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It’s all about Signing Day in this week’s 3-2-1 Column, as we recap the class Pitt signed, look at some of the standouts and discuss a lot more.

THREE THINGS WE KNOW

That’s a wrap on the class (for now)
The December Signing Day is over, and obviously that’s what we’re thinking about this week. Pitt announced 17 additions to the roster on Wednesday, including one graduate transfer, one junior-college transfer and 15 high school players.

Overall, it’s a pretty good class. It ranks No. 46 in the nation, but that’s according to the Rivals.com team rankings formula, which is ultimately a points system where each recruit is assigned a point value based on their Rivals rating (along with some bonuses thrown in).

That approach to team rankings is pretty solid, I think, and it tries to avoid being biased toward big classes by only counting the ratings of the top 20 recruits in each class. That standardizes things a little bit and levels the playing field to some degree between schools that sign classes of various sizes.

For a quick example, Georgia is currently ranked No. 5, Penn State is No. 14 and North Carolina is No. 26. The Bulldogs only have 19 commitments, while PSU has 27 and UNC has 26. If we counted all committed recruits, then the rankings formula would probably end up favoring the Lions and the Heels. But if you look at the classes, Georgia’s 19 commits include three 5-stars and 13 4-stars. PSU can match the 13 four-stars but doesn’t have any five-stars; UNC’s class of 26 only has nine four-stars (which is still a lot, but by comparison to UGA, it’s not much).

So just on those numbers, you tell me which class should be ranked highest. It’s obviously Georgia, and using 20 as the number for how we compare teams favors the Bulldogs - which it should.

Anyway, Pitt has 17 guys on the commitment list, and the points total puts the Panthers at No. 46 (as of Thursday night). If we look at average stars, though, Pitt does a little better. The Panthers average 3.06 stars per recruit - better than or tied with 17 of the teams ranked ahead of them. Of course, there are two teams ranked behind Pitt who have equal or better average stars, but I do think that looking at average stars gives a little better on Pitt’s class, and by that measure, the Panthers are in the 30's.

(Interestingly, the Panthers are seventh in the ACC in ranking points and seventh in average stars, so that’s pretty much where they are - right in the middle.)

Ultimately, I like this class quite a bit. I’ll dig into that more in a minute, but I think there’s a lot to like. Pitt got some instant help at a few key positions, added some offensive playmakers and continued to rebuild the defense. The coaches didn’t get everybody they wanted, but that’s kind of how recruiting goes; LSU and Clemson and Georgia and Ohio State didn’t get everybody they wanted either (LSU even lost a kid to Maryland; can you imagine?).

Overall, I think the Pitt staff put together one of its best collections of athletes that we’ve seen in the last five years. And I think time will tell on that one, which is why I believe what I'm about to say.

This is quite possibly Narduzzi’s best class
I’ve been on this notion for awhile. I probably wrote about it in a previous 3-2-1 Column. I know I’ve said it on a podcast or a radio show or a podcast and a radio show or maybe just to myself on a long drive back from some place in the Carolinas - I spend a lot of my days talking about Pitt - so you’ve probably heard this before.

But I really think this is going to turn out to be Pat Narduzzi’s best class. In terms of rankings, the 2016 class that was No. 29 nationally and No. 5 in the ACC was Narduzzi’s best. But I think when we look back on what the classes have produced, we’re going to be impressed with the 2020 class.

Believe me, I’ve been down this road before. I’ve sat on Signing Day and said ‘This guy will be a starter, this guy will be a star, this guy will be all-conference, this guy will play in the NFL’ and ended up being dead wrong about all of them (listen, go back and watch Chris Burns’ tape; the guy looks like Steve Slaton).

So I know to take all of this with maybe not a grain of salt, but certainly with the understanding that a lot can happen when a kid gets to college. Never mind the physical transition and adjusting to the speed of the game and all of that; just think about the transition of being a young person going to college. It’s a whole new world, and I’m sure you are like me and saw plenty of people not handle that transition well.

Athletes fall into that trap, too. The adjustment to being a college student doesn’t always go smoothly, and that’s probably an underrated factor when we start talking about “busts” in college athletics. So we take that into consideration and understand that it’s impossible to project that side of things.

But among the things we can project, I think there’s a lot to like.

For starters, there are guys who can help right away. I’m talking 2020. Lucas Krull is the obvious one; he is coming to Pitt as a graduate transfer from Florida and he just so happens to play the position that most needs someone to do anything positive. He’s a tight end, of course, and an intriguing one as a 6’6” 255-pound athlete who can run and - ideally - catch. So that’s an instant boost to a position that desperately needs one.

And then there is the trio of offensive skill guys we have talked about since the summer: running back Israel Abanikanda and receivers Jordan Addison and Jaylon Barden. All three guys have the ability to get on the field as freshmen. They really do. We all talked at length about Henry Parrish, the four-star running back who committed to Pitt in June and then spent the fall building up to a December decommitment, but the truth is, Abanikanda is no slouch himself. Listed at 5’11” and 195 pounds in Pitt’s press release, Abanikanda has decent size and high-end speed. Nobody in Pitt’s running back room should feel like they’ve settled into a role because nobody in that room did enough in 2019 to secure a role. Abanikanda will jump into the mix and should have a real shot at playing time.

As for Addison and Barden, these are two legit playmakers at the receiver position. Neither has elite size, but they make up for it with explosiveness and ball skills. I say this is as someone who is probably more bullish than most on Taysir Mack, Shocky Jacques-Louis and Jared Wayne, but I think Addison and Barden walk in and almost immediately compete with those guys for spots in the rotation.

And to top it all off, Abanikanda and Addison will be here in the spring.

Beyond them, you’ve got another good receiver in Aydin Henningham, two mountain-sized offensive tackles in Branson Taylor and Michael Statham, a pair of strong pass-rushing defensive ends in Sam Williams and Emmanuel Belgrave, two perfect-for-the-defense linebackers in AJ Roberts and Bangally Kamara, three defensive backs who continue the staff’s run of finding really good fits in the secondary with Hunter Sellers, Jahvante Royal and Buddy Mack and then one do-it-all athlete in Solomon DeShields, who could play offense or defense and might end up being the best player in the class.

Oh, and how could I forget the hometown hero? That’s Dayon Hayes from Westinghouse, the biggest recruit the City League has produced in years and a young man who never had any doubts about where he wanted to go to college.

“I don’t know how people can leave Pitt without committing,” he told me on Signing Day.

I thought you’d like that quote.

This class is really good, top to bottom, offense and defense. Yes, there is a missing piece or two in there (we’ll talk about quarterbacks in a minute), but I think this group is as good as anything we’ve seen from Narduzzi. And I’m one who thinks the 2019 class is really going to surprise some people with how good they turn out to be.

This 2020 class, though, could be really, really good.

It’s not how it ended
And yet, for all the promise and potential that this class has, all was not well in Pitt Fan Land during the run-up to Signing Day. In fact, I would say Pitt fans were borderline - or over-the-border - disappointed in how the class turned out.

Specifically, Pitt fans seemed to be less than enthused about the events leading up to and surrounding Signing Day. Over the last two weeks, we saw the coaches in various positions of contact with roughly a half-dozen recruits who seemed to be giving the Panthers a serious look but ending up signing elsewhere.

There was Tate Rodemaker, the Georgia quarterback who looked like he was leaning to Pitt before new Florida State coach Mike Norvell got involved. He’s now a Seminole.

There was Bryan Robinson, a four-star receiver from Florida who looked like he was leaning to Pitt before Norvell retained FSU receivers coach Ron Dugans. He’s now a Seminole.

There was Derek Bermudez, the Jacksonville defensive back who looked like he was leaning to Pitt before new Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin got involved. He’s now a Rebel.

Plus, there were others who weren’t really leaning to Pitt but were considering the Panthers, like defensive lineman Ahkeem Mesidor (West Virginia) and defensive backs Lovie Jenkins (Louisville) and Davonte Brown (UCF).

And that doesn’t even dig into the host of FSU commits who seemed to be open to Pitt after Willie Taggart got fired but then solidified their futures as Seminoles with Norvell.

The possibility of landing any of those recruits - Rodemaker, Robinson, Bermudez, Mesidor, Jenkins, Brown or the FSU commits - was exciting and seemed to be setting Pitt up for a very good Signing Day. But one by one, they all drifted away, and the Panthers’ Signing Day additions ended up being Buddy Mack and the two tight ends, Lucas Krull and Daniel Moraga.

Those are good additions, but they don’t quite have the flash of a quarterback, a four-star receiver or a flip from Florida State. So disappointment, as it often does, crept in. Pitt fans maybe weren’t entirely disappointed in the class, but they were disappointed in the way the class was finished. “What could be” turned into “What isn’t,” and when none of the scenarios you dreamed up come to pass, it can feel like a letdown.

Me? I think it’s all about timing. I was thinking about this on Wednesday morning as I sat in the auditorium at Westinghouse and watched Dayon Hayes “sign” his Letter of Intent. He wasn’t really signing, of course; his actual LOI had gone in a couple hours earlier, and what I was watching was purely ceremonial.

But I couldn’t help thinking, ‘What if this was the real thing? What if we didn’t know where Hayes was going? What if he hadn’t been committed since June and he was making his actual commitment and signing right there on that stage? And what if he used that opportunity to commit to Pitt?’

If that had happened, Pitt fans would have been over the moon.

The same goes for Addison or Barden or Royal or a whole bunch of the recruits in the class. If four or five or six of them had decided not to commit in June and played out the recruiting process and took more visits and committed on Signing Day, the Pitt fans on Panther-Lair.com might have crashed the Rivals network. It would have been pandemonium and the excitement would have been through the roof.

But that’s not how the timing worked out. Hayes and Addison and Royal and almost all of the rest committed in June. By the time Signing Day rolled around six months later, they were old news. Addison made things a little interesting by taking a last-minute official visit to Maryland and then delaying his signing until Thursday, but otherwise there wasn’t really any drama.

The only drama went against Pitt, so in lieu of good news, Pitt fans dwelled on the bad news. Which, I suppose, is normal.

But I think you have to take a long view here. Look at the big picture. The class isn’t just defined by what happens leading up to Signing Day; the class is defined by the class that is signed on Signing Day. And that group, like I said, is pretty darn good.

Would it have been more exciting if Pitt had pulled in some new names this week? Sure. Everybody loves some good Signing Day drama, especially when it goes their team’s way. But ultimately, it doesn’t matter if they commit in June or January as long as they commit. Pitt got a really good class largely off the strength of June commitments, and nothing that happened in the last week changed that.

TWO QUESTIONS WE HAVE

What else do they need?
Now that the class is in, we can look ahead to February, since there’s another Signing Day waiting on the 5th of that month.

Last year, Pitt signed one high school recruit on the second Signing Day - linebacker SirVocea Dennis, who played extensively on special teams this season - and also added a graduate transfer offensive lineman in Nolan Ulizio.

The staff could look for another grad transfer on the offensive line, but honestly, it’s probably time to start growing your own in that regard, so to speak. I do think that offensive line will be a target in January, though - just among high school recruits.

Pitt signed two offensive linemen on Wednesday, and while I think it’s a good haul with Branson Taylor and Michael Statham, the numbers need to come up. Since signing five offensive linemen in the class of 2017, Pitt has brought in two high school recruits on the line in each of the last two classes (pending some potential position changes for freshmen this offseason).

There again, Jake Kradel and Blake Zubovic (from 2018) and Liam Dick and Matthew Goncalves (from 2019) look like pretty good players who will contribute at Pitt in the future. But you need numbers on the offensive line, and two per year isn’t enough.

So that makes the line a priority in January, as the coaches will have to try to find a few more recruits to go with Taylor and Statham. Ideally, those would be interior line prospects, but even moderately-sized tackles can move inside and play guard, so all options should be on the table.

I think tight end might be an area the coaches look at in January, too. They obviously announced two tight ends, but one was a graduate transfer and one was a junior-college transfer; the first of those guys will be gone after next season and the other will be done after 2021, so the biggest problem for Pitt with tight ends - creating a full roster with depth to sustain over multiple seasons - won’t be solved.

Lucas Krull and Daniel Moraga are stopgaps; Pitt needs to get some high school prospects to build a pipeline. So I will be looking for the coaches to try to find another tight end next month, depending on what’s out there and available.

Speaking of what’s available, Henry Parrish is still on the board and didn’t sign anywhere. You know Pitt defensive line coach Charlie Partridge isn’t giving up on that one, so we’ll see what develops.

And then there’s quarterback…

Will Pitt sign a quarterback in February?
Hey, let’s jump into a new section of the column for this one.

I’ve talked about this a bunch of times, dating back to the summer when Pitt’s quarterback targets were mostly off the board. And I talked about it a week or two ago when it seemed like the Panthers might not get any quarterbacks in the December signing period.

And I’ll talk about it again here because they didn’t get anybody.

They tried. Pitt had a good shot at Tate Rodemaker, the rare quarterback prospect in this class to earn the seal of approval from Mark Whipple. But Rodemaker was wooed at the last minute by new Mike Norvell, who also performed an act of theft and stole Chubba Purdy from Louisville.

Pitt’s tire-kicking efforts in December extended to a handful of quarterback targets, but none of it panned out. So it’s back to square one, more or less, heading into January.

And for the next six weeks, we’ll all ponder the same question:

Will Pitt sign a quarterback in February?

If I had to bet, I would probably lean toward yes. There are enough high schools with enough senior quarterbacks in the country that Pitt should be able to find a competent player to add to the 2020 class. The Panthers have a dedicated and tireless recruiting staff, and those guys will find players to show to the coaches.

I just wonder, though…

Like I said before, offensive line is a definite priority for next month. Tight end seems important, too. And then a guy like Parrish - a no-matter-what target - could end up going for the Panthers. So in addition to the question of whether Pitt can find a quarterback, there’s also the matter of whether Pitt has room for a quarterback?

I guess one part of the equation is the current roster. Obviously Pitt has Kenny Pickett for one more year, Nick Patti for three more years and Davis Beville for four more years. If the staff believes in Beville as the future of the position, then it’s not too crazy a thought to skip this year. Pitt doesn’t have great numbers at quarterback, but with two young players in the system and general optimism about their futures, the idea has some merit.

Even if you punt on taking a quarterback this year, you can get one next year and still have at least three scholarship arms on the roster. Paul Chryst used to say he liked to have five or something, but I just don’t think that’s realistic. If a quarterback doesn’t see a clear path to playing time, there’s a real chance he takes off. It happens quite often in college football these days.

And there’s the other half of the equation: quarterbacks transfer. A lot. Look at the starting quarterbacks in the playoff field this year: transfer, transfer, transfer, sophomore two-year starter. The transfer market for quarterbacks is plentiful, so even if you have to skip a year in recruiting - like Pitt could do this year - and it comes back to bite you in two or three years when your depth gets in a tight spot, there will be options to fill out the roster.

There’s no definite answer right now to the question that started this section - will Pitt take a quarterback? - because it’s going to depend on what the recruiting board looks like in January. But if we narrow the question a bit - can Pitt get by without taking a quarterback? - I think the answer is probably yes.

ONE THOUGHT
…on each of the recruits

So this is usually the prediction section of the column where I make an ill-advised, poorly-reasoned and generally wrong prediction about something - anything, really, because I’ve been wrong on everything from game outcomes to individual performances to recruiting developments.

You name it; I’ve probably been wrong about it.

In lieu of predicting next week’s Quick Lane Bowl - for Pete’s sake, they really better win that one - I’m going to do something a little different this week and look at the 17 players joining Pitt’s roster this year, or at least the 17 who got announced this week.

I’m going to do one thought in one sentence on each recruit. Brevity isn’t always my strong suit, so let’s see how this goes.

Israel Abanikanda
Pitt’s other running back commitment - who is no longer on the commitment list - got all the attention but Abanikanda deserves just as much because his senior season was outstanding and he will put up a fight for carries as a freshman.

Jordan Addison
The end of his recruitment got interesting but he was worth the wait, because he’s a big-play receiver who makes up for size with explosiveness and should see the field this season.

Jaylon Barden
Along with Addison, Barden represents one of the best receiving duos to sign with Pitt in a long time, as he’ll join the Panthers after catching 68 passes for 1,234 yards (18.1 ypc) and 15 touchdowns this past season.

Emmanuel Belgrave
Belgrave’s senior season was limited by injury, but that doesn’t diminish his 8.5-sack performance in 2018 or the way he fits as a strong-side defensive end in Pitt’s 4-3 scheme.

Solomon DeShields
Possibly the steal of the class, DeShields starred on both sides of the ball for Millville (NJ) and could line up at a variety of positions at Pitt, since his combination of size and athleticism could make him a beast at linebacker or receiver.

Dayon Hayes
The hometown hero who was always going to Pitt - and was damn proud of that fact - Hayes is the foundation of the class, a potential star defensive lineman who represents the future of what Narduzzi and Charlie Partridge have built up front on Pitt’s defense.

Aydin Henningham
As a standout on a loaded state championship-winning team, Henningham excelled in all three phases of the game, and while he probably won’t play both ways at Pitt, he could help on offense or defense in addition to special teams.

Bangally Kamara
The Pitt staff has gotten really good at identifying linebackers who fit the defense and Kamara is a near-perfect fit for the “Star” position - so much so that he could even step back and play strong safety but he’s got enough size to line up at linebacker.

Buddy Mack
The last recruit to join Pitt’s class before Signing Day, Mack flipped to the Panthers from Charlotte but looks like an ACC safety and will fit well at the boundary position in Narduzzi’s defense.

Daniel Moraga
I’m pretty sure Lucas Krull will be a mainstay on the field this year but I’m a little more curious about Moraga’s role since he’s also a pass-catcher but doesn’t have the size that Krull does.

AJ Roberts
There is versatility in Pitt’s linebacker positions, so Roberts could end up inside or outside, but he’s got a chance to be the Panthers’ next multi-year middle linebacker with sideline-to-sideline ability.

Jahvante Royal
Somehow one of Pitt’s four-star commits was one of the less-heralded prospects in the class, but Royal merits some attention as another piece in restocking the Panthers’ cornerback ranks.

Hunter Sellers
A classic Narduzzi defensive back who could play corner or safety, Sellers excels in coverage while showing plenty of desire to put some big hits on receivers and running backs.

Michael Statham
The first word with Statham is size, as he’s very large - so big, in fact, that strength coach Dave Andrews is probably looking forward to molding him into the effect tackle he can become.

Branson Taylor
Like Statham, Taylor is a large human being, and Narduzzi said that he can move after watching Taylor play basketball, so the potential is high for the future tackle.

Sam Williams
Pitt’s first recruit in the class, Williams is another long, athletic pass-rusher who was very productive in high school, piling up 20 tackles for loss in his senior season and generally earning must-be-accounted-for status among opponents.