Pitt swept the Big East weekly honors this week. LaRod Stephens-Howling named Offensive Player of the Week. Chris McKillop took Defensive POW.
In light of the season ending injury to redshirt sophomore, safety Eric Thatcher, Coach Wannstedt’s messge was to remind many players in practice that they could be expected to step in and perform as a starter. Obviously that message was one Chris McKillop heeded a while ago.
“I went out there every day and, even though I wasn’t a starter, I played like I was,” McKillop said. “I practiced hard and let the chips fall where they may. It was unfortunate we lost Doug, because he’s a great player, but it gave me an opportunity. I can’t let the window of opportunity close. I seized the opportunity.”
McKillop’s inspired play has been paramount to the Panthers’ improvement on the defensive line. After getting manhandled in his first season at defensive end, the 6-foot-3, 250-pound converted middle linebacker spent the offseason adding 15 pounds of muscle to his frame.
McKillop lost the starting job at left end to Joe Clermond in training camp, but he was ready when called upon after Fulmer was injured against The Citadel.
“That was a tough situation,” Pitt defensive line coach Greg Gattuso said. “That’s a hard thing to do, lose a starting job and to keep working as hard as he worked. It should send a message to not only our defensive line but, hopefully, all our team that you never know when your number is going to get called again and it’s important to be ready.”
Assuming that Pitt beats UCF on Friday and Rutgers beats Navy on Saturday (netither, especially the latter, is a given), the Homecoming game (Oct. 21) with Rutgers should be a very big game in the Big East and for the top-25 rankings. If so, it will likely end up on ESPN2 and move the gametime to 5:45 pm from noon. Apparently ESPN2 is going to show a BE game in that slot. The other choice would be Louisville-Syracuse.
It’s all about making the most of the chances being given.
“I think we also got grounded a little bit after being 2-0. Some people around here were floating a little higher than they needed to be, and they have come back to more of a hard hat, blue-collar work ethic since then.”
PITT has always seemed to get ahead of themselves, and its good to see that the staff has tried to keep them realistic. We’ll need to go into the tough stretch of our schedule with a firm understanding that we have to work on every play.
There was a good article in the P-G about DW being able to watch Cowher and his approach to the game from the vantage point of sharing facilities – and how he is modeling PITT’s program on the Steelers.