Amid college coaching carousel, Pitt's Pat Narduzzi declares, 'I'm all about loyalty'

Sitting in Pat Narduzzi’s office inside Pitt’s South Side training facility is an old, folded-up piece of paper that his father, Bill Narduzzi, kept in his pocket.

Why does he keep it?

“It’s called loyalty,” Narduzzi said of what the words on that scrap of paper represent. “I’m all about loyalty.”

The topic surfaced Thursday while Narduzzi was chatting with reporters two days before Pitt’s appearance in the ACC championship game against Wake Forest.

In the past few days, The Athletic linked his name to the Notre Dame job vacated when Brian Kelly left for LSU and a 10-year, $95 million contract. Also, college football reporter Dennis Dodd tweeted last week that if Narduzzi took another job, he would stay through the ACC title game.

IF — big IF — Pat Narduzzi goes elsewhere hearing he will stay throughout the ACC champ game.

— Dennis Dodd (@dennisdoddcbs) November 25, 2021

So, it was no surprise Thursday when Narduzzi was asked about the current climate in college football with coaches suddenly changing jobs and salaries on the rise. Michigan State’s Mel Tucker, who’s only in his second season, recently received a 10-year, $95 million contract extension. Penn State coach James Franklin’s new deal runs through 2031 and will pay him $80 million.

“I’m all about loyalty. It ain’t about the money,” Narduzzi said “It should never be about the money.

“You see some of these (coaches say), ‘I can’t turn it down.’ Supposedly, everybody’s out of money. Because of covid, you couldn’t have people in the stands last year. But they’re finding it somewhere. But they can’t find enough money (to raise the scholarship limit) to make sure everybody gets an extra year. They put coaches in the bind where we can only be on 85 scholarships. It doesn’t make sense. We have all this money to throw around. But what are we doing for the kids?”

He said he doesn’t want to criticize coaches “for taking a job or not taking a job.”

Yet, he added, “It’s not good for the profession.”

Wake Forest coach Dave Clawson recently received a contract extension after, he said, rumors of him taking another job were getting out of hand.

“I had planned on, hopefully, signing an extension when the season was over because of how well our players had played,” Clawson said. “I did not want an announcement of my extension before the season. I thought that would be a distraction.

“But when these rumors kept coming up, it started impacting recruiting. Other coaches were using it against us and some coaches on our staff shared with me that players had asked them about it. The distraction of the players thinking I might be leaving was outweighing the distraction of announcing an extension.”

Narduzzi said he doesn’t believe reports of him being linked to other jobs bother his players. The situation also surfaced two years ago when the Michigan State job was available.

“I don’t remember it being that big of a deal,” quarterback Kenny Pickett told Pantherlair.com this week. “I think, probably, because he addressed it in a meeting. If I know coach Duzz, he’d have to get out in front of it and talk to us directly. His door is always open.”

Said Narduzzi: “I think our kids know where I stand. But things happen and you see Brian Kelly leave in the middle of the night, you kind of wonder.”

Narduzzi is one of 10 Power 5 coaches competing for conference championships Friday and Saturday. Nine of them have been with their teams for at least four seasons and the list includes Alabama’s Nick Saban , Utah’s Kyle Whittingham and Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz who have been with their schools for 16, 18 and 23 seasons, respectively.

Narduzzi has been at Pitt for seven seasons, and he is the university’s second-longest tenured football coach in the past 56 years.

“I’m happy in Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh is my home,” he said.

Narduzzi was hired as a first-time head coach in 2014, and he has received strong support from Pitt Chancellor Patrick Gallagher and athletic director Heather Lyke, who extended his contract through 2024 after a 5-7 season in 2017.

“It’s about the people. It’s about being happy every day,” Narduzzi said. “I turned down five head coaching jobs before I took the right one. I could have doubled my money with Kevin Sumlin at Texas A&M a long time ago. I said, ‘No.’

“Most people don’t do that. I’m not like some of these other guys. Two days before I took this job, I turned down Colorado State. You turn down Colorado State, you may never have another opportunity to be a head coach.

“I turned down UConn. I’m making $800,000. I turned down $3 million. I’m an idiot, right? But it ain’t about that. It’s never going to be about that.”