In this week's 3-2-1 Column, we're thinking about how Pitt will bounce back from the SMU game, what areas the Panthers need to emphasize, what's still on the table with four games left and a lot more.

THREE THINGS WE KNOW

The first loss is the deepest…

…baby, you hope.

With any luck, Pitt’s first loss of the season will be its worst loss of the season, which is to say, ideally none of the Panthers’ final four games will look anything like the complete dismantling they took at the hands of SMU on Saturday night in Dallas.

That was just about as bad a destruction of a good Pitt team that we’ve seen in a long time. We’ll talk about blowout losses in a minute; for now, let’s talk about that game and where the Panthers go from here.

Look, I think we all more or less knew a loss was inevitable at some point. Through seven games, the Panthers looked like a good team but also a team with flaws. Their late-game heroics against Cincinnati and West Virginia were the stuff of legend but not exactly the kind of thing you can rely on, and their explosive offense was considerably less so in the final two games of October.

They were good, but not good enough to go 12-0; the questions were where and when (and how, to some extent) they would lose. SMU certainly was a proving ground, an opportunity for Pitt to stack a really impressive win on top of a perfect seven-game run. But the Mustangs are also pretty good, with a talented quarterback, speed at the skill positions, a stout pass rush and good athletes throughout the back seven on defense.

So it was going to be a challenge, and one that Pitt would probably lose most times out of ten. But it didn’t need to be a three-touchdown blowout; that was the part that was truly surprising.

Either way, it happened, and the Panthers came out of that game with a handful of lessons that they should have already learned this season. We’ll get into those in a moment, too, but before we get heavy on details, let’s think about what’s ahead.

Up first is a home game against Virginia, who is 4-4 overall and 2-3 in the ACC with a three-game losing streak coming into Saturday. Next is No. 24 Clemson in the home finale, and while the Tigers took a tough loss to Louisville last week and will have an interesting challenge at Virginia Tech this week, they’re the type of team no one will ever overlook.

And then the Panthers finish the season on the road, starting with No. 23 Louisville and closing at Boston College.

There are the should-wins - Virginia and Boston College - and the more challenging opponents - Clemson and Louisville - but one overriding thought emerges:

There’s a whole lot that’s still on the table for Pitt. Despite the humbling loss on Saturday (which might look better for SMU than it looks bad for Pitt), the Panthers have a whole lot they can accomplish this season.

Maybe they’ll knock on the door of the College Football Playoffs and maybe they won’t. I don’t know about that (and I’m not really betting on it). But what I do know is, there are two very winnable games left on the schedule and two other games that are tougher but not impossible. Even just winning two of the final four would give Pitt at least nine wins in a season for the third time in the last four years; you have to go back to the early 1980’s - an increasingly common reference point this season - to find the last time the Panthers had that kind of sustained success.

A nine-win season. A good bowl. A powerful statement in the bounce-back from last season. And a pretty good boost into 2025.

It’s all still there. Learn the lessons from last week, reset your focus and effort and go get a few more wins.

Some perspective from the national respect

I have to admit, I didn’t expect Pitt to be No. 18 in the initial College Football Playoff rankings that were released on Tuesday night.

I expected the Panthers to be ranked, but I didn’t think they would be in the top 20. Maybe it’s the recency bias of a three-touchdown blowout loss, but I thought they would be more around where they are in the Associated Press poll (No. 23).

So when the CFP committee made its announcement, I was kind of surprised.

But it also reminded me of something that was probably easy to lose sight of this week:

Pitt is still 7-1, and while that notch in the loss column was a rough one, it doesn’t change the seven notches in the win column. For the committee, apparently, those were worth quite a bit, too.

To be honest, the CFP ranking kind of felt like a reset button. I have to imagine everyone’s expectations took a dip after the SMU game, but 72 hours later, the CFP committee said, “Actually, Pitt is still a top-20 team.”

That served as a bit of a reminder, for me at least.

Sure, the Panthers just got their tails handed to them, but they have four games left against four teams that have each shown some flaws and deficiencies this season. You can’t take anything for granted, obviously, but winning at least nine games and possibly more in the regular season is still very much in reach.

Being a top-15 team is still very much in reach.

Having a certifiably Good Season - even better than it already has been - is still very much in reach.

I don’t know how far into the depths you sunk after the SMU game, but if it was somewhere in the range of “All momentum lost, all remaining wins unlikely,” maybe the committee putting Pitt at No. 18 was a bit of a wake-up call.

And just to further the point about what’s still on the table, while No. 18 Pitt hosts Virginia (4-4) on Saturday, No. 17 Iowa State will be at Kansas (a feisty 2-6 team), No. 16 Ole Miss will host No. 3 Georgia and No. 15 LSU will host No. 11 Alabama.

So there are a whole bunch of opportunities for games to break the right way around Pitt this weekend. Provided the Panthers take care of business Saturday night, they could very possibly have a clear path into the top 15 as an 8-1 team.

If that happens, the SMU game becomes less of a season-crusher and more of a speed bump, a tough matchup on the road with just about everything that could go wrong doing just that.

Really, that loss at SMU wasn’t the worst thing for Pitt. A win would have been preferable, of course, but the fact that the Panthers’ only loss to this point came on the road against a team that is just outside the playoff cut line doesn’t get held against them all that much.

In a funny sort of way that can only really happen in college football, SMU’s resume looks better for beating Pitt which, in turn, makes Pitt’s resume look better.

And because Pitt’s resume doesn’t look too bad, the Panthers are right there in the mix of things.

It’s important to keep that in mind, I think; the accomplishments of the first seven games didn’t go anywhere, and while Pitt’s loss at SMU was bad, it wasn’t a Bad Loss.

Do I think Pitt is going to make the playoffs? No, probably not. But are the Panthers still in position to get into the top 15? Yes, I think so, and that’s pretty good.

Bouncing back

If you’ve read these columns for awhile or listened to our podcasts for awhile or simply been on Panther-Lair.com for awhile, you probably know that I like to look things up. Stats, trends, history - I like opening the media guide or a good informative web page and seeing what wonders it returns.

I did it again this week on a few topics, and one of the areas I was really interested in was how Pitt has bounced back from blowout losses under Pat Narduzzi.

Obviously, Saturday night’s loss at SMU was the inspiration, so I decided to limit the data set to losses of 20 points or more. As such, there were 10 blowout losses in Narduzzi’s first nine seasons (2015-23; SMU is No. 11).

Oh - one other thing I like to do is find some stats or whatever and use them multiple times, so I talked about this on Thursday’s Morning Pitt. But it’s one thing to hear me talk about it and another to see it for yourself, so here are the 10 blowout losses from 2015-23 and what happened the next week.

I think there are a few interesting things to see there. One is how often Clemson was involved - either as the team giving out the 20-point blowout (2018 and 2020) or as the team Pitt faced after the 20-point blowout (2016 and 2018). That doesn’t really mean anything, but it’s an odd coincidence.

More interesting, and possibly more relevant, is how those 20-point losses have gone recently. For starters, only four of the 10 blowout defeats have come in the last five seasons (Virginia Tech in 2019, Clemson and Notre Dame in 2020 and Notre Dame in 2023). And the Notre Dame game last year broke a streak of 28 games without a 20-point blowout loss.

I thought that was interesting.

It’s also interesting that Pitt is 5-5 under Narduzzi in the game after the blowout loss. That’s probably the most topical stat, since we’re all very curious to see how Pitt responds in the aftermath of the 23-point loss at SMU.

To that end, Pitt is 2-1 after a 20-point loss since 2020, winning both of the next games that year and losing to Florida State after the Notre Dame game last season. But that FSU game is an interesting one, too, because while Pitt lost by 17 to the Seminoles, the game was closer and more competitive than that. You may or may not recall that the Panthers played FSU to a 0-0 tie in the first quarter and then nearly took the first lead of the game early in the second when Christian Veilleux hit Konata Mumpfield for an 82-yard pass from the Pitt 18 - yes, an 82-yard completion that started 82 yards from the end zone - but it didn’t result in points since Fentrell Cypress yanked Mumpfield’s face mask and forced a fumble that went out of the end zone.

Mike Norvell praised Cypress’ commitment to hustle on the play; I guess that’s one way to look at it. Another way to look at it is to see Mumpfield’s helmet spinning around on his head.

But I digress.

Pitt ultimately did score first in that game, and while FSU hit a touchdown and field goal to go up 10-7 at halftime, there were probably a few nervous folks in Tallahassee. I suspect they got even more nervous when Pitt was in field goal range in the third quarter before a curious unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on Gavin Bartholomew (who wasn’t even on the field at the time) pushed them back and FSU scored on the next possession.

But I digress again.

My point is that, despite losing by three scores, Pitt was a lot more competitive against the No. 4 Seminoles than anyone expected them to be - particularly when the Panthers were fresh off a 51-point blowout loss at Notre Dame.

So you’ve got a trio of pretty solid performances after each of the last three times Pitt got blown out. Does that mean anything for Saturday night’s showdown with Virginia? No, probably not. But you can impress your friends at the tailgate with your recall of Pitt’s most recent 20-point losses and how the Panthers bounced back.

TWO QUESTIONS WE HAVE

Should Yarnell get a shot?

I feel like I could hear Pitt fans singing out in a chorus this week.

All we are saying

Is give Nate a chance

Okay, maybe not all Pitt fans, but there’s definitely a non-zero number looking to see what Nate Yarnell can do with a real opportunity - not just playing in mop-up duty late in the last two games.

I get it. I do. In the last three games, Eli Holstein has completed 59.3% of his passes for 489 yards, two touchdowns and three interceptions. Sure, the Syracuse game was a weird one - he only attempted 15 passes - but overall, that production is a far cry from the first five games, when he threw 15 touchdowns and averaged 313.4 yards per game.

Meanwhile, Yarnell came in at the end against SMU and threw for 99 yards and two touchdowns on 9-of-10 passing.

There are plenty of caveats there - mostly that SMU had emptied its bench by that point - but after Holstein completed 29-of-48 for 248 yards and a pick, the simple act of completing passes and taking what was available from the defense seemed like a real accomplishment.

So while Pat Narduzzi dismissed the notion at his weekly press conference on Monday, I have to believe he and offensive coordinator Kade Bell have at least spared a thought or two on the question:

Should Yarnell get a shot?

I’m torn on this myself, because I think there are a lot of angles to the question.

On one hand, you might choose to look at it as a debate between development and winning now. Holstein is Pitt’s quarterback of the future, but recently, he has been playing like the inexperienced redshirt freshman that he is. So should Narduzzi and Bell stick with him in the interest of developing him for the future with the idea that every snap is a learning opportunity? Or, if they believe Yarnell gives them even a 1% better chance of winning right now, should they go with him?

Some of it comes back to the question we discussed so often in August:

Which quarterback has the most upside? It seems like that was the factor that ultimately separated Holstein in the training camp competition, and I think we’ve seen that upside on the field.

But what if the staff believes, at this particular moment in time, that Yarnell’s floor is higher? If that’s the case, then a question of higher-floor-vs-higher-ceiling is an interesting one. How many games can the higher floor win? Maybe it’s high enough to beat Virginia and Boston College, but is it high enough to beat Clemson and Louisville? Or is the higher ceiling - even with a lower likelihood of being hit - needed to win those two?

Maybe we’re all just talking for the sake of talking and the coaches see it as a no-brainer to continue with Holstein because he’s the long-term answer. I think that’s possible and even plausible.

But I also think it’s reasonable to say, “Hey, this season has been pretty special so far and there’s a chance to win nine or 10 or even 11 games; the decision on the quarterback should be based on which guy can get that number as high as possible.”

Of course, this isn’t to say that I think Yarnell is necessarily the best option for winning right now and Holstein’s only value is in what he means for the future. On the contrary, my opinion is that Pitt should stick with Holstein; I think he has shown enough this season to earn the right to work through the struggles and improve on the field. And I also believe Holstein playing at his highest level gives the team the best chance to win.

But I think it’s an interesting question and one that probably merits a bit more consideration from Narduzzi than he let on during his press conference.

Should Pitt be running more?

This is not a platform I expected to champion this season, but here we are.

Maybe this is just how it goes. When an offense is struggling and it does one thing more than the other - passing more than rushing or vice-versa - then it’s inevitable to suggest a flip, or at least something closer to balance.

That’s a magic word, isn't it? Balance.

Pitt doesn’t have a whole lot of that right now. The Panthers’ running backs have recorded 152 rushing attempts this season; meanwhile, the quarterbacks (and punter Caleb Junko) have attempted exactly 300 passes. That’s a 2:1 ratio on passes-to-running back carries.

Now, we should make note of Eli Holstein’s 72 rushing attempts; some of those were sacks, but most of them weren’t, and that’s part of the running game, too. But let’s keep the focus on the running backs for now.

I think it’s reasonable to ask whether Pitt should commit to running those guys a little bit more than it has.

I’m looking at the last three games specifically since the Panthers’ offense has taken (more than) a few steps back in that span.

By my count, Pitt’s running backs recorded 55 rushing attempts against Cal, Syracuse and SMU. Those carries accounted for about 28.8% of the Panthers’ total offensive snaps. Obviously, there are some caveats - a heavy emphasis on passing in the blowout at SMU and a low number of offensive snaps overall against Syracuse - but generally speaking, I don’t think you would expect to see running back carries account for less than 30% of the plays.

What’s more, though, is that the running back rushing attempts were largely successful. Of the 55 carries the backs recorded in those three games, 29 reached the “win” threshold of gaining four yards or more. That’s a 52.7% success rate, and while I can’t claim to know what coaches would consider a good success rate, it seems like getting four-plus yards on more than half of your running back rushing attempts is pretty desirable.

And yet, they just didn’t seem to give the ball to the running backs all that much. In the first half against Cal, Pitt ran 26 offensive plays and just 10 were running back carries. Those 10 carries accounted for 118 yards, and even if you want to remove Desmond Reid’s 72-yard run on fourth-and-1 - which, why would you? - that still means the backs picked up 46 yards on nine carries.

That’s better than five yards per carry, with five of the nine rushes getting four yards or more. Meanwhile, the passing game in that half produced 4.23 yards per attempt.

The pattern largely continued throughout the rest of those three games. In the second half against Cal, the first half against Syracuse and the first half against SMU, Pitt’s yards per passing attempt hovered right around five while the running back rushing attempts accounted for just 18.2% of the total plays.

Look, I know this is a passing offense. I know Kade Bell was brought here to reinvigorate the passing game and add explosiveness to Pitt’s attack. And I’m certainly not advocating a return to what we saw the last two years.

But there’s a happy medium here, and it doesn’t even have to be a “medium.” Balance doesn’t have to be a 50/50 split, and I don’t personally think Pitt should go for a 50/50 split. Leaning toward the pass is generally a good approach and probably the best way for the Panthers to move the ball.

All I’m saying is, maybe the running backs could get the ball a little more. Reid, Rodney Hammond and even Daniel Carter have shown that they can make plays, and while there are certainly challenges in running behind Pitt’s offensive line right now, there are opportunities there (like running outside the tackles, where Reid is averaging 4.4 yards per attempt).

ONE PREDICTION

Eli Holstein will bounce back

I keep using that phrase - “bounce back” - and there’s nobody who needs it more than Eli Holstein.

I mean, we don’t really know what his mindset is like right now since he hasn’t spoken publicly in a midweek media session since the third week of September (aside from that time he shot the breeze with Pat Bostick over dinner at Sarafino’s), but I’m sure he’s feeling the effects of struggling like he has for the last three games.

A quick aside:

I don’t really understand why Holstein hasn’t been made available to the media during a midweek session pretty much all season. I know he talks after (some) games, but the midweek sessions are an opportunity to take a bigger-picture look at things. By not making him available - which is the head coach’s decision - it looks like something is being hidden or someone needs to be protected. The offense has struggled recently after experiencing great success earlier, so let the quarterback address it and talk about his process and mentality.

Ditto for the offensive coordinator, who hasn’t spoken to the media since the second week of September.

But, as is so often the case, I digress.

One of the people who did talk to the media this week was Pat Narduzzi, and one of the more common topics he discussed was the matter of scouting.

Specifically, scouting opponents.

Specifically, scouting opponents’ defenses.

On Monday, Narduzzi talked about how each of the last three opponents seemingly caught Pitt off-guard by doing things on defense that they hadn’t really done earlier in the season. Cal, Syracuse and SMU used different defensive styles against the Panthers, and those plans apparently worked, given Pitt’s offensive struggles.

I get it with Cal. Pitt’s offense came into that game expecting one thing and got another. And the Bears are pretty good on defense to begin with, so facing something unexpected only increased the difficulty level.

And maybe I get it with Syracuse. Cal did one thing and it worked, but there was no guarantee that Syracuse would try to copy that.

I don’t know if the Orange copied it verbatim, but they did a pretty good job of taking a similar approach - namely, limiting the blitz and focusing on dropping into coverage to make Holstein pick apart the defense.

So Cal did it. And Syracuse did it. Anybody want to take a guess on what SMU was going to do?

From the look of things - or at least the results - Pitt might have bet against SMU playing copycat.

And that bet was wrong.

Narduzzi more or less admitted as much this week, and on Thursday, he acknowledged the copycat nature of football and pretty much said the Panthers should expect to see more of it this week.

So while my prediction is that Holstein will bounce back, I’m also making a larger prediction that the game plan will be better - and better reflect the reality that Virginia is likely going to try to do some of the same things the last three teams did.

Personally, I think Holstein is really talented. I think he has played like a redshirt freshman at times, but he has also made some really, really big-time plays. And even in the last three games, he wasn’t a complete waste; he was 6-of-6 for 72 yards and a touchdown in the second half against Syracuse before he got hurt, and he made just enough Good Throws in the other two games to show that he’s still got it.

Holstein just needs to do it a little more consistently. Improving the game plan will help with that, and I also think a renewed emphasis on Konata Mumpfield and Kenny Johnson would be a good thing, too.

My prediction, then, is that those things will happen. Kade Bell will come out with a better plan for beating that kind of defense, Mumpfield and Johnson will be emphasized and Holstein will settle into a rhythm, taking what Virginia gives him and occasionally attacking downfield.

He has done it before and I think he’ll do it again tomorrow night.