Takeaways: Second Straight Pitt Loss Highlights Vulnerability

PITTSBURGH — Despite the odds, and the dubious officiating, Pitt had a chance to walk off the field at Acrisure Stadium with a win against Virginia.

That didn’t happen. Instead, Pitt dropped its season game of the season, the second game in a row.

“It starts with me, starts with our coaches putting our kids in position to make plays,” Pat Narduzzi said Saturday night. “We had way too many penalties in the first half offensively. Again, we got iPads. So I’m seeing a lot of things on iPads. But we lost as a team. Again, it starts with me. I’ve got to do a better job getting our guys prepared. I thought we had a great week of practice, but Virginia came in with a week off and did a nice job.”

Pitt dropped to 7-2 (3-2 ACC) with the loss to Virginia, a 7.5-point underdog, and the record now doesn’t do a good job highlighting the hole Pitt has fallen into over the last month.

Something’s Got to Give 

We’ve reached a breaking point. It may be just two losses, but if Pitt wants to salvage this season (with two ranked matchups on the schedule), something has to give.

Pitt hit rock bottom offensively against SMU, and it was somehow worse against Virginia.

Pitt is averaging 308.8 yards and 20.3 points per game over the last four games, and that’s inflated by some garbage-time touchdowns against SMU. Pitt racked up 453 yards and 25 points against the Mustangs, and most of those yards and points meant absolutely nothing to the end score.

Pitt has to be better. And it starts with offensive coordinator Kade Bell. So, what’s going on?

“The teams (we’ve played) got better,” Narduzzi said. “That’s the first thing you’ve got to say. Give credit to the defenses. They’ve done a nice job. And we’ve got to do a better job creating plays and making plays. Like I said, I don’t know how many, six, seven drops, I don’t know. So you can’t move the ball, you can’t move the sticks if you don’t catch it and you don’t get to the right guy.

“We’ll sit down and reevaluate where we are, what we’re doing, how we’re doing it, and try to put a better product out there. But it’s frustrating, it’s frustrating for our offense, coaches; it’s frustrating for our offensive players. And again, it takes 11, 11 guys out there that have to make plays.”

Pitt hasn’t executed. That’s clear. It’s on playcalling, and also the way Bell has prepared Holstein for what he’s facing on a week-by-week basis.

It’s not good enough, and with the results on the field over the last few weeks, it’s hard to see it changing much.

Pittsburgh Panthers quarterback Eli Holstein (10) November 9, 2024. Michael Longo/PSN

What to do with Eli Holstein? 

Holstein wasn’t the only reason Pitt lost to Virginia, but he certainly didn’t do much to help before exiting the game with an apparent head injury.

He completed 10-of-23 pass attempts (43%) for 121 yards. No touchdowns, no interceptions. And he benefited from some near misses as he attempted to make plays out of nothing. It’s an admirable trait until it hurts the team.

Holstein showed some signs of his old self, but he looked overwhelmed against Virginia. He skipped screen passes across the turf, missed Konata Mumpfield running over the middle of the field a couple of times and just looked rattled. He’s looked rattled for weeks, and for whatever reason, the Pitt coaching staff hasn’t been able to settle him down.

It was particularly disappointing against Virginia — a Cavaliers pass defense that entered the night 126th in passing defense nationally.

“It starts with coaching,” Narduzzi said. “It starts with our offensive staff, our head coach, me, and we have just got to get better play. It wasn’t good enough overall. It’s not just quarterback, it’s everybody involved. We had way too many dropped passes out there today. So, it’s hard to get in rhythm when you’re not catching the ball like we had all year. And that’s our job to catch balls. It’s our job to get them to catch balls. We’ve got to do a better job in ball drills and catching the ball and making plays.”

Holstein has so much talent, as he’s shown this season, but he looks like a quarterback who doesn’t have any confidence in his play right now.

The Defense is OK 

Pitt allowed 340 yards and 24 points against Virginia, but the defense was far from the problem against the Cavaliers.

Even if Narduzzi wants to see more from his run defense.

“We had two interceptions, six sacks,” Narduzzi said. “They ran the ball too much on us. They did a nice job running the football. And we’ll look at why. But we’ve got to stop the run better. Again, the goal was to come in, as you guys know, 10 years of stop the run, and we didn’t stop the run good enough on defense. You can get six sacks. Had two nice interceptions in the first half. Didn’t get any in the second half. But 24 points and one of them was a 20-yard drive. And gotta play better.”

Virginia carried the ball 45 times for 170 yards, which equates to 3.8 yards per carry. Not bad. The run defense wasn’t perfect, but the unit gave the offense chances.

Pitt racked up six sacks, eight tackles for loss, two interceptions and gave the offense chances. 24 points isn’t terrible either, especially when a turnover on downs (that resulted in a field goal) was taken away by the officials and a touchdown drive took just 20 yards.

Pitt played poorly defensively against SMU, but that wasn’t the case against Virginia. The defense was left out to dry against the Cavaliers.

Pittsburgh Panthers head coach Pat Narduzzi November 9, 2024. Michael Longo/PSN

Officiating Woes Shouldn’t be Forgotten 

Pitt didn’t play well enough to earn a win against Virginia. Right? Okay. And the Panthers were still screwed over by the officiating crew.

Pitt was flagged 11 times for 75 yards, which is whatever, not ideal, but it’s the game-changing calls that burned the Panthers. Two stand out pretty clearly after the fact.

Pitt appeared to have stuffed Virginia backup quarterback Grady Brosterhous on a fourth-and-1 midway through the fourth quarter. The Pitt defense celebrated, thinking they got the ball back to the offense with a chance to go down the field and take the lead.

Until the officials stepped in and said the play had to be replayed since “the officials weren’t in position.” Virginia got a second chance and converted, moving the chains. It resulted in time burned off the clock, a field goal and an eventual win.

And Narduzzi didn’t receive an explanation from any of the officials.

“To be honest, I have no idea. It’s a great question. I’m sure (the ACC) will answer that for us on Monday or Tuesday. But it’s our job to get lined up and get in position. And it’s their job to get lined up and get in position as well. We had a stop on fourth-and-1. And no explanation.”

And he received no explanation on a phantom holding call on Ryan Baer earlier in the quarter that negated a successful two-point conversion, which would have tied the game at 21.

“He did a technique we called trap his arm, and he knocked his arm down. That’s all it was. The guy wasn’t even close to the quarterback. You talk about non-factors. But players play, coaches coach and officials officiate.”

It certainly wasn’t a banner day for the ACC officiating crew.

What’s Next? 

Narduzzi barely mentioned No. 23 Clemson in his postgame presser.

And that’s fair. There’s typically a lot to process in a postgame presser, but Narduzzi usually mentions the upcoming opponent in some detail. It was in passing Saturday night.

“That’s the game of football,” Narduzzi said. “Half the teams win and half the teams lose every weekend. We’ve got two in a row. Gotta bounce back against a really good Clemson football team.”

Clemson is coming off a 24-14 win against Virginia Tech, scoring all 24 points in the second half, and while it wasn’t an inspiring effort, the Tigers are a talented squad. With all due respect, much more talented than Virginia.

Pitt has Clemson, No. 22 Louisville (who beat Clemson last weekend) and Boston College left this season. The last two games are on the road.

If Pitt wants to finish the season with more than seven wins, there needs to be some serious introspection this week. And that’s been promised for a while now. We’ll see if it comes to fruition.

In the meantime, Clemson will arrive next weekend for a noon kickoff against Acrisure Stadium.