Pitt Bringing Different Energy to River City Rivalry Matchup

The River City Rivalry between Pitt and Cincinnati will take center stage at Nippert Stadium for 14^th time in the series’ history on Saturday.

Pitt will walk into a raucous environment of 37,000-plus Bearcat fans in the heart of their campus. The Panthers are looking to avenge last season’s let down and win its first game in the rivalry since 2010 – a game infamously known for the Cincinnati mascot and company pelting Dion Lewis with snowballs.

For Pitt head coach Pat Narduzzi, it also marks the first time returning to Cincinnati since he served as the defensive coordinator under Mark Dantonio from 2004-06. One of Narduzzi’s athletes at the time happened to be current Pitt linebackers coach Ryan Manalac, who played for the Bearcats from 2005-08.

“Looking forward to a trip down to Cincinnati,” Narduzzi said on Thursday. “Old stomping grounds down there. It will be a good time.”

It’s also the last matchup between the old Big East foes for the foreseeable future.

“It’s a rivalry game I’d like to see played again. It’s not far away. There’s something to it. You can’t play everyone though,” Narduzzi said.

Last fall, Cincinnati provided the first true test of the season at Acrisure Stadium with the Panthers mounting 20 wins the previous two seasons.

However, the Bearcats jumped out to a 20-7 lead at half time as Pitt failed to keep up with disastrous quarterback play from Phil Jurkovec, who went 10-for-32 (31%) with 179 yards passing and three touchdowns and received boos from the home faithful.

Pittsburgh Panthers quarterback Phil Jurkovec (5) September 9, 2023 David Hague/PSN

Pitt’s run defense was also gashed repeatedly as the Bearcats ran for 216 yards in the 27-21 defeat.

This time around, the Panthers are hoping to erase those demons of the past and there seems to be a shifted mentality this year.

“It’s been great,” Narduzzi said about Pitt’s energy heading into the matchup. “We had a leadership meeting in here [Thursday] morning and said how’s the team, picking their brains. It’s just different. I don’t know why. It’s beyond me. They didn’t know last year, so our guys know the difference between this year and last year.”

With the River City Rivalry taking a hiatus after this season, Pitt is hoping to have the last laugh and bragging rights for the coming years.

Pitt will depend on another strong performance from its new-look offense. In the home opener, redshirt freshman quarterback Eli Holstein threw for 336 yards and three touchdowns on 30-of-40 passing as the offense racked up 55 points.

Running its no-huddle up-tempo scheme, Narduzzi believes that the offense won’t be impacted by the crowd a whole lot as it’s something they’ve prepared for.

“We got crowd noise out there during practice every day. It’s loud. It doesn’t bother us at all. We expect Nippert to be loud as well, so we practice loud. I don’t know how loud it will be down on the field, but I would imagine we were louder today than it will be there,” Narduzzi said.

Pittsburgh Panthers running back Derrick Davis Jr. (34) August 31, 2024 Photo by David Hague/PSN / Pitt football

On the flip end, Pitt’s defense will matchup with another explosive offense that features Indiana transfer quarterback Brendan Sorsby. The Bearcats totaled a whopping 658 yards of offense – the fifth-most in the FBS — last week in a 38-20 victory over Towson.

Pitt was often stumped by the Bearcats offense last year, but Narduzzi feels they have done plenty of preparation on Scott Satterfield’s crew going back to his days with Louisville.

“We got a three-year breakdown on them. We’ve dissected everything from Louisville to Cincinnati, so it’ll be interesting to see what’s up his sleeve,” Narduzzi said.

The River City Rivalry also goes another level with both teams recruiting the same players over the year, which provides some familiarity to the coaches.

“It helps a lot when you know the people and you know some strengths and weaknesses from some high school days,” Narduzzi said.

Heading into the Noon matchup in which is a 2.5-point underdog, Pitt holds an 8-5 edge in the series that dates back to 1921. Pitt won the first seven matchups in the rivalry and has since dropped six of its last seven meetings.

The most notable matchup between the two programs came in Pittsburgh when the Panthers and Bearcats battled for the Big East title in 2009. Pitt led 31-10 shortly before halftime. Cincinnati marched back for 45-44 win in front of a stunned Heinz Field crowd as the No. 5 Bearcats went on to an undefeated regular season.