MORE HEADLINES - Video: Narduzzi's post-game | Video: Peterman reflects on his final game at Heinz Field | Video: Galambos - "Thank God for our offense" | Talk with other Pitt fans about the game

Pat Narduzzi tried to play it cool in his post-game press conference. He turned to coaching clichés like “A win is a win” and “There’s no such thing as a bad win.”

And it’s true: there is no such thing as a bad win. But for Pitt’s head coach, who made his name as the architect of Michigan State’s dominant defenses, there was only so much he could stomach, and Saturday’s 76-61 win over Syracuse at Heinz Field likely gave him more than a few gastrointestinal issues.

“You know, I’ve never been in a game like that. I don’t ever want to be in a game like that again,” Narduzzi said after the game. “But I’ll go back and say, there’s no such thing as a bad win. But half of me is jumping for joy with what our offense did out there today and the other half makes me sick.”

Pitt’s offensive performance on Saturday was one for the ages, with the most points scored since 1977 and the most yardage gained since 1995. But whatever jumping for joy that Narduzzi may be doing is probably going to be overshadowed by the sick feeling brought on by Syracuse’s offense.

668 yards of total offense, 228 rushing yards, seven touchdowns on seven trips to the red zone, four fourth-down conversions on four attempts and, of course, 61 points - the most since Ohio State put 72 on Pitt in 1996.

“It’s always good to get a win, but letting up that many points is just bad,” senior linebacker Matt Galambos said after the game. “The defense, we were kind of struggling. Good thing our offense scored damn near 80 points.”

The difficult part is finding explanations for why Pitt’s defense struggled. Narduzzi didn’t Syracuse’s up-tempo approach caused too many problems (“No more than it gives anybody else”) and he wasn’t interested in the notion that his defensive players took it easy since Pitt’s offense was playing so well (“If they did, then I’m going to go berserk”).

Narduzzi wasn’t hearing any of those options.

“There’s no excuses,” he said.

Galambos offered the following:

“We had to make plays and the plays were there to be made; we just didn’t really do it.”

That was the refrain this year: players didn’t make plays. And while Pitt did record seven tackles for loss and three sacks - plus a Dane Jackson interception that went for a touchdown - that wasn’t enough when Syracuse managed to run more than 100 plays.

So the Orange just kept scoring, especially in the second half, when they got touchdowns on six of their final seven drives. Fortunately for Pitt, the home team’s offense produced six touchdowns after halftime, too, leading Galambos to echo a refrain that became all-too-common this season.

“Thank God for our offense, man; they scored a ton of points,” Galambos said.