PITTSBURGH — Pitt had its annual kickoff luncheon Friday, and the keynote speaker was former star running back LeSean McCoy. Pitt will open the season Thursday against old rival West Virginia in a nationally televised edition of the Backyard Brawl.
McCoy was a most appropriate choice for the speaker because this is — at least from what I can tell — the most anticipated Pitt season since 2008. McCoy — and the Backyard Brawl, for that matter — was a huge reason for that optimism because he delivered one of the greatest single-game performances by a Panthers player in team history in the final game of the season before.
That 2007 season was marked with quarterback issues that rendered the Panthers’ offense anemic and made winning games extremely difficult. It was so bad the coaches figured out by the third game of the season against Michigan State their best offense was getting the quarterbacks out of the way and direct snapping the ball to McCoy. He nearly carried them to the upset that day, and a new offensive philosophy was born.
The Panthers’ offensive woes held them back all year, and while they played better with an offense driven almost completely by McCoy, they were 4-7 going into their final game in Morgantown against the No. 2-ranked Mountaineers, who only had one loss at the time. WVU had a powerful offense driven by the speed of Pat White, Steve Slaton and had put up 66 points the week before against Connecticut.
Pitt was a four-touchdown underdog. Nobody thought they had a chance to win the game, but McCoy and company had a different idea. The Panthers pulled the stunning 13-9 upset, and McCoy was downright heroic that night as he ran 38 times for 148 yards and would have ran for more had it not been for a few questionable holding calls negating runs. West Virginia, like every team that year, knew McCoy was going to get fed the ball but could not stop him.
That win and all the hype and excitement that came with it was followed by a great recruiting class and a surge in ticket sales. The Panthers had a ton of players coming back for 2008, including McCoy and quarterback Bill Stull, who was returning from a thumb injury that kept him out of 2007.
The excitement surrounding the program was at a high point, at least heading into a season, and the Panthers were the talk of the town. That is very similar to this year, as they are coming off an ACC championship and are returning the bulk of their players from that team. This year reminds me a lot of 2008 in terms of the preseason accolades and excitement preceding the start of the season. Next Thursday’s game is sold out and has been for quite some time, and the Panthers are one of the favorites to win the ACC championship.
It feels like Pitt has finally turned the corner and truly arrived as a legitimate top-25 program. Pitt begins the year ranked No. 16, and if you look at the experience and depth on their roster, it is reasonable to believe the hype surrounding them.
There is a cautionary tale for the current Panthers in the story of the 2008 team, though, and that is: Don’t believe the hype too much. Pat Narduzzi has done as good of a job as possible in not allowing the Panthers to read the headlines too much and get too far ahead of themselves.
The 2008 Panthers didn’t handle expectations very well, and that much was clear when they lost their opener, 27-17, to Bowling Green at Heinz Field. Bowling Green is not only a MAC team, but that year, they were a bad MAC team whose coach ended up getting fired at the end of the year. The Panthers found themselves in a dogfight the next week against a pedestrian Buffalo team and needed a couple of borderline miracle plays to pull it out in the end to get to 1-1.
Pitt appeared to right the ship and got to 5-1, setting up an important Big East showdown against Rutgers. The Panthers talked a good game leading up to their clash with the Scarlet Knights, but they got crushed, 54-34, at Heinz Field. The Panthers did enough that year to get to the Sun Bowl (which they lost 3-0 to Oregon State) and finish 9-4. But the Bowling Green, Rutgers and Sun Bowl debacles left people with the “should-have-been-so-much-more” kind of feeling. Pitt could have won double-digit games that year but instead just missed the mark thanks to a loss to Bowling Green.
This Pitt team has all the ingredients to be special, just like last year’s group. There doesn’t appear to be a flaw on the roster. The Panthers’ offense should be one of the most explosive in the ACC. It should be a great season and one in which all of this preseason hype and expectations will be justified.
That won’t happen, though, if the Panthers don’t learn from 2008 and manage expectations correctly. The Panthers need to refrain from reading their headlines and focus on playing football at a high level every week.
