PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – As senior night approaches, Pitt head coach Pat Narduzzi discussed how the current state of college football impacts that experience. What he said about transfers, plus doubling down on wanting conference championship games.
Seniors
Defensive lineman Jimmy Scott said when he talks to high school players now he tells them not to get caught up in getting paid, the money part and then already thinking about transferring if the first year doesn’t work out how you planned. Scott tells them to be ‘process driven and focus on being better’.
Who knows how teenagers receive this message. The temptation for going after the biggest salary as a freshman or getting to play right away and not waiting is tough to overcome for anyone. There is hope from Narduzzi that over the next couple of years players might just hear enough people with Scott’s mindset that could lead to at least some reverting back to how college football used to be.
He admits that starts with trusting the head coach at the school you commit to, that he will remain with the program.
“If a coach can be loyal, how come the players can’t be loyal,” Narduzzi said Wednesday. “There are always going to be those kids that want to go chase a dollar bill, but hopefully they’ve learned a lesson.”
“Maybe it’s a new trend? I don’t know if that Protect College Sports Act will come out with a one transfer rule, that will help a lot.”
Then Narduzzi points out how this impacts the student in student-athlete.
“It will help these kids not only have stability in their academic life, but their football life,” Narduzzi said. “These kids that jump in there and transfer more than once, they are never graduating, it’s not going to happen.”
The questions kept coming at the Pitt head coach about this topic with 19 players recognized as seniors on the current Pitt roster, several were only in Pittsburgh for a short period of time.
“That’s the saddest thing about the transfer portal, you play somewhere for two years or one year, you got to start all over,” Narduzzi said. “I don’t think kids understand that. I think that’s the biggest benefit and biggest lesson kids can learn, it’s a process and you got to trust the process.”
While Narduzzi said every player, whether at Pitt for a season or five, is loved by him, he called them his adopted kids, he doesn’t like this system. He prefers being able to develop players knowing he’s got time with them and trusting through recruiting they got the right guys.
“To me it was a process, now you got none of that and we got a bunch of nomads running around in college football that are mercenaries playing for different teams every year,” Narduzzi said.
Conference title games
Let’s just let you read what Narduzzi said about the elimination of the ACC, and all other, title games.
“I told you guys before, I love the conference championship game,” Narduzzi said. “I’m trying to figure out why we have two open weeks (in the new system) and why we do that. That doesn’t make any sense to me, if you are going to have two open weeks, have a championship game and one open week.”
“I love the championship game. I think there are some cool things about being a champion. Starting in 2027, there is going to be one champion and that’s it. Everyone else is going to be losers, to me that’s not good for football.”
“In 2018 when we were (ACC) Coastal Division champions, to me that was a huge thing. We’ve gone, since I’ve been at Pitt, from having division champions, like you have in the NFL, to conference champions to now just having one champion.”
“There is one champion the whole time, it’s a problem. I don’t like it because it gives nobody else hope. I always thought that 2018 Coastal Division championship helped our guys understand it was a step.”
Narduzzi said he had a similar experience coaching at Michigan State where the Spartans first won a division, then won the Big 10 and it was part of growing a program.
College football keeps changing, maybe in time, some of it might change back to how Narduzzi likes it.
Coverage for senior night starts Friday at 4p with kickoff at 7p on 93.7 The Fan.
LISTEN to Pitt head coach Pat Narduzzi ‘everyone else is losers’
LISTEN to Pitt head coach Pat Narduzzi ‘everyone else is losers’
