Happy Thanksgiving. This is actually unrelated to Pitt. I just want someone to take away the password to my blog if I ever reach the levels demonstrated below.
A couple things that almost defy belief.
From the “there’s always a hater” file:
Jay from Cincinnati writes: There was a small blog in the Cincinnati Enquirer with your comments about Coach Brian Kelly and the national coach of the year, Why? Now don’t get me wrong, I’m happy with the results from the team this year. But he’s only been here two years, hasn’t seen any action from his recruits, he was ready to throw the towel on Tony Pike and was forced to use him when other QBs went down. You don’t groom a QB after the season started and be forced to use him. What you’re seeing is all Tony Pike. One could question Coach Kelly’s ability to see talent by not naming him the starter from the very beginning. Take a look at the film from the West Virginia and Louisville games, there are some very questionable calls from the offense. Coach of the year for what? Being a salesperson for the team, school?
Brian Bennett: Thanks, Jay, for proving that no matter how much a coach does, even if he goes 20-5 and gets a program without much history to the cusp of the BCS and does so despite having to use five different quarterbacks in a season, there will always be someone to complain about it.
Wow.
From the frustrated fanbase has lost its mind department, Irish fans are a little unhinged.
Here are a couple of things he [new Athletic Director Jack Swarbrick] could do to forestall the uprising:
- Immediately renegotiate all game contracts to designate that only neutral conference officials be used in any game in which Notre Dame plays. It’s bleeding obvious, and today’s game was just one more log on that fire. Taking it one step further, he should lead the charge in taking officiating away from the conferences altogether.
…
- Demand that Notre Dame have some say (assuming it does not currently) in the selection of the announcers for NBC broadcasts. We don’t need homers, but we could live without the glee provoked by Notre Dame’s miscues evinced by the former Southern Cal quarterback and his figure-skating-devotee partner. We’d be better off with the actual Mitch Daniels and Bea Arthur. We should can their look-alikes.
That’s right, ND fans are complaining about not getting the calls in their own stadium. Forget the fact, that practically every non-con game in every conference goes by the following rules: conference refs from the visiting team are used. Oh, that’s right, the Irish don’t have a conference affiliation for road games. They — they feel that the NBC announcers are anti-ND? So when in doubt, fall back on the fact that Pat Haden played QB at USC. I’m sure they don’t care, but no one else sees these things through that Irish prism.
It is not a totally uncommon occurrence for the boys of BGS — who I actually enjoy reading when they stick somewhere near reality. They just have a touch of paranoia and see conspiracy from anyone who went to a rival school.
A real classic example came way back when they still loved Charlie Weis. Remember the reported interest Weis had from an NFL team. The thing Weis never denied getting and which helped him get his ridiculous 10-year contract. Well, when the rumors first started, the messenger was clearly doing it to preemptively strike down the Irish before they could return to glory.
Why would he do this? Well, surprise, surprise…Schefter’s a notorious Michigan homer. (Check this out, direct from the annals of Wolverine nostalgia.) Schefter’s “developing story” was nothing more than buckshot from Ann Arbor, aimed not only at Irish fans who are feeling pretty good about their coach, but also directly targeting recruits who are considering the Irish. (“Despite the fact that he has one of the country’s most heralded recruiting classes coming in next season, Weis has positioned himself to leave Notre Dame after this season for the NFL…”) What better way to shake the foundation of an up-and-comer than insinuating he’s not long for college ball.
I don’t even know how to begin to address the substance of those delusions.
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7-0 Pitt.
That was an atrocious pick to give up before the half. I applaud trying to get JB into the game, but damn, kind of hard to argue that they shouldn’t have just had Shady pound it. Well, let’s come out stronger in the second half.
Just dumb to let this team hang around this long. Just a TERRIBLE call to not run it in with McCoy, who they haven’t stopped all day.
BTW, did everyone go to the game or are we live chatting today?
It appears that we are the liveblog…
SHADY blasts it through!
HAIL TO PITT!!!!!
HTP!
(I have no idea what happens next year in the quarterback area.) But for now…..Let’s savor beating WVU’s ass again…… 13-9 what?????
Now it’s 19-15!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sure you can argue that it’s not hard to continue handing Shady the ball, but there were solid misdirections other calls instead of just playing “smash mouth”.
The problem is how limited we are with Stull. I’m sure he’s a nice kid with good leadership qualities, but he consistently throws into triple coverage, dances, throws off his back foot, and lobs balls that are over or underthrown to the receivers.
HTP!
Two years and counting (and 3 of the last 5 too!)
Now if we could only get the guys in the white helmets back on the schedule so we can beat their asses too!
17 car 207 yds 1 TD
Devine vs. Pitt (DC not Paul Rhodes)
12 car 17 yds 0 TD
Maybe we’ve figured those hicks out?
Very good point about how well we contained Flava Flav today. Also, the secondary finally stepped up as well. Hats off to Coach Bennett and the entire defense.
Auburn faithful: Are YOU trying to piss off the volcano?!
Congrats to all for the comeback and the win…all other discussion and frustration is moot.
Hail to Pitt….!!!
I think you need to remember that Cav was dialing it up real well in the 1st half and looked like he could walk on water. I liked the balance and I think that Cav wanted to out coach WVU who likely was going to key on Shady.
No the fault on that play lies completely with Stull. He does not strike me as a thinking QB. Has no pocket presence and rushes the his throws (look at the wide open inc he got on 3rd and 7 because he has no touch whatsoever).
Stull is horrible. His deep pick, I didn’t see anyone in the vicinity.
Personally, I think Pitt was trying to make WVU to pay for keeping 8 in the box and once they pulled the Safeties back give WVU an overdose of Shady.
It became apparent that this was not going to happen so DW/Cav had no option but to go with Shady.
My guess is they never really new that Shady has an “S” underneath his uniform.
When you can will your team to victory…that’s the stuff of legends. I hope to see him back, but if he changes his mind, he has earned it because without shady we don’t get a sniff to victory today.
Brilliant effort from Shady. As well as the D (but that darn Pat White was driving me nuts…I am just thankful that I can say “for the final time”
DaveD
Thank God for Shady. He hoisted us on his shoulders and willed us to a win. And the D was fandamtastic.
There are things to complain and gripe about; but I look at it this way: we have beat WVU two years in a row. If this staff is going to make a habit of that, then fire no one. Let’s not complain after winning the only game on our schedule that even matters.
I thought Cav called a good game overall (maybe had too much ice cream when he tried the fade before halftime).
But think of it…Stull wasn’t at his finest, the refs made a horrible call (giving wvu a first down and then a FG), White runs a long TD…and we win.
Kudos to both of our lines–they really both were dominant today!
Hail to PITT!
-al-
Just think if Pitt had a QB that did not suck we would have a few more wins under our belts.
Shady is the man!
Look, defense was awesome. Running game was awesome. Special teams were awesome. Passing game, not so much. I’ll take three out of four and a win though.
I just don’t want this to turn into a “We won but we’re going to complain anyways”-thing as usual (I’m guilty of it too).
It’s WVU, it’s a big game, and we did it. I’m more than satisfied with that.
Lets go PITT!!
Other than Stull being inept for much of the game and the refs blowing 3-4 big calls in the 2nd half (one ruled catch by WVU for a 1st down on 3rd down in front of their bench was right in front of me, and he was juggling the ball out of bounds), the big question to me is—-can Dave Brytus kick it more than 35 yards in the air????
Go Pitt!
It’s actually become a pretty popular song at sporting events since Kill Bill vol. 1 dropped. I know I’ve seen it at a few Penguins games as well as Florida State Baseball and you can hear it in the background of a lot of other games. Jim Colony used to also have it in the background when he would read his sports report on Mark Madden’s old ESPN radio show.
How is the hoops team looking right now? I’m following the ticker on espn.com.
Onto bowl talk. I lurk (but don’t post) at pantherlair.com a lot and people are talking about the Sun or Car Care bowls taking Big East teams with worse records over us because their fans travel better and stuff like that.
To the best of my knowledge, if the Gator or Sun takes a Big East team, it has to be the #2 team in the league, regardless of whether or not they think our fans will travel. Their only choices are whether to take the Big 12 team, Big East team, or Notre Dame. But if they do take a Big East team, it MUST be the #2 team in the conference.
Same goes for the Car Care bowl except with the #3 team in the conference. It doesn’t matter if a team can only sell 23 tickets, if they’re #3 in the Big East, they’re going. End of story.
I know all of this talk is going on over on the rivals board, but I figured some of them read this as well and I also didn’t feel like registering for that board to clarify this.
So in summary, it doesn’t matter if they think we’ll travel or not. If you’re in a certain place in the conference, you get to go. If Pitt finishes 3rd and WVU 4th, Car Care has to take Pitt. They can’t choose WVU because they bring more fans.
Everything I’ve read on this shows that this is how it works.
And as I typed this, we beat Texas Tech!
Until Pitt can get a solid QB throwing the ball, this system will suffer at least 2 losses per season. By solid I mean – does not get scared by collapsing pocket, can throw screens and short passes consistently, and can keep teams honest with an occasional deep ball.
While I am almost certain Stull will be starting next fall, I am hoping for some type of QB controversy to occur.
They do a good job of putting Pitt regalia all around that stadium, I’ve never complained about that (go to RayJay in Tampa, there’s NOTHING USF-centric in that place, and they often play with Buccaneer logos all over the field, if you want to complain). It’s just up to the fans to go the damn games! When they do, the result is nice. For the first time in a couple of years, it didn’t feel like I was watching Pitt play in the Steelers stadium. And it wasn’t just the Pitt logo at midfield haha.
The only thing wrong with Heinz Field is that it’s probably about 10,000 seats too big for Pitt’s fanbase at this point.
And, as a member of the student section today, we were trying to drown out the “Let’s Go(oooo) Mountaineers” chant more than once and it was nice to see the rest of the stadium respond.
On a side note, was following the ESPN ticker for the Bball game, and it said that Tim Frye had a two-point dunk shot. Does anyone know if this is reality or not? I’m surprised the boy got in, let alone to dunk… Really?? any light shed would be nice..
Hail to Pitt.
As a postscript, DeJuan didn’t look any worse for the wear.
Looking forward to the final tomorrow night.
When bowl teams are selected, when they say they are taking the #2 Big East team, it does not mean the team which finished 2nd in the conference. This number means the order in which they are chosen by the bowls. It is the same for every conference. Go and read Mandel’s Bowl Projections on SI.com, he lays it out nicely and explains all the selection processes.
Basically, the bowls can take whoever they want as long as they have 7 wins. I predict the Gator will take a Big 12 team (Nebraska) and the Sun will take their choice of a Big East team. I think they may still take WVU based on fans. That would likely put us in the Meineke Bowl which isn’t a terrible drive and would be a nice matchup vs. an ACC team.
i’d send your exact comments to the ad department. I think they are valid but won’t get addressed unless they know..to their credit, they have been responsive to my comments/suggestions.
Also, I am still celebrating the WVU win. Cursing and Hollering in front of the mother-in-law for one day a year is sooo f’in cool.
