In this week’s 3-2-1 Column, we’re talking about the latest changes to the 2020 football season, questions about Pitt’s NFL Draft prospects and more.

THREE THINGS WE KNOW

The changes keep coming
This first section of the column is called “Three Things We Know” and, brother, let me tell you:

We don’t know a whole lot.

What’s more, every time we think we know something, we find out we know less than we did before. This situation we’ve found ourselves in here in 2020 AD is just constantly changing as the things we think we can count on continue to move and shift.

On Tuesday, I did a whole podcast on the prospect of the college football season moving to the spring and what that would mean for Pitt and the sport as a whole. I planned to write a fair amount of this column on that topic, too, and talk about it on the Panthers Insider Show on 93.7 The Fan Saturday morning.

Well, the radio show plans got scrapped and will have to be redone, and only some of the writing that had been done for this column survived.

Because by the time we got to Thursday, when I was (hoping to be) putting the finishing touches on the column, things got turned upside down for about the 1,275th time since the second week of March. Now, instead of a spring season being the big change, we’re starting with little changes. Like dropping non-conference games; that’s what the Big Ten announced on Thursday, and various reports have the ACC following suit.

There are a few pieces to fall into place for that to happen - some speculation has the ACC likely working in concert with the SEC - but it sure seems like that’s where things are heading, and I guess I understand it. Limiting the season to just in-conference games would give the conferences control over testing protocols and guidelines, thus ideally ensuring a higher level of safety for conference members - with the idea being that nonconference opponents might not be operating under the same protocols and guidelines.

I suppose that makes sense.

There are a million questions to answer with a conference-only schedule, of course. Do the FCS and G5 opponents who signed six-figure contracts to play those nonconference games still get paid? Do the conferences add to their current league schedules to give members a 10 or 11 or 12-game slate? Does Notre Dame add more ACC opponents to its schedule? Does the ACC try to force Notre Dame to join the conference?

And then, of course, is the biggest question of all:

When does “conference-only games” turn into “football in the spring”? Because that has to be coming next, right?

Hopefully it won’t happen until after this column is published. But just as the spring sports season fell apart in a step-by-step manner in March, so too is the fall sports season seeming to slip away, one step at a time.

Some tough decisions could coming
If college football does move to the spring, there are a lot of branches that grow from that tree. But a really big one is how the season would overlap with the NFL offseason - particularly the pro league’s evaluation of college players.

This year, the NFL Scouting Combine was held Feb. 23-Mar. 2, and that’s usually a good time for it. It’s after the NFL playoffs have ended, so scouts and coaches and general managers can devote their full attention to what they’re seeing in Indianapolis. And it’s also more than a month after the College Football Playoffs end, so all college players should have a minimum of six weeks - and most will have more - to train and prepare for the Combine.

The Combine then leads into the college pro days, which tend to be held throughout March. In between, NFL teams will bring in players for interviews and individual workouts, and all of that leads to the Draft itself, which was held April 23-25 this year.

But if the college season gets moved to the spring, then every single thing I just listed gets thrown into upheaval.

While it’s up in the air as to when the season would actually be held - my guess is February through April, although January through March is possible - it’s almost impossible to avoid overlap with all of those events. The Combine, the pro days, the individual workouts and the Draft would almost certainly conflict with the college schedule unless the NFL decided to adjust, which seems unlikely.

And the result would be that players who are established Draft candidates - either seniors or Draft-eligible underclassmen - will face a decision: do you play your final season of college football? Or do you skip it and take part in those things we listed, like the Combine and pro days?

For some players, that would be an easy call. Trevor Lawrence knows he’s a top Draft pick, potentially No. 1 overall and not likely to fall out of the first round. But he’s the exception, the tip of the spear, and a whole bunch of other players are going to have much more difficult decisions to make.

Like Pitt’s top Draft prospects on this year’s team: Jaylen Twyman, Patrick Jones and Paris Ford. Those three all made the decision to return to Pitt for the 2020 season, but all three are not expected to be back in 2021 (Jones will be out of eligibility any way, but Twyman and Ford are likely leaving for the NFL).

So they’ll face a decision if the season gets pushed back to the spring: Do they play or do they sit it out? The case for sitting it out revolves around doing the traditional NFL spring evaluation circuit, not putting themselves at risk of being injured or coming off an injury in the Draft and also being fresh for the 2021 NFL season rather than being a few months removed from the college season, which could limit their contributions as rookies.

There’s a case to be made for playing, though. If you look around the Internet enough, you can find evaluations that have Ford, Jones and Twyman listed as first-round players, but I don’t know if any one of those three is a surefire top pick just yet. They could all play themselves into that position with another season on the field, though; another year of productive game tape where they take the small issues from 2019 and convert them into strengths in 2020 could propel each of those guys into the first round.

So there’s a benefit there to go with the risk, but it’s still a really tough call. On Wednesday, I put a poll on Panther-Lair.com asking the simple question: What would you do if you were in those guys’ shoes? As of Thursday night, more than 300 people had voted and it was a pretty close split: 54.5%-45.5%, with the majority saying they would not play.

Obsessed with numbers
This happens to me quite often:

I get hung up on a stat or a storyline and I just can’t let it go.

It happened last season with the whole “correctable mistakes” topic regarding Pitt’s offense. At a certain point in the second half of the season, I started tracking the offensive procedure penalties, fumbles (lost or recovered), interceptions and dropped passes.

As the games progressed and the offense continued to let the team down, often coming undone by its own hand, I couldn’t stop tracking it. The stat simply retained its relevance, all the way through the bowl game against Eastern Michigan.

When all was said and done, I was glad I had tracked it because the results - 104 of those mistakes through 13 games, or eight per game - seemed to tell a certain story about the offense and why the team went 8-5 instead of…well, instead of something better.

This is what happens: I find a stat like that and can’t let go of it until it loses its relevance. This offseason, a few of those kinds of things have emerged.

Two, actually, at least in the last couple weeks, and I’ve mentioned them in this column and in other venues a handful of times.

The first is the sack total. Pitt had 51 sacks in 13 games last season, an average of 3.92 sacks per game that led the nation. Going back over the last 15 seasons, no team has produced 50+ sacks in consecutive 13-game seasons, so I keep wondering if Pitt can or will do it.

The other stat, which I brought up in last week’s 3-2-1 Column, is receptions for the tight ends. Actually, it’s specifically about Lucas Krull and whether he can get 35 catches this season. I put that in the “One Prediction” section of last week’s column because I think it not only can happen but it will. Which is going out on a limb, since only two Pitt tight ends in the last 15 seasons have caught that many passes (Scott Orndoff in 2016 and Dorin Dickerson in 2009).

I actually think both of these numbers will hit. I think Pitt returns enough personnel that the sack total should get to 50 or more again. And I think that Krull is good enough and will see enough opportunities to get over 35 receptions. All of this is subject to change if Pitt plays fewer than 13 games, of course, and I would adjust the expectations if, by some chance, the Panthers find themselves playing more than 13.

But I’m going to go on the record here and say that Pitt will go over in both stats. This isn’t the prediction section so maybe it’s out of place, but this is what I do: find a stat and obsess over it. And the obsession will continue into the season; I’ll be sure to keep a sack tracker and a tight end catch tracker running throughout the games (whenever they’re played).

TWO QUESTIONS WE HAVE

What other numbers are important?
That last bit about being obsessed with certain stats got me thinking: are there any other numbers I should be focused on for this season? Any other points of obsession I should commit to?

Most relevantly, are there more important stats I should be highlighting as we drift through the summer months?

Obviously numbers like “points scored” or “points allowed” are the most important. But turnovers are big, too, and in terms of Pitt’s defense, that’s probably the one key area that was lacking in 2019 and needs to be improved in 2020.

That number should come up, I think, simply as a correlation with sack totals. Pitt produced 14 turnovers last season despite having 51 sacks; that’s pretty far out of whack, since teams that rush the passer well tend to come up with turnovers, too.

For example, of the 15 teams that had at least 40 sacks last season, all but three produced 20 or more turnovers and none had as few as Pitt. Taking it even farther, there were 32 teams that recorded at least 35 sacks in 2019, and only two came up with fewer turnovers than Pitt.

This is all to say that Pitt’s pass rush should lead to more turnovers, and getting more turnovers - as a number of the Panthers’ 2019 opponents would tell you - can really boost a struggling offense.

Aside from points scored and points allowed, turnovers gained might be one of the most important stats for Pitt this season. It is certainly an emphasis for the coaching staff this offseason and was a major talking point for the coaches and players during the three days of spring camp that happened back in March.

One other that really stands out to me is passing touchdowns. Kenny Pickett threw 13 touchdown passes last season, an improvement that actually seems like a downgrade given that his pass attempts from 2018 to 2019 increased by 159 but his passing touchdowns only went up by one.

This year, Pickett needs to be in the 20’s. Only three quarterbacks in Pitt history attempted 400 passes in a season prior to 2019: Alex Van Pelt in 1992 (407 attempts), Rod Rutherford in 2003 (413 attempts) and Tyler Palko in 2004 (409 attempts). All three of them threw at least 20 touchdown passes and Rutherford damn near threw 40 (he had 37).

Pickett’s 13 look pretty paltry by comparison, and if Mark Whipple calls on him to throw the ball 400 times again, it simply has to come up.

What’s the comparison point for this Draft class?
Let’s go back to the talk about the NFL Draft and Pitt’s Draft-eligible prospects. We’ll set aside the uncertainty and the questions about playing or not playing and just focus on what the 2021 Draft could look like for Pitt.

Because the 2021 Draft class looks like it could be one of Pitt’s best in quite some time.

There are the three big names, of course, and that’s where you have to start: Patrick Jones, Paris Ford and Jaylen Twyman. Like I said before, if you look around the Internet long enough, you’ll find someone who projects each of those guys as a first-round pick. I’m not going to dispute that; I think they each have a little work to do, but if they do the right work, they could all end up in the first round.

Which would be wild and virtually unprecedented, at least in the 21st century.

Since 2000, Pitt has had five first-round picks: Larry Fitzgerald, Darrelle Revis, Jeff Otah, Jonathan Baldwin and Aaron Donald. Donald was the most recent and that was in 2014, so if Pitt gets even one first-round pick next spring, it will break a six-year drought.

Getting multiple first-round picks in the same Draft? That hasn’t happened at Pitt since 1989 when Burt Grossman (No. 8 overall) and Tom Ricketts (No. 24 overall) were both taken. Getting three in the same first round? That has actually happened twice in Pitt history, but not since1983, with Jimbo Covert (No. 6), Tim Lewis (No. 11) and Dan Marino (No. 27).

(The other time Pitt had three first-round picks was 1981, with Hugh Green at No. 7, Randy McMillan at No. 12 and Mark May at No. 20. Pretty solid run there for the Panthers.)

Now, if I was a betting man, I would say it’s unlikely that Jones, Ford and Twyman all go in the first round. I think they each have that potential, but saying it will actually happen, especially with the uncertainty surrounding everything - that might be a bridge too far.

Still, whether those three all go in the first round or get spread out over the first three rounds - I don’t think any of them will be on the board after the third round - you’re looking at one of Pitt’s best Draft classes in a long time.

The 2018 Draft has turned into a very good one for Pitt. Brian O’Neill was a second-round pick and Jordan Whitehead and Avonte Maddox both went in the fourth; all three of those guys are still enjoying successful NFL careers and should be in the league for quite some time, so that class looks pretty good, although it didn’t have a first-round pick.

When Donald went in the first round of the 2014 Draft, the Panthers had two other players selected but both were after the third round (Tom Savage was a fourth-round pick and Devin Street was a fifth-round selection).

The last time Pitt had three players taken before the end of the third round was the 2004 Draft. That was when Fitzgerald went No. 3 overall and Shawntae Spencer and Kris Wilson were selected in the second round. That’s probably the bar for Pitt’s current class - one first-round pick and a pair of second-round selections - and if it happens next spring, we could be looking at Pitt’s best Draft class in more than 15 years. And I imagine a few more Pitt players will be drafted in addition to those three, so it could really fill in nicely.

All hell will continue to break loose
It sure felt like things happened fast this week.

It started on Monday with a report from The Athletic that the Ivy League was expected to cancel its fall sports season - including football. The official announcement on that came Wednesday and then, as many of us feared, the dominoes started falling.

By Thursday afternoon, the Big Ten announced that it would only be playing conference games. Then Brett McMurphy reported that the ACC was seemingly following suit. Later reports indicated that the conference hadn’t fully committed to such a plan just yet, but it seems like a matter of time, doesn’t it?

Would you be surprised at all if the ACC makes a similar announcement today or tomorrow or next week? Either preceded by or followed by announcements from the other Power Five conferences? Even though there is some sentiment that the Big Ten jumped the gun, that doesn’t change the feeling that we’re all careening toward a certain inevitable ending.

The question is, which ending will we crash into? Is a conference-only season the final stop on this trip? Or will we get to that point and fly right past it, eventually landing on a spring football season?

I can’t make the odds on this one because I just don’t know what’s going to happen; right now, my feeling is that we’re probably not going to see college football this fall. But to get to that point, to get from here (a full fall season) to there (a spring season), I’m guessing it’s going to take steps.

Like cancelling non-conference games. Then delaying the start of the season, maybe pushing it back to October and then November. And then, maybe, we’ll get a cancellation on the fall, followed by a plan for the spring, which will inevitably change at least a few times before the first kickoff is actually in the air.

All of that means we’ll have more days like Thursday in the future. We’ll have more days where it seems like things are happening fast, decisions are being made and changes are put into action.

We’ll have more days where it feels like all hell is breaking loose. That’s been the case in all walks of life for the last four months, to be sure, but this week has been a wild one for college sports, and it likely won’t be the last time we say that.