of things. That makes him a great leader in my opinion.”

Then, there’s Jimmy the regular guy.

“He changed a lot of people’s lives in this building,” Warren said. “Everybody in the building, from the janitor to the security (people). He comes in every morning and says hello to everybody. He knows everyone’s name.”

4. The pandemic’s effect

With most of spring practice canceled and much of the summer disjointed, there may be several mistakes and penalties early in the season.

But Narduzzi said his team might be smarter, thanks to repeated Zoom meetings while everyone was quarantined. Pitt sent a grease board to every player’s home to use in those meetings.

“I know I’m going to put a better team out there on the field this year, offensively, than we did last year against Virginia (in the opener),” he said. “Just knowing what they’re doing.

“They are way ahead mentally than where they were.”

Narduzzi said meetings were good because coaches, who weren’t permitted to recruit on the road, could spend more time with current players (even if it was virtually).

“(Most) of the kids I talked to (said), ‘Coach, I learned so much. You were able to go into more detail.’ ”

Borbely even conducted what was called an empty clinic in which blocking schemes were discussed when the quarterback is alone in the backfield.

“Right now, our guys are pretty crisp,” Narduzzi said.

5. Tough schedule

Each ACC team will have 10 conference games, two more than usual, ratcheting up the intensity scale 20% in the quest for a conference championship.

Pitt also lost annual opponents Duke, North Carolina and Virginia while the ACC replaced them with No. 1 Clemson, Louisville, N.C. State and Boston College. The game against No. 10 Notre Dame now counts as a conference game.

Plus, six of Pitt’s 10 ACC games are against teams that received votes in the Associated Press preseason poll.