Pitt has a big basketball game tomorrow at Washington, yet I am still writing about recruiting stuff. That’s messed up.

USA Today had a story on Pitt recruiting after the WVU win among other things.

During the West Virginia game, Wannstedt, who recently had surgery to repair a ruptured Achilles’ tendon, pitched his crutches in frustration. His annoyance peaked with two horrendous penalties against Pitt in the second half that could have reversed the outcome on the road.

“I ended up breaking one of them,” he said. “The next day I was in the training room with the players. I set myself back a week, but it was worth it.”

My wife was glaring at me for most of the week for leaving her with the sick kids while I went to the game. It was worth it.

Getting the right players is paramount. Wannstedt recalled what USC’s Pete Carroll told him when he considered the job at his alma mater: “Get a good offensive and defensive coordinator. And you better have seven guys who can recruit.”

Today, he will host 14 recruits at the school. Two days ago, one of the top recruits in western Pennsylvania, Cameron Saddler, verbally committed to the Panthers in the wake of their upset of the Mountaineers after he appeared to be a lock to attend Virginia, or possibly WVU.

“We’ve been talking about turning the corner with this program with recruiting good players and getting Pitt back to where it was in the ’70s,” Wannstedt said. “The win over West Virginia really gave us a big shot in the arm. That was a big recruiting game for all the local kids. We’ll see when it’s all said and done in February how many we actually end up with.”

Wannstedt does say he’s planning to review the assistant coaches and players — as would be standard at this point — to see what can improve. No surprise the biggest concern is the O-line.

The area hit hardest by graduation is the offensive line, and it will be an area of concern yet again for the Panthers with left tackle Jeff Otah, center Chris Vangas and right tackle Mike McGlynn moving on. Jason Pinkston, who will be a redshirt sophomore after shoulder surgery this season, could move from right to left tackle. A junior-college center will attempt to be signed as well, so a tackle must emerge. Wannstedt did not rule out moving some defensive linemen to offense, but he wouldn’t confirm anything.

“We’ve got to bring the offensive line together,” Wannstedt said. “We’ve got to determine the five starters, and then we’ve got to get them playing together as fast as we can. … That’s our top priority in the spring.”

Getting that JUCO Center to verbal this weekend would be huge for Pitt. Not only is Vangas gone, there wasn’t much behind him (which was why he kept the job).

Brief aside, anyone else just a little concerned that even at this point Wannstedt refers to Elijah Fields as “week to week?” I can’t help but worry he will never make it back when the structure of the regular season — even if he was suspended for the season — is not in place.

Nice that Cliff Stoudt has given a verbal to Pitt. Looks like there will be some increased depth at the QB spot in the future.

The euphoria over the final game of the season is reasonable, but it also guarantees little change to the coaching staff despite a crying need.

I’d like to believe that Paul Rhoads has finally learned the value of aggreassive, attacking defenses and that things will be different. The problem for me — beyond a rather calcified and hardened position/bias on this issue — is seeing one-half of a season of that hardly erases the previous 7 1/2. I’d also note that aside from Scott McKillop completely exploding on the scene this season, there was not a whole lot from the linebacker position Rhoads was coaching. Little development and growth there.

In my ideal dream scenario, Rhoads bolts for another DC job or a minor head coaching gig while ostensibly hot. Greg Gattuso gets promoted to DC and still works with the defensive line. Gattuso has really impressed me since coming to Pitt from Duquesne. The D-line has been the strength of the team this season, his development of Romeus and keeping the line strong even after Mustakas went down was impressive.

Paul Dunn still needs to go as O-line coach. It was nice to see the Pitt offensive line really blow the Mountaineers off the line last week, but again, one game does not change the ineptitude and poor play from the rest of the season and prior seasons.

Special teams. Ugh. That’s Charlie Partridge, who is a good recruiter but hasn’t exactly distinguished himself with his coaching. Oh, and he also works with the linebackers.

I’m probably in the minority, but even before the final game, I was and still am fine with Matt Cavanaugh coming back next season as OC. Just too many key injuries and a bad O-line performance to put all the blame on him. I also thought he showed the previous season that he could get more out of the offense. I do think he needs to add more elements of the spread into the offense, and stop trying to instill a completely pure West Coast Offense. He would benefit from visiting some other schools and coaches to pick some brains — Florida, Tulsa, Cal and Arizona State would be on my short list of places to visit.

Here’s something very interesting, via Troy Nunes IAAM, a basic breakdown of recruiting ranking versus performance for college football. Pitt was second biggest underachiever in the Big East behind only Syracuse. This is a blunt instrument, not a fine tool. Nonetheless, it is still instructive and interesting.