‘I Ain’t Leaving Yet’: Dayon Hayes Signals Return to Pitt in 2024

PITTSBURGH — It hasn’t been the easiest season for Dayon Hayes and the Pitt defense, not as the unit has played well enough to win and not been supported by its counterpart, certainly, but Hayes himself has also been unable to finish.

Hayes, who did not walk on Senior Night, entered Thursday night with two sacks. He racked up two first half sacks on the way to a thoroughly dominant performance.

“It felt good,” Hayes said following the win. “It took forever, I was in a drought lately, but it felt good to get that quarterback.”

He finished the night with six tackles (five solo), three tackles for loss, two sacks, two pass breakups and a quarterback hit — and it may be just the launchpad he needs for one more season. Does Hayes have unfinished business at Pitt?

“Yeah, I do,” he said with a grin. “I ain’t leaving yet.”

Pat Narduzzi and the defensive coaching staff will certainly welcome Hayes back next season, able to form a starting duo with Samuel Okunlola (who recorded a sack himself Thursday night, one of six team sacks), and it should be one of the strengths of the defense. Hayes was certainly a strength against Boston College.

“Dayon had a good game,” Narduzzi said following the win. “When you get a chance, I think we had a few sacks. I don’t know how many sacks we had. Six sacks.

“Again, it’s hard to get sacks when they have 66 rushes, but we were able to get to the quarterback and early in the game, and that was good. I think we had three early in the first or second quarter. Those were critical.”

Hayes now has 40 tackles (23 solo), 9.5 tackles for loss, four sacks, a forced fumble, four pass breakups and a lot of pressures, hurries and quarterback hits despite the low sack totals. Hayes has been better than his individual statistics indicate this season, and he has one more game this season to improve upon those. And he’s coming off his best game — from a production standpoint — in quite some time.

And it’s all in what now appears to be a tune-up for his fifth season at Pitt in 2024.