First off, the semi-official brewery of Pitt Blather is opening a new branch this weekend. Voodoo Brewery is opening another brewpub, Voodoo Homestead.

Voodoo Homestead — not a brewery or brewpub, but an unusual satellite pub selling just Voodoo brews — will open in a big chunk of the first floor of the former Homestead municipal building and fire station on East Ninth Avenue at Amity Street. The more-than-a-century-old, three-story building had been vacant for two decades when the borough approved selling it to Voodoo for $8,500 this past summer.

Since that time, the Voodoo crew has worked non-stop filling containers and containers with refuse, with a lot of that hard, dirty work being performed for free by volunteers, some of whom flew from distant cities to chip in.

Others volunteered to help decorate the decrepit but beautifully-boned building, gracing the vaulted ceiling with fanciful chalk artworks and colorfully painting the interior sides of two massive roll-up doors.

That’s why this weekend’s public opening was proceeded by a party for those volunteers, whose names are written in chalk behind the old-metal-barn-roofing-clad, 24-foot-long concrete-topped bar, right next to the chalked list of the beers that will be available to drink on premises or take home in growlers.

The article also gets into some of the lunacy of Pennsylvania liquor laws with the hoops Voodoo has to jump through for this. I realize every state is insane in their own unique ways with liquor laws, but Pennsylvania is a special kind of crazy.

As learned on twitter last week, one of the brews on tap will be the wonderful H2P IPA.

Voodoo’s head brewer, creator of H2P IPA , PittBlather loyalist and Pitt guy, Curt let me know that the plan is to have H2P on draft at Voodoo Homestead full time. Oh, and Curt will be on hand tomorrow.

It is my goal to keep H2P on draft at this location all the time, but it will largely be dictated by production ability/tank space, but I feel like I should be able to accommodate this. I will be around all day Saturday to chat beer and football.

Also, we will be pouring H2P before the Syracuse game at the Campus View Club at the Pete from 2:30-4pm before the game. H2P will also be on draft at the University Club. They have expressed a desire to have it available all the time, so we’ll see how that goes.

In addition to H2P Curt notes that there will be lots of their barrel aged beers — including their GABF award winning, Big Black Voodoo Daddy Stout aged in Pappy Van Winkle bourbon barrels. I’ve had some of this stuff, it is amazing.

Here’s their facebook page. And here’s the description of H2P. Definitely a place to stop by on my next visit to the ‘Burgh.

In other news, Jordan Whitehead isn’t going anywhere but to Pitt.

After dabbling with hoops briefly — he played a few games with Central Valley’s basketball team in December — he’s getting ready for his first season of college football. He’s been lifting and stretching. He may run sprints for the Warriors’ track team this spring.

The last two weeks, he’s been on Pitts’s campus, getting accustomed to the place he’ll play and study as a collegian.

“Everything is falling into place,” he said.

Not that Head Coach Pat Narduzzi is leaving anything to chance. He just happened to stop by Central Valley HS today. Which just about guarantees that Narduzzi is the last coach Whitehead will see face-to-face before Signing Day.

Pat Narduzzi makes no secret of what the approach will be for Pitt football under him.

“I think there’s a lot of things we do well at Michigan State, so I would say you will see Michigan State of the city of Pittsburgh, really,” Narduzzi told the ‘Griff and Grinz’ Show on Lansing’s 92.1 FM The Team, per MLive.com’s Mike Griffith.

“Why would you change the blueprint of what Coach Dantonio has done there?” he asked. “There will be tiny little things here and there, but the blueprint has been set. I’ve been in the program for 11 years with Coach Dantonio, and I know how we’ve done it and built it, and I think that’s the way it’s going to be.”

Dantonio’s formula is simple: play fundamentally-sound and physical defense with a ball-control offense. The Michigan State program has also been highly successful developing its talent despite lesser recruiting classes.

And Dantonio comes from the Tressel coaching tree so, yeah. Fundamentals. Not that that means 10-7 games. Michigan State has been a strong offense the last couple of years. Not afraid to score points and keep the the foot on the neck of teams.

Good topic, strange choice. Over at the ESPN.com ACC beat, they have an interesting series on position that needs improvement for each team.

Every team has issues to address this offseason, and this week, we’re taking a look at the most glaring holes for each ACC team and figuring out where they might find answers between now and the season opener.

Then they come to Pitt. It seems a no-brainer that it would be on the defense. The only question is which position? Cornerback, Defensive End, maybe Defensive Tackle?

No. Quarterback. Kind of.

This isn’t so much as a fix as it is a molding of Voytik into a player who, at the very least, is equally dangerous with his arm as his legs. Voytik was already showing signs of his maturation as a passer through the second half of last season, so there is reason to feel confident the Panthers will see Voytik jump into the upper half of the league’s quarterbacks. He also has the advantage of being a dual-threat option, which can help get him into an early rhythm and keep drives alive on third downs.

I’ve read through the piece several times. I still don’t get it. Basically the piece admits almost right away that Voytik noticeably improved during the season. Then when it comes to fix, admits it doesn’t need to be fixed, just Voytik needs to continue to improve.

Finally, the ACC schedule release. Justin nailed it well yesterday. I’m just going to point you to a solid behind-the-scenes piece from David Teel on the ESPN influence on the schedule.

ACC schools vowed in 2001 not to play Friday night football, long the domain of high schools. That changed in 2012, when the conference signed a contract with ESPN that increased rights fees by 30 percent and mandated three Friday games per season.

…

So in exchange for yet more ESPN money, the ACC agreed to Friday night games that improve the network’s programming. How much more money, we’ll never know.

Also understand that ESPN holds all the high cards here. The ACC desperately wants a cable channel dedicated to league sports, and the revenue such a project could potentially deliver. And that channel hinges on ESPN. So what the worldwide leader wants …

As I mentioned in a Tuesday post foreshadowing the Friday games at Tech and Virginia, props to the ACC for burdening the state schools in the same season, so as not to disadvantage one’s relationships with high schools. I wouldn’t be surprised to see similar pairings of Florida State and Miami, and North Carolina and N.C. State.

It will be interesting to see what happens with Friday night games and Pitt. Pitt has played them — away. Even back in the Big East. One thing Pederson definitely delivered on in a promise was that Pitt would never play a Friday night home game during the high school season. That has continued, but the question has now become, “but for how long?”