Game for Saturday against VT in Heinz Field has been announced.

3:30 pm. ESPNU coverage.

Here’s the bad.

Pitt’s offense is utterly, completely and without a doubt. Completely one-dimensional.

Pitt’s defense cannot stop a good passing game.

Pitt is still not even bowl-eligible at 5-4.

Now the good.

That single dimension of the offense is really, really good.

Pitt likely doesn’t face another passing offense as good as even Duke’s over the remaining three games.

Pitt is 4-1 in the ACC and alone in first place in the ACC Coastal Division.

I’m not going to get bogged down in the non-con schedule that had Pitt play three top-15 teams. We knew it was brutal going into the season. There was still some level of optimism about what could be. It didn’t happen. Losing all three was always realistic. The fact that Pitt wasn’t even competitive in two of them is what did and still does stick in the craw.

If Pitt had even lost closely in those games, Pitt fans and the national perspective on Pitt might be a little more upbeat. Maybe not by too much given yet another year of losing to UNC, but a little. Pitt fans might at least have been feeling a little more charitable about the program direction after September. After the UNC loss, it was legitimately fair to ask if Pitt was even going to to get back to a 5-7 record.

The point is, now. In November. Pitt has the best chance of any team in the Coastal Division of winning. That is, well, it’s a bit on the crazy side.

Here are the legitimate scenarios for Pitt to win the Coastal with the minimal amount of drama:

3-0 — beating VT, WF and Miami

2-1 — beating VT and either WF or Miami

2-1 — beating WF and Miami, losing to VT; but VT drops one of their last 2 games to UVa or Miami

After that it starts getting messy. Let’s not waste time on scenarios where Pitt gets the Coastal finishing 1-2.

Now, I know there will be some Pitt fans who will try to be contrarians to argue that they don’t want Pitt to end up winning the Coastal this year just to be destroyed by Clemson in the ACC Championship Game (along with those who want Narduzzi fired, and fear that any success will prevent that). God, forbid the optics.

Just don’t. Forget the rampant negativity and self-hate for a moment that it represents. No one rational is even thinking Pitt would win. But then, no one would be picking any Coastal team to beat Clemson. Clemson is a playoff team and the best of the ACC by a wide margin.

What needs to be considered are the bowl implications. Want to see Pitt in a decent bowl? They need to get to Charlotte.

No ACC team will be picked for the Peach or Fiesta Bowl. At worst, ND loses a game and they drop out of the Playoff picture to one of those bowls. That means the loser of the ACCCG heads to the Camping World Bowl to face a Big 12 team. Correction. I didn’t read that right. Camping World gets first pick, not simply the loser of the ACCCG. It’s just worked out that way at times.

After that it will be a jumble for one of the four ACC “tier one” bowl slots. Where Pitt is unlikely to get slotted.

If Pitt isn’t in the ACCCG, they will find themselves way down in the bowl tiers. Every ACC Coastal team except UNC will be likely be bowl eligible (6 teams). The ACC Atlantic — even if you take Clemson and ND out of the mix and consider them for the Playoffs — will have at least three teams and perhaps four (BC, Cuse, NCSt and maybe WF). So that’s 9-10 teams with records almost all within a few games of each other.

NC State and either BC or Cuse will likely end up with better overall records then Pitt. Miami or VT are more attractive bowl participants for TV or attendance.

Pitt will be battling for a better bowl slot with Duke and Virginia (and WF?). But that tier is below the Belk, Gator or Music City, Pinstripe and Sun.

We’re talking Military, Independence, Quicklane or even the Bad Boy Mowers Gasparilla Bowl.

[Additional note, in regards to the correction. With Camping World, that’s 5 slots. Pitt’s only chance of getting a tier one bowl starts with going 3-0 in the final three games. At least have the best record in the Coastal and hopefully bring pressure with the ACC to have the Coastal Champ in a tier one bowl.]