Pitt’s special teams began the year in the splashiest of fashions.

In Week 1 vs. Duquesne, Desmond Reid returned a punt 88 yards for a score, and Kenny Johnson took a kick back 78 yards in the Panthers’ blowout win.

Special teams play remained competent in Weeks 2 and 3, despite Reid suffering an injury vs. West Virginia, prompting a shuffling of the deck at returner, with Johnson fielding punts and Deuce Spann handling kickoffs.

But last weekend against Louisville featured a catastrophic day for assistant coach Jacob Bronowski’s units, as two game-changing errors — a controversial muffed punt by Johnson and a fumble by punter Caleb Junko — directly led to 14 points for the Cardinals in their 34-27 win.

“Special teams: two gigantic, game-changing plays (that) affected the game in a big way,” coach Pat Narduzzi said Monday, reviewing the Panthers’ loss. “… Those are two plays that we haven’t done and we’ll never do again. Mark that down. That ain’t happening again.”

Bronowski, who joined Pitt in 2024 and also oversees the team’s tight ends, has been involved in special teams for the vast majority of his coaching career, dating to his graduate assistant days at New Mexico (2016-17).

So Bronowski grasps that when things are going swimmingly on special teams, a pat on the back isn’t always forthcoming. But when things go wrong — and that might be an understatement to describe the mishaps against Louisville — the scrutiny can be intense.

For Bronowski, what’s done is done. As soon as Saturday’s game ended, his mission became helping Pitt’s specialists move past the costly mishaps and work to ensure those situations don’t reoccur.

“Unfortunately, there were two situations that negatively impacted the game,” Bronowski said. “But to me, the thing I love about coaching this team is, you come in on Sunday, everybody’s locked in, guys are learning from it, everybody’s picking up the guys that had the issues and encouraging them. That’s ultimately what this is about. It’s all about how we respond.”

Of the two special teams fiascos Saturday, Junko’s appeared more preventable. A routine long snap went through the senior punter’s hands, leading to a fumble and turnover on downs deep inside Pitt’s territory.

Bronowski hopes to use the miscue as a message of emphasizing unrelenting attention to detail among his special teamers.

“I think the biggest thing is it’s a great reminder for all of us, myself included: fourth down, you can’t afford to have any type of mental lapse,” Bronowski. “You can’t let up ever.”

Junko, navigating his third season as Pitt’s full-time punter, began the year with high personal expectations in what is his final collegiate campaign.

He is averaging 44.3 yards per punt on 15 attempts. In 2024, Junko punted 58 times for a 43.7-yard average.

“I think (vs. Louisville) was a little bit of a down game for him, and I think he would say that same thing, too,” Bronowski said. “I think the biggest thing this year is his kick locations have been great. He’s painting the sidelines, and everything’s been outside of the numbers.

“Last game, he left a couple towards the middle of the field, so he’s got to clean that up. But I think he’s improved a ton there.”

If there’s been a consistent shining star on special teams for Pitt, it has been kicker Trey Butkowski, who continues to impress as a true freshman.

Butkowski is 8 of 9 on field goals, with a long of 46 yards. On extra-point attempts, he has converted 17 of 18.

He has drilled all three field-goal attempts within 30 yards and is 3 for 3 on tries of 30-39 yards.

Butkowski’s only miss came at West Virginia, when he failed to hit a 43-yarder in the first quarter.

However, Butkowski rebounded, making attempts from 23 and 46 yards in front of the hostile Milan Puskar Stadium crowd.

The first-year Panthers kicker has handled the pressures of his responsibilities well.

“To be quite honest, there haven’t been much (nerves),” Butkowski said. “I thought I’d be way more nervous, especially in that Duquesne game, my first game in college. I thought the nerves would be high and there’d be a lot more nerves than there were. But I like to think I was able to put a cap on that and maintain a level through all the ups and downs that I’ve faced.”

When Butkowski earned the starting job out of fall camp, Narduzzi and Bronowski had to reckon with the reality that they were entrusting precious points to a player fresh out of high school.

But the month-long sample size Butkowski has put forth has done much to establish trust in his reliability.

“I’d be lying if I told you that the first game, sending a 17- or 18-year-old guy out there, (I thought), ‘Oh yeah, he’s going to make every single one,’ ” Bronowski admitted. “But I was always really confident in Trey. That’s one thing I loved about him in the recruiting process: He’s a very stoic, poised, competitive guy.”

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