Vukovcan: Don’t Hate on Dayon Hayes, Just Use it as Motivation

Coaches in every sport are looking for ways to motivate their players.

Sometimes the motivational tools are BS and made up. For example, following the Super Bowl, Travis Kelce was screaming about how, “No one gave us a chance, everyone counted us out.” Sorry, Travis, any team with Patrick Mahomes has a chance.

That’s called fabricated motivation.

Whether he intended to or not, Dayon Hayes has given the 2024 Pitt Panthers some real-life motivation, his former head coach Pat Narduzzi, in particular.

I can only imagine the internal conversations that Narduzzi is having this morning with his coaching staff and players on the team. Knowing his fiery personality and the passion with which he coaches, it wouldn’t surprise me if Narduzzi was at the facility this morning in the early, early morning hours.

The reported reason for Hayes bolting Pitt is controversial, to say the least. In the new era of college sports, to hit the portal for money is one thing but to leave because you don’t think your team is going to be good is another.

Ouch. That’s one that I don’t remember hearing too often, if at all.

It’s no doubt hard to swallow if you’re a member of the Pitt football program. After working all offseason and finishing up spring practices to read that a team leader doesn’t think you’re good enough to win this season has to hurt a little bit.

Whether or not that’s truly how Hayes feels is debatable, but what isn’t is that this group of players and coaches will be hearing about that for the rest of the season.

But you know what? It doesn’t matter what Hayes or anyone else thinks about how good the Panthers are. Ultimately the players and the coaches are the ones that control the narrative of their season, not what one former player thinks.

Could Hayes be right that for the second consecutive season, the Panthers will struggle? Of course, but I don’t think so.

Considering their schedule, some of their returning personnel (for now) and some of the young talent that will be counted on to be contributors, while they might not be contenders for the ACC championship, I find it very hard to believe that Pitt will have another season below .500.

The key to that will be how the offense performs under new offensive coordinator Kade Bell.

I know it was a small sample size, but Nate Yarnell certainly looked the part of a quarterback who can actually win some games. Bell will no doubt do a better job of getting the ball into the hands of playmakers like Rodney Hammond Jr., Gavin Bartholomew and others. This offense will be something completely new for the opposing defenses, which will give Pitt an advantage.

Plus, I’m really bullish about a lot of the young players on defense and think they have a large group of players that have a chance to be really good. Narduzzi was able to bring in some players through the transfer portal that should be able to step right in and give the team an upgrade over what they had a year ago, too.

It’s way too early for me and, honestly for anyone else, to be making an educated evaluation of how this Pitt team will perform this season. It’s April, the entire offensive coaching staff was overhauled and there’s a new defensive line coach. That’s a ton of changes, so let’s let them use the next four and a half months to continue to learn the offense and for the coaches to properly evaluate what they’ll have to work with.

I’m not going to use this media forum as a vehicle to publicly criticize Dayon Hayes either. I first got to know him when Pitt was recruiting him out of high school and continued to communicate with him during his time at Pitt. He’s been a stand-up kid and if you look at his track record, Hayes has done a lot in terms of giving back to the community over the last four years.

I know what was reported, but only Hayes truly knows the story and his real reason for entering the portal. Was it really because of Pitt’s talent level, or was it really for a better NIL opportunity and he just didn’t want to say it? At this point, it really doesn’t matter.

In the end, the only thing that does matter is for this team to do everything in its power to prove to Hayes and any other players who decide to transfer that they made the wrong decision and show them that 2023 was a blip on the radar and that the 3-9 record was more about coaching than it was about talent.