It was there for the taking, but Pitt squandered a chance to add to its legend of “giant killing” and upset a top 5 team for the third consecutive year. The Panthers had an eight point lead for most of the third quarter and completely shutdown the Notre Dame running game, but missed two makeable field goals, had some questionable coaching decisions and could never really get its offense going. Pitt also won the turnover battle, out-possessed the Irish, and got another touchdown on special teams, this time via a Maurice Ffrench kickoff return.
Notre Dame will now probably go undefeated the rest of the season before getting trounced in the Playoff versus Clemson or Alabama.
For Pitt, the calls for OC Shawn Watson’s job get louder (at least on Twitter). Fortunately they have two weeks to find a passing game and things are looking slightly better going into the teeth of their ACC schedule.
The Coastal Division is still very much up for grabs. All the Panthers have to do is win out.
The Panthers sit 69th in ESPN’s FPI ratings. Which is not nice. In the S&P+ rankings, Pitt drops nine spots to 82nd. Interestingly, Notre Dame dropped two spots, to 10th after wildly underperforming versus a (bad) Pitt team.
ACC BEAT
It could have been a perfect day for Pitt’s Coastal Division title aspirations… then North Carolina went ahead and let Virginia Tech drive 98 yards for a last second touchdown, thus ruining what would have been a five way tie between VT, Miami, Virginia, Pitt and UNC for the ACC Coastal lead. As it stands, VT (3-0) maintains a one game lead at the top and Pitt is tied with Miami and Virginia for 2nd. … Virginia upset #15 Miami … Georgia Tech is well-entrenched at the bottom of the division at 1-3. … In the ACC this year, only Wake Forest and Louisville have allowed more points than Pitt.
