DETROIT - Pitt last won a bowl game in the 2013 Little Caesar's Bowl. Aaron Donald was the star of the team, while freshmen James Conner and Tyler Boyd were budding stars. Pitt was led by now Wisconsin head coach Paul Chryst. Pat Narduzzi was the defensive coordinator at Michigan State and every player on Pitt's roster was still in high school.
Needless to say, it's been a while since Pitt could talk about a bowl win.
Pitt endured a wild loss to Houston in the 2014 Armed Forces Bowl under interim coach Joe Rudolph before three losses with Narduzzi at the helm in the 2015 Military Bowl, the 2016 Pinstripe Bowl, and the 2018 Sun Bowl. As Pitt found itself trailing in the fourth quarter to Eastern Michigan during Thursday's Quick Lane Bowl, it looked as though another bowl loss was potentially on the way.
Pitt stepped up in the end to find a way to win. Quarterback Kenny Pickett engineered a 91-yard drive in the final minutes capped off with a touchdown pass to Taysir Mack to put Pitt ahead and give the Panthers a 34-30 win over Eastern Michigan.
Now, nobody is claiming a win over a MAC team in a bowl game in Detroit was a program changing win or anything. However, it does end a streak, it gets a few people off the hook, while allowing the senior class to end their careers with a win. Pitt still enters the offseason with concerns, but a full blown panic has at least been avoided with the win.
It's not something the seniors will take lightly.
"It’s mean everything," safety Damar Hamlin remarked. "With all the adversity we’ve been fighting through throughout the season, we just wanted to go out with a win. To get our first bowl win, it’s big. It’s something we never experienced."
Added fellow senior Dane Jackson, "It means a lot, we finally got it done finally got a bowl win."
Pat Narduzzi now moves to 1-3 all-time in bowl games as a head coach. He didn't want to make it out to be anything more than a win for his seniors, however.
"You know what, head coach, coordinator, it doesn’t really matter," the Pitt coach said of his first bowl win. "A win’s a win. I’m happy for these guys."
The underclassmen will look to capitalize on this win and use whatever momentum they can from this to head into next season according to junior center Jimmy Morrissey.
“It’s huge especially since he’s been here he hasn’t had a bowl win," Morrissey said of his coach. "We finally got one, so that can kickstart us into next year."
It might not have been an ideal destination or bowl game by definition, but it afforded Pitt the opportunity to end the season with a win. Now as Pitt slides into focusing in 2020, the team and coaches will get a chance to enjoy the New Year before beginning prep on next season.
"More than 24 hours, I can tell you that," Narduzzi said on how long the team will focus on this before starting next season. "We’re going to enjoy the New Year and that’s the great thing with ending the season with a victory. We’re going to take some time off here and get through the new year and we’ll meet back up on January 2nd as coaches and get ready for the new year, period. It’ll start real quick and we’ll be back on the road to finish off this class."
