PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Pitt has won the second-most games in the ACC since Pat Narduzzi took over the football program. They’ve won 20 games overall the last two seasons and won the ACC championship two years ago. Yet Pitt is picked to finish sixth in the conference.
“I hope it puts a chip on their shoulder,” said Pitt head coach Pat Narduzzi on Wednesday. “We've never been picked to be first. It's the same thing as last year, same thing as the year before, except now it's, I guess, 6th in the total ACC with one division now, I guess, would be like being 3rd in the Coastal. So I guess we're just right where they always put us.”
The Panthers have had ONE losing season in conference play since 2013. They are picked behind Florida State with ONE conference winning season since 2016. Pitt is tied for sixth with Duke, the Blue Devils have 20 total ACC wins over the last eight seasons.
“Everybody thinks, without mentioning names, everybody thinks that they're better than you,” Narduzzi said. “That's kind of how it is. There's some other really good programs out there. Whether you beat them or not, we're going to be better this year. We were bad last year, but we're going to be better this year. They all have excuses of why they didn't win. We just keep plugging away.”
“Everybody believes the excuses and ranks them up higher, whatever. We just keep playing football. Our job is to win one game at a time, as you guys know, and just coach our football team and try to be good in August here. Once September 2nd comes around, show people what we got.”
Former Pitt linebacker John Petrishen said on 93.7 The Fan there is no doubt in his mind Narduzzi has talked to his team about this. The mental edge of disrespect to help fuel his team. He also believes while it might be annoying for a couple of days, the season is still a month away and it won’t impact training camp like something said on game week.
“We can’t control what the critics think,” said Pitt receiver Bub Means. “All we can control is what we do on the field. I look at the work we put in and I’m excited for the season. I’m looking forward to September 2nd.”
“We don’t look a lot at rankings and social media, that can get to your head,” said Pitt receiver Konata Mumpfield. “We just stick to the grind and the hard work. The chip on our shoulder is not from the rankings, just naturally carrying that chip on your shoulder playing this game.”
“I think we are dead last, that’s where everybody should have us,” said Pitt quarterback Phil Jurkovec. “That’s where we would like to be.”
“We don’t give it too much attention.
There have been some rankings that are pretty disrespectful to the previous Pitt teams that have played here and the guys on those teams.”
“I like where we are at. We are flying under the radar this year.”