Pitt head coach Pat Narduzzi met with the media at the conclusion of the program’s pro day. There were 14 former Panthers who participated in the schools pro day on Wednesday at Pitt’s Southside facility, and Narduzzi recaps the day’s action.
Narduzzi: Again, a really good day. I was impressed with our kids. They are away from campus really the bowl game and they go train somewhere and they come back. There are trainers everywhere, they trained and did a great job and I thought they looked good today. Obviously some looked better than others. Everybody can have their opinion on who looked good and who didn’t, but I was impressed with the way they came back.
You had a lot of fast times at the combine and here today. What allows for your guys to be so fast on and off the field?
Narduzzi: I don’t know what it is. There’s a bunch of different things and obviously the trainers whoever they were helped out because we don’t run many 40s. But to me when you talk about strength and conditioning, you talk about Coach Stacchiotti and his entire staff. I mean they development they had — they didn’t go away for a couple of months and all of the sudden get fast. Brandon Hill was fast already. Izzy was fast when you watch him run through defensive lines and linebackers, but I think it’s the strength work we do. I think it’s getting them to play fast every day in practice and not something they’ve never done before. We play fast and we try to practice fast everyday and try to get the best out of them. I think that’s part of it, but my hat goes off to Mike Stacchiotti and our strength staff.
Kenny Pickett was drafted in the first round last year and you have had a defensive back drafted three years in a row, what does that say to you?
Narduzzi: That’s what we’re supposed to do, that’s our job. Our job is to develop these guys and get them to ply and teach them. As a coach, we don’t coach the 40, we try to get them fundamentally. When you go through the drills and watch Erick Hallett go down that hash, go right down the hash and open up his hips and flip and go like as straight as an arrow and you watch things like that, that’s our job as coaches. It’s our job as coaches when they talk to a coach that they can speak the language and you can talk football and that’s our job as coaches. Our guys do it A+ work there too.
After what this group accomplished on the field here at Pitt, does that give you extra pride and give this Pro Day a little bit more?
Narduzzi: I mean pride is an ugly word. It’s not pride, it’s just what we do, it’s our job. It’s something that you love to do and it’s a passion more than it is a pride thing. Again, this is no different than the first year. Those are our kids out there and I always say this, sometimes NFL coaches that don’t know you, they’re not calling you because they know we’re going to say good things. They’re like our kids, our children, they’re someone and we’re with them all day long. But from first day to this one, number eight or whatever it is, it’s really the same.
Do you reflect on days like this thinking about, ‘I was in that living room when he was a junior…?’
Narduzzi: Oh, yea. You reflect a lot on it, every one of them as you go through the process. I’m looking at the D-Line at the end going, ‘I’m going to miss these three guys.’ Those are three football players over there, so you reflect and you know every one of them and where they came from, what they did, and how they did it. It’s been a long time.
With Calijah, what stood out most when you were recruiting him and where has he developed the most?
Narduzzi: Oh man, he’s developed in every respect. I mean on the field, off the field, emotionally, just in every way. He’s a good football player. He’s gotten better and he’s learned how to have a motor. I think when you talk about motor and consistency, that might be the place he’s most improved from when he was a baby. He’d do a play then take a couple off, now he does it all. It’s natural. They wanted more drills and were like, ‘That’s it, we’re done?’ They wanted more at the end there.
He seems like he is consistently proving to people he’s not this undersized guy and there is a lot more to his game. When you were recruiting him, did you ever have questions at all about his size?
Narduzzi: No, I’m never worried about size. Sometimes those bigger guys can get knocked off the ball quicker. Those short guys, and he’s not short he’s 6’1” and a little bit more and 280, so he’s not small. He’s played big. This is big boy football. I think he’s proven that. Some people don’t have the scheme and the ability to coach like we do. We can play with those guys. We’re not worried about the Aaron Donalds of the world, we kind of like those guys. We don’t worry about size at all ever.
SirVocea was joking around saying he was your recruit and you saw him dunk in high school when you went there with Tim Salem. What’s it like to watch a guy like him go through the process?
Narduzzi: They’re all the same. I mean everybody had a different path to get where they are. That was one I was telling the coaches from the Steelers, just his last visit. Not even looking for him and found him by accident. That was a good day. I should go back and look at the notes and find out what day that was and put it on my calendar for the rest of my life, but he’s special just like they all are.
Can you share any interesting tidbits from conversations with scouts from today?
Narduzzi: I think most of the conversations and a couple of the individual and some of them I’ll keep private, but the big thing is the one guy from the Rams said we have the best workout gear of anything he’s got, that was just at the end there. But the big thing here is just how smart our guys are and how they represent themselves out here. I think that’s the big thing.
How was it an ‘accident’ that you saw SirVocea?
Narduzzi: We were just going recruiting and we popped in his high school and we didn’t go there to see him. We were just there going to say hello to the coach and look to see if they had any underclassmen. It was late in January before the February signing day at the time. The coach said I still got the linebacker out there and I said let me see him. I watched the tape on my phone, watching his Hudl tape and I was like, ‘Oh this guy is pretty good. Let me see him.’ Then I met him and we were able to talk at that time in January and I said, ‘Can you dunk?’ And he said, ‘Yes, let me send it to you’. He texted me the pictures and I was like, ‘You have a scholarship and I’ll bring you up this weekend’ and that was it. A couple hours later Syracuse offered him after we did.
Do you ask every prospect if they can dunk?
Narduzzi: No. I just wondered. I don’t know. You know how those things just happen. I just wanted to find out how athletic he was if he was still out there. That’s the thing, we trust our opinion on what we see. I think that’s important.
Izzy was dealing with some injuries during the offseason and missed the combine. What stood out to you about him today and what makes you think he's a fit for the next level?
Narduzzi: The 41” vertical, I looked at his back and I was like, ‘Woah, look at that dude’ and maybe I hadn’t looked at him without his shirt off in a long time, but he was a beast over there jumping and the way he ran at 217 pounds. I mean that’s a big man running fast. I don’t think he played it that way, he probably has another seven. Most guys get skinnier for pro day so they can run faster, he put on more horsepower and went out there and ran really well.
Are you impressed with just how athletic and polished he is for his age? I think he just turned 20…
Narduzzi: Yea, I mean obviously he could have had another year, but he’s a grown man right now.
What are your thoughts on Johnny Petrishen just giving it another try and not giving up?
Narduzzi: I don’t know if he’s ever going to give up. He might be coming back in three years asking if he can have another day. We initially were not going to let him run, because I don’t want a bunch of guys, this is about the 2022 guys. But I said listen if you can find an NFL team that wants you to run, then we’re going to listen to the NFL. So I had that very simple talk with him and his agent got someone to say hey we want to see him run and he did a nice job today. Good for him.
There are seven mock drafts having Kancey going in the first round which would make back-to-back years with a first round pick at Pitt. What does that say about you and the success you have built at this program?
Narduzzi: It would say a lot. It would be big-time to have two first-rounders and put another guy up on the board. It just tells you about our evaluation and development that we’re looking at the right guys character-wise, athletic-wise, and so we’ve done a good job at looking at what we want. I don’t know how many offers. I don’t go back and look at how many stars he had or offers he had out of high school, but we found somebody that we liked just like a Kenny Pickett. We bring him in here and develop him the right way and I think it says a lot about what we’ll do if someone comes to Pitt.
