PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Pitt head coach Pat Narduzzi said with all of the fuss made about the impact of Name Image Likeness with college football. There is at least one other rule likely to impact college football teams in 2021.
“The NCAA made this new rule that we are only allowed nine days in full pads,” Narduzzi said Tuesday. “That’s nine days to tackle. You have to learn how to tackle and how to break a tackle in nine days.”
The emphasis there on the nine days. The rule to help with player health, but Narduzzi, and other coaches, question whether its good for the game. The veteran coach said he’s been in football a long time and used to judge whether to put full pads on by how they practiced the day before, health, etc. He remembers two-a-day practices where they would practice in pads the whole time. Now you can’t practice in pads more than two practice in a row.
“We’ll have what we call thud,” Narduzzi said of padded practices. “You better do a good job of thudding up. Don’t think I will get it in practice tomorrow. Every thud, every pads practice is going to be critical. Don’t think I’ll get it tomorrow, there may not be a tomorrow.”
Where you will see the immediate impact is on the defensive side, wrapping people up.
“I think it’s really tough on the tackling part,” Narduzzi said. “That’s going to be the key, who does the best job in coaching in the thud periods. You have nine of 25 in pads.
Narduzzi did credit the NCAA for allowing spider pads, which are essentially small versions of shoulder pads. He said that should help limit the two to three shoulder injuries that invariably happen each training camp.
Related
Fast camp
In his opening comments before questions from the media Tuesday, Narduzzi said his team is playing as fast as he’s seen his team practice. Even after losing a number of players to the NFL.
Why faster?
“Having the athletes and our guys know what to do,” Narduzzi explained. “You got a spring ball in. Last year you forget how little we had. Now you have a spring ball in, a good summer period in where the kids are doing 7-on-7. You see less busts.”
“We cut down on a lot of different mistakes whether it’s pre-snap penalties, pre-snap alignments. We are a lot further along after day three, we have to keep the pace.”
Camp visitors
The ACC Network visited Pitt practice for their camp report as did Narduzzi’s old head coach. Retired Michigan State head coach Mark Dantonio watched drills in a new Pitt golf shirt.
