Passing Attack has Golden Opportunity Against Louisville

It’s not exactly controversial to say that Pitt has struggled to find sustained success on offense in recent years. While the 2016 team had a prolific attack, key player and coaching departures the following offseason began the current period of mediocrity. Over the past 41 games, stretching back to the beginning of the 2017 season, Pitt is averaging only 24.3 points per game. Over that same period, they’re averaging 5.5 yards per play and 373.7 yards per game. To give these numbers some context, out of 130 current FBS teams over this period, they are 104th in points per game, 88th in yards per play, and 95th in yards per game. These numbers are decidedly below average and nowhere near where you’d want them to be for a team that aspires to win ACC titles. 

Despite these lackluster results, there are reasons of optimism. Pat Narduzzi had enough sense to end the disastrous Shawn Watson experiment after the 2018 season. So Pitt has entered 2020 in Year 2 of new Offensive Coordinator Mark Whipple. They also have a Senior 3-year starter in Kenny Pickett and the Offensive Line returned 4 of their 5 starters. Pickett also had some new intriguing receiving options in Freshman Jordan Addison and Grad Transfers D.J. Turner and Lucas Krull. The offense began the season clicking in the opener against Austin Peay, racking up 42 points in the first half before the backups were brought in. Though it was only against an FCS program, it still gave reason to believe that the Pitt offense would be much improved. The hope at the very least is that the team won’t have to lean on their defense quite so much to win games. However, last week they only scored 21 points in a mistake-prone win against a Syracuse team projected to finish towards the bottom of the ACC. So which offense are we going to see this weekend against Louisville? The electric attack from the opener or the sloppy outfit from last week. There’s actually a great chance that we’ll see the latter as Pitt has a golden opportunity to have a field day through the air against Louisville.

Pitt could not stop shooting themselves in the foot on offense last week. They had 4 drops according to Pro Football Focus’ accounting. There were multiple procedural penalties. They had two turnovers and were lucky to not have more as there were two additional fumbles that they recovered. Though more special teams, but still resulting in points left on the field, there were 3 field goal attempts that resulted in zero points. Mistakes happen to all teams, especially in the college game, but the number of unforced errors committed by the Panthers last week was unacceptable. Games like last week were emblematic of the offensive frustrations from the past few seasons. Against Syracuse they could play like that and still win handily. That likely won’t be the case against a Louisville team that can put points on the board at a much higher rate. However, the reason the Pitt offense has such a rich opportunity has more to do with the Cardinals’ other side of the ball.

Though it’s early still, Louisville almost reminds me of that 2016 Pitt team. They have a high-powered offense, but a porous defense. Particularly in the Secondary. Through their first two games they are surrendering 8.6 yards per passing attempt. That figure includes their non-conference game against Western Kentucky from Conference USA. Against Miami last week they gave up 10.8 yards per attempt. Miami starting Quarterback D’Eriq King went 18/30 for 325 yards and 3 touchdowns through the air en route to a 47-34 victory. Additionally, though it’s a small sample size, they have no interceptions through their first two games of the season. We can also look at Pro Football Focus grading to get a more complete picture of how the Secondary has performed. Say what you will about them, and there are some valid criticisms, but they generally do a pretty good job in my opinion of capturing things that don’t show up in the traditional statistics. Through the first two games of the season, the Louisville defense has collectively received a 59.3 grade, which was 32nd out of the 52 teams that have played a game so far. However their Coverage grade is only 44.5, which is 44th out of 52.

Once again this is a small sample size, but Louisville’s strength this season was always going to be it’s offense. To see their defense get manhandled as they did against Miami does not exactly bode well for the remainder of the season. It’s also worth noting that though their Coverage grade for last season was much higher at 73.5, this is almost exactly the same grade that the 2016 Pitt team received in that category (73.7). Anyone who remembers that team will know how bad that Secondary was. The Louisville defense is fairly experienced too. Of the 9 players listed at Cornerback or Safety positions on this week’s two-deep, 7 are Juniors or Seniors. This includes some of the worst-graded players on this young season, such as Safety Isaiah Hayes and Cornerback Chandler Jones who are both listed as starters, but also have overall Defensive and Coverage grades below 60. Because these players have a track record and contributed greatly to their team’s mediocre marks from last season it seems more likely that last week’s rout at the hands of Miami was not exactly a fluke.

I lay all this out not to crap on Lousville’s Secondary. As a matter of fact, I fully expect them to go out and intercept Kenny Pickett 3 times this weekend now that I’ve written all of this. Rather it’s more to lay out the opportunity at hand for Pitt to flip the script when it comes to their recent offensive history. Kenny Pickett is looking better than he has at any point in his past 4 seasons at Pitt. He also has some fun new weapons to throw to and a more experienced offensive line to protect him. Last week they faced a Syracuse team that deployed an unusual 3-3-5 defensive scheme that featured All-ACC Safety Andre Cisco. Despite this, he still completed 70 % of his passes and two touchdown passes. Given all of these facts, it’s not so crazy to expect Pitt to move the ball through the air effectively and to be much more effective overall on offense than they typically have been of late. As mentioned above, the key will be to not make stupid mistakes that will kill drives. If they can play a relatively clean and disciplined game, the Panthers could actually win a game relatively easily without leaning on their defense too much.

*Stats courtesy of College Football Reference and Pro Football Focus

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