Pitt throttles No. 15 Georgia Tech early, hangs on to keep ACC title game hopes alive

A simple proposition awaited Pitt on Saturday in Atlanta ahead of kickoff with No. 15 Georgia Tech: win and stay in the ACC title game hunt or lose and have the season’s top goal slip from its grasp.

The course of the ACC season, its many tiers of tiebreakers and Pitt’s own performance required the Panthers to steal a win at Bobby Dodd Stadium to remain alive.

Pitt throttled Georgia Tech to start, scoring the game’s first 28 points before fighting off a fierce Yellow Jackets rally en route to a 42-28 win in the biggest game of the year.

“Our kids played their butts off today on the road down in Atlanta,” coach Pat Narduzzi said on the 93.7 FM postgame show. “I couldn’t be more proud of our football team. The attitude they took all week — they knew it as a must-win game. We came down and stole it.”

One contest removed from an offensive clunker against No. 9 Notre Dame, Mason Heintschel and Co. were electric early but faltered in the second half, as Georgia Tech rallied to within a touchdown late in the fourth quarter.

But Ja’Kyrian Turner delivered the knockout blow to the Yellow Jackets after they had come within 35-28 of Pitt, exploding for a 56-yard touchdown run to make it 42-28 with 2:41 to play.

Pitt (8-3, 6-1 ACC) was without Desmond Reid for the fourth time and second straight week, but Turner more than did his part, rushing for 186 yards on 20 carries.

Heintschel completed 20 of 27 passes for 226 yards and three total touchdowns.

Defensively, the Panthers contained Georgia Tech’s vaunted offense, ranked No. 1 nationally in yards per game (496.7) entering the night.

The Yellow Jackets (9-2, 6-2) had only 111 at halftime, finishing with 378 total.

Heisman Trophy contender Haynes King was mostly held in check through the air and on the ground.

He threw two picks in the loss — including a 100-yard pick-six to Braylan Lovelace in the third quarter — but had 333 all-purpose yards and three touchdowns.

In the third quarter, Georgia Tech cut Pitt’s lead to 28-14 and was at the Panthers 5-yard line when Lovelace seemingly sucked the air out of the comeback effort and made it 35-14 instead of potentially 28-21.

But the Panthers lost most of their offensive steam in the second half, and a failed fake punt set up the Yellow Jackets inside Pitt’s 40-yard line down 35-21 with about seven minutes to play.

Six plays later, it was a one-score game as King found Isiah Canion in the end zone for the second time.

Then came Turner’s touchdown, sparing Narduzzi from having to live with a game-altering fake punt call.

The Panthers struck on their second drive of the game, as Heintschel found Kenny Johnson for a 31-yard touchdown strike to go up 7-0 with 7:49 remaining in the opening quarter.

After Pitt’s defense stuffed Georgia Tech on a fourth-and-3 try near midfield, the offense responded with a six-play, 55-yard touchdown drive to go up 14-0 with 3:13 still remaining in the first quarter.

Heintschel hit tight end Justin Holmes from 19 yards for the score.

A horrid start for the Yellow Jackets continued soon thereafter, as King was intercepted by Kavir Bains-Marquez on third down to set up Pitt at Georgia Tech’s 28.

With 39 seconds still in the first quarter, the Panthers were up 21-0, courtesy of a short Juelz Goff touchdown.

As the second quarter commenced, Pitt didn’t let up, as a 3-yard run by Heintschel with 11:48 left before halftime made it 28-0 Panthers.

“Everything was working,” Heintschel told reporters in Atlanta. “We were playing in rhythm. We were able to get our tempo going and were able to execute at a high level. I wish we could have done that in the second half, but we made up for it when we needed it the most.”

With 4:45 left in the half, Georgia Tech finally got on the board on a short King keeper that capped a long 15-play, 75-yard drive.

The Yellow Jackets set up their score by successfully converting a fourth-and-4 from Pitt’s 13-yard line.

The touchdown ultimately was a self-inflicted wound by Pitt, which had forced a fourth down near midfield, only for an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on Rasheem Biles to move the sticks.

A litany of Pitt mishaps allowed Georgia Tech to manufacture some momentum late in the half and make it a 28-14 game.

The Panthers first saw a possession implode, with Heintschel sacked twice in quick succession before being flagged for intentional grounding.

Caleb Junko’s ensuing punt then travelled only 17 yards, thanks to a bad bounce.

Pitt was also flagged for a facemask on the punt, giving the Yellow Jackets the ball at Pitt’s 30-yard line with 2:05 on the clock.

The result was King hitting Canion for a 5-yard score.

The Panthers responded well to the burst of energy from Georgia Tech but came up empty.

Getting the ball back with 1:08 left in the half, Heintschel marched the offense to the 22-yard line, setting up a 40-yard field goal try as time expired.

Making the attempt was Sam Carpenter, subbing in for Trey Butkowski (illness) for the second straight game.

Carpenter missed, shanking the ball wide left, but an offside call on Georgia Tech gave him another shot from 35 yards.

That try, too, was no good, as Pitt maintained its 28-14 lead at halftime.

Georgia Tech looked to build more momentum in the third quarter, and its opening drive penetrated to Pitt’s 5-yard line, but King instead was picked off by Lovelace at the goal line, resulting in a 100-yard pick-six.

With 5:55 left in the third, Pitt was in front 35-14 thanks to their fourth pick-six of the year, three of which have been by linebackers.

“I dropped in pass coverage and I saw the hook and the curl coming behind me,” Lovelace said after the win. “I just read the quarterback’s eyes, saw the ball and made a play.”

Georgia Tech made it a 35-21 game with about eight-and-a-half minutes to go on a short Jamal Haynes touchdown rush.

With 4:51 to play, Pitt’s lead had dwindled to 35-28, as Narduzzi’s fake punt gamble on fourth-and-9 backfired, giving Georgia Tech a short field, with the Yellow Jackets cashing in for a touchdown.

But Narduzzi and the Panthers sideline could sigh in relief as Turner busted upfield for his long touchdown run on the offense’s next possession.

“That was a big-time run by (Turner) at the end,” Narduzzi said. “You look at Lovelace’s (100-yard) interception — those were our 14 points in the second half. We didn’t muster up much offensively besides that big run by (Turner). We made some mistakes, but we’ll clean that stuff up.”

From there, Georgia Tech’s next possession resulted in a turnover on downs at Pitt’s 43-yard-line with 88 seconds to go.