The Pittsburgh Panthers are a relatively new member of the ACC after coming over from the Big East Conference. Last year, they played another new arrival to the ACC (also from the Big East), the Syracuse Orange, and won the game with a score befitting a basketball game, not a football game. The 76-61 win was one of the most improbable and out-of-nowhere scores ever seen for a college football game. It showed how much Pittsburgh’s offense had grown, but it also indicated how flawed Pittsburgh’s defense was. What will be new for Pitt in 2017? For one thing, the two people at the heart of the Pitt offensive juggernaut have departed.
This season will be a real challenge for head coach Pat Narduzzi.
How Did They End 2016
The Panthers had a very weird season, and yet a season which was also very consistent in some ways. The 76-61 win over Syracuse was the final regular season game. A loss to Northwestern in the Pinstripe Bowl was a sad way to finish the season, but the real turning points came midway through the regular season. Pittsburgh was good enough to beat a top-five team, Penn State, and the eventual national champion, the Clemson Tigers. Pitt won that Clemson game on the road, showing how much talent it had. On the other hand, Pitt could not stop Virginia Tech, and it allowed a last-second touchdown to North Carolina after leading most of that game. The defense simply didn’t make many clutch plays, which is why a steady stream of excellent offensive performances were not rewarded a lot more than they were.
Offseason Changes
Offensive coordinator Matt Canada, the man who enabled the 2016 Pittsburgh offense to roar to life, is gone, replaced by Shawn Watson, a man with experience at Louisville and Texas in recent years, among other places. Quarterback Nathan Peterman is also gone, meaning that the Pitt offense must change not just coordinators, but quarterbacks. That’s a very tough pair to lose. If the Panthers had both in the fold for one more year, they could rightly expect to repeat their production, but by losing both (not just one), they will probably suffer a lot.
Team X-Factor
The offensive line has to hold the offense together. Everyone will be focused on the new coordinator and the new quarterback, but they both need help from other sources if the playbook is going to unfold smoothly and the Panthers are going to score at a high rate once again.
What To Expect From The Panthers This Year
The offense could not have been better last year, and the defense could not have been any worse. Realistically, it seems almost certain that the offense will decline and the defense will improve. The question is how much? The weakness (the defense) is so large, and the strength (the offense) is losing two highly important players, which suggest that the Panthers will not improve.
Record Last 5 Seasons
2016: 8-5
2015: 8-5
2014: 6-7
2013: 7-6
2012: 6-7
Schedule & Outlook
The Panthers have a very grueling start to the schedule, which is going to make life tough for them. They’ll beat Youngstown State at home in Week 1 but after that, they probably have one of the toughest months of September. For their second game of the season, they’ll head to Penn State. After that, they’ll host Oklahoma State. In Week 3, they’ll go to Georgia Tech. The good news for them is that they’ll miss a number of the heavy hitters in the ACC, so they should have a much easier time of things beyond September. They’ll host North Carolina and Miami, and have to go to Virginia Tech, but you’ll notice that there is no Florida State or Clemson on the map. That’s a good thing for Pittsburgh.
Pittsburgh is not ready to put all the pieces together, and its changes will probably cut in a negative direction. The Panthers will do no better than 7-5, possibly just 6-6. With the regular season win total set at seven, don’t expect them to go over this number. A push is where they’ll top out.
Regular Season Win Total Prediction: Under 7
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