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UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

October 28, 2019

Pat Narduzzi

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

PAT NARDUZZI: Obviously disappointing afternoon on Saturday. Tough one for our kids, tough one to swallow. Not only Saturday after the game but even Sunday. As you watch the tape, didn't play our best ballgame, and for whatever reason sometimes that happens. Complacency, comfortable, I don't know what it was. Again, give Miami credit, they're a good football team, top-15 defense in the country, and I think anytime you face that, you're going to come up against some things.

You know, I think that's really what happened there. They made one more play than we did obviously in the end, but our kids fought, and they fought tough. I think the entire game. They never gave up. At the end we got an opportunity to make really probably three catches in that two-minute situation and don't. We got a chance in that four-minute situation which we've talked it seems like all year about, practicing those situations at the end of games, and again, obviously we failed in both those opportunities.

You know, again, it's a learning opportunity for our kids. We re-gather, we close the chapter, we're moving on to a Georgia Tech team that seems to be getting better every single week. They beat Miami the week before, Jeff Collins, new head coach, came from Temple, came from the state of Pennsylvania, so tough guy, and defensive-minded guy, likes his tricks on special teams. We've gone back and watched all the Temple stuff, and very creative. I think every week there's a new offense as far as what they try to do and try to create so you kind of don't know what you're going to get offensively on Saturday when you look at what they do.

James Graham, their new quarterback, I think has started the last four games. I think it all starts with him, but I think they've kind of found their way to sit back after playing three quarterbacks. And then defensively they're very, very solid up front, four-down, and will attack you, a lot of zone pressures, a lot of man coverage and a lot of quarters coverage.

Questions?

Q. You mentioned complacency; do you think there was complacency?
PAT NARDUZZI: I don't know. Shoot, how do we really know? You don't really know. I sure hope not. We try to make sure they don't, but always -- we've got to talk about it, got to think about it. Again, there's handling adversity and there's handling success, and to me there's both those things you're going to deal with, and it's harder to handle success than it is handling adversity. I think adversity if you've got a bunch of tough guys, which we do, that's easier than handling the success that you have at times, and we had some success. We figured we're going to find a way to get it done, and sometimes you just are one step behind, one play behind and don't get it done. Who knows. I'd throw that out there just to whatever.

Q. Do you think a part of that is you guys have been in so many games this year where you've come back at the end and been able to do it? There's that confidence in the team; do you think they leaned on that a little too much?
PAT NARDUZZI: Maybe. Like I said, we can think all we want. We've got to come out and play, and when you start thinking about those things, then it is what it is. You've just got to move on. Again, it's an opportunity to learn. We've just got to go take care of business this week down in Atlanta and play football the way we know how to play. Again, sometimes you've got to get slapped upside the face to figure it out, and hopefully they felt it. It didn't feel good, and we have to respond. We'll find out how we now deal with adversity.

Q. Are there any sort of positives you can take from the offensive end against Miami?
PAT NARDUZZI: Yeah, there is. Obviously the way we ran the ball. Again, people haven't run the ball against them like we did, I don't think. I think they were averaging 80 coming in, and not only with what our offensive line did and we moved some guys -- obviously Gabe was back and we tried some different things of number one trying to keep guys fresh and give Van Lynn some opportunities, so it was good to see some guys go and make some plays. Obviously wasn't happy with the four-minute one. We got some missed placement of some people on some plays that can't happen, and again, that's a lack of focus or a lack of knowledge, one or the other.

And again, that whole situation could have been a lot different than what it was, and that's the disappointing thing because it comes down to maybe some missed assignments on some plays that shouldn't be. But the way we ran the football, certainly, I really liked the way V'Lique Carter -- I mean, AJ has run it solid. I liked the way V'Lique Carter didn't dance around and he hit it, and he looked like a tailback instead of just a jet sweep guy, and I think that's another positive because he needs to carry the football inside, not just be a jet sweep guy and hand the ball on the outside run. He showed some things in the run game that make you want to give it to him inside again.

Q. It seemed like Miami was the first team that was really able to slow down the pass rush. What were they doing specifically on offense to kind of neutralize that?
PAT NARDUZZI: You know, we probably missed three sacks, but we're not going to get 10 sacks a game, I can promise you that. Most people would be happy with two. But they got the ball out quick. They threw it quick. Whether it was complete or not, you can throw it quick and throw it incomplete, congratulations. Good on their part not giving up the sack, but it wasn't like they threw a bunch of deep balls, either. If you want to throw a five-yard route, usually it's either going to be complete or incomplete, but it's going to come out like a five-yard route would. If you're going to throw a bunch of fades and deep balls, obviously the D-line has got a little bit longer to get there. It comes down to how fast you're going to get the ball out of your hand and what kind of balls you're throwing. And then the last play -- they had two explosives, they through a seven route one time, post corner I should say. They only had two explosives on the entire day, so it was a heck of a job by our defense. I don't think very often do you give up two explosives and lose a football game.

But the 32-yard one at the end was fatal and was the most disappointing thing, and it's a zone pressure, and we didn't -- again, should we have played base, should we have zone blitzed, all those things come to mind. And as a play caller you can change it all the time, but to me players make plays, calls don't. And again, as an old defensive guy, old, old defensive guy, we've got to make plays and we've got to execute it a little bit better than what we did, and that happens.

Q. I'm curious about Sundays; what time do you get in, and players aren't in until the afternoon, right?
PAT NARDUZZI: Yeah, coaches come in at all times. We're in by about 11:00 at the latest, but everybody comes in, grades the tape. I used to grade it at home at night so I could spend time with my family in the morning. So guys got time to go to church in the morning and do what they need to do, spend some family time because it's about the only time you get to see your kids awake and your wife functioning.

And then the kids get here I want to say around -- they come injury check around 2:00, hopefully get here by 2:45 and then their day kind of rolls.

Q. Do you guys have a team meeting at the outset at all?
PAT NARDUZZI: At the end. It's really a lift-meet kind of schedule: Lift, meet, flip it.

Q. What was yesterday like at that team meeting? I'm sure it's different after a loss.
PAT NARDUZZI: Yeah, obviously different than the last four weeks. But you know, again, it's kids, and not too much different. It's just talking about the details. And again, it's all about details of what we do on the field, off the field, whatever it may be and how they trickle into your life on the field, but we've got to be better with the details in that game. We didn't have the details that we need to. Why is that? I don't know. Maybe it's attributed to who we played against and what they did. Sometimes that happens.

But to me it was all about what we did. It was nothing Miami did, it was what we did and how we did it. That's kind of how the ball rolls sometimes. But the meeting was normal, and to me sometimes you've got to pick them up a little bit more after a loss. It's easier to go rip them after a win and say, why did you let them come back in the second half, this is what we've got to do. But I think everybody hurts after a loss.

Q. Do you get any sense from your leaders that they'll take care of that stuff and be ready to go this week?
PAT NARDUZZI: Yeah, I do. I mean, I don't have a good sense from our leaders, but I've got a good sense of who our players are in this room and how much they care and won't let it happen again. But you know, you lose one, we've got a lot of games to play.

Q. You don't have to prepare for the triple option this week --
PAT NARDUZZI: You know, they've got a little option they run. There's sometimes they look like they're lining up in a spread offense and there's sometimes they'll run some speed option. Not near as much as Duke, but who knows, we may see the whole game they may line up in it. We'll watch that Duke game and maybe put it back in, I don't know. They're very creative on offense.

Q. Have you ever been in a situation where a team was recruited to play one scheme and then the next year all the players were running something entirely different than what they were recruited to run?
PAT NARDUZZI: No, not really. Thank God. That's a tough deal to walk into, I think, and Jeff will do as good a job as anybody in the country, and he already has. They've got two linemen that are transfers that have come in to play for them on that O-line. I mean, they really just converting from a 3-4 defense to a four-down, but it was only one year of a three-down, so they were already built for four-down, so I don't think that hurt them too much.

But they've found the right quarterback; I think that's a key. They've got skill. They've always had skill. They're down in Atlanta; it's hard not to have skill. So they've slot receiver, No. 10, that runs a 10.5 100-meter. He can motor. He's a guy we've got to make sure we know where he is at all times, and they've got two -- really their old fullback is their tailback, so 215 pounds that can throw it down in there. They run physical. They're trying to make you miss. They'll try to truck you and run you over and get another 10 yards.

Q. Does that loss change the ACC Coastal goal at all?
PAT NARDUZZI: What was the goal?

Q. The previous --
PAT NARDUZZI: Is that your goal? Our goal is to win one game each weekend. We don't talk about it in here. It's kind of like the thing that we don't talk about. It's just about Georgia Tech and --

Q. There were a lot of guys who signed off their interviews by saying, let's go win, let's go win it again.
PAT NARDUZZI: I didn't see it. I don't watch any of those videos. I don't know what they're reading, what they're seeing, unfortunately. Maybe I should take a better tab of that. Maybe that's what they're thinking about, and they need to be thinking about Georgia Tech, not something like that. It all leads to the same thing. We know what we want to do. You don't know what's going to happen in the crazy conference like the ACC or the Big Ten, and you've just got to keep playing, and you find out in five weeks.

Q. Everybody loves the story of the guy who comes in right away and makes an immediate impact, but how gratifying is it to the coaching staff to see a player like Patrick Jones who played a couple years ago, three and a half sacks last year, already has seven sacks this year, to see the maturation of him on and off the field?
PAT NARDUZZI: Well, that's why we coach the game of football. It's called development, and I don't know how many stars he had. I know he didn't have four or five coming out of high school. But it's called development, and Coach Partridge has done a great job on and off the field with Patrick Jones, No. 91. I mean, he's phenomenal. He's done -- those two sacks he had Saturday were big time. They were big time. They weren't just -- and they were four-man pressure sacks, I believe. The one I can think of for sure was.

But you know, he just went around the corner and I'm sure there's a lot of people that liked what they saw out of No. 91.

Q. You mentioned after the game the game Kessman had and how far he's come since some struggles early. Does that speak to how much he's worked?
PAT NARDUZZI: You know, I'm excited for Alex. You know, it's a big day, and I'm sure he'll be rewarded for it in some way. And I know on the field he is, and by his teammates he is. It's the adversity that he went through. Now can he handle that success as we're talking, you go through it individually, you go through it as a unit, you go through it as a team at times, and the performance he -- again, it wasn't like he hit three short ones and then came back and hit a 54-, 55-yarder. It was start off with the big one and put it through, which they say statistically that's about a 30 percent chance of making those 50-plus. So it's a 30 percent chance.

But we've got a lot of confidence -- I told you earlier in the year we have a lot of confidence in him, and we've corrected several things, and great job by our coaches getting that thing done and getting him turned around because we need that guy if we've got any chance of continuing to win, we're going to have to win it with a kicker. You need a kicker.

Q. You've been separating out Warren and Carson in at left tackle. What have you seen those of those guys?
PAT NARDUZZI: You know, again, whether we rotate those guys in, and we'll figure out the plan, but Carson has played well and really Gabe Houy, as well. We'll find out what we are, and I probably could have put a couple "ors" in there. Coach Borbely didn't put any "ors," I put "ors," so just blame me. No, it was EJ did it. But I threw some "ors" in there just because I see what's going on and I can feel that those guys deserve some more reps, so it's really just a tribute to what Carson has done when he's gone in the game.

Q. So that's your decision, not Borbs?
PAT NARDUZZI: Yeah, Borbs isn't looking at the depth chart. He's watching Georgia Tech's front on Sunday nights.

Q. How do you address individual receivers' dropped balls, critical situations?
PAT NARDUZZI: Why do you got to ask that question? How do you address it?

Q. I mean, as a coach, how do you coach up that catch or not letting that continue to kind of fester?
PAT NARDUZZI: Well, you talk to them. I don't think you yell at them. But we've got several ways. It's no different than a field goal kicker. It's like what do you do when a kicker is missing them. You love him up, you put your arm around him and try to get the best out of him. The big thing is you've got to let it go, and if you let it fester and -- these things are dangerous. These things are dangerous.

My first question to anybody is like, what are you reading. Oh, yeah, I read Twitter. Oh, you do? That's a dumb thing to do. Get off this thing. Go get him a flip phone today, see if Petty can get him a flip phone so guys don't go on computers. But those things are dangerous, and the people are brutal, and I've seen guys tank it because they look at that stuff. So it's finding out what they're doing in their life, what are you looking at. Just the psychological part of it is huge, and just trying to maintain that and just -- you can't think about dropping the ball, you've got to think about catching the ball, and that D-word is a bad word. That "miss" word is a bad word. It's make, it's not miss.

Q. I wanted to ask you -- I just wanted to follow up about Damar Hamlin. Unlike Patrick or some other guys he was a big-time recruit, and a lot of times it seems like he's been sort of quietly really good. How would you assess his play?
PAT NARDUZZI: Damar Hamlin has been outstanding really all year. He really has. His tackling is -- I'd say a year ago he may have been a six or seven. He's a nine or ten right now in his tackling, and I've told NFL scouts the same thing, probably the biggest thing he had to fix from a year ago to where he is now is that tackling, and he's done that. He's answered the bell on that account.

He's been great in coverage. He's got great eye control. There was a couple times yesterday he didn't have great eye control, was looking in the backfield on some things, which is like those details that you've just got to -- don't get too nosy and start staring in the backfield, but he was good again. Anytime you hold an opponent to 208 yards total offense, it's not just one guy doing a good job, it's 11 guys at a time. We played a lot of guys on Saturday, too, so there's a lot of guys we have faith in, but we did only play two safeties, I can tell you that. Damar and Paris Ford took all the snaps at the safety position, I believe. I don't think there was another safety that took a snap back there.

Q. Jimmy Morrissey said after the game that he didn't feel the offense has been reciprocating what the defense has kind of been putting out there. Do you feel like that's the case?
PAT NARDUZZI: Not really. I mean, again, I'm glad they think that. I'm glad they feel that. It tells you they've got a little bit of accountability and responsibility for what they do, and I think it's a little chip that I hope they carry into this week.

But I don't feel that way at all. To me you win as a team, you lose as a team, and it all depends on what you're playing against. If you've got a top-15 defense, things might -- our defense has got to play better. That's how I've always felt. And if you're not playing a top-15 offense -- again, I challenged our defense, I think it was -- when was it? I guess Friday night, our final team meeting, about the best -- I guess the best a defense has played against them was giving up 265. That was the best. Maybe I should have put some points on it instead, but 265 yardage-wise was their lowest output of the year, and we held them to 208, so I just challenged them, I said, you want to be elite, you want to be a damned good defense, then hold them under 265, and they did that. And shoot, if you take off that 32 at the end, they're in the 180s, 170s. We just didn't do that.

But it all depends on what you're playing, and again, you guys can look at all the rankings and where they are offensively, defensively and special teams, and there's some challenges sometimes, and you've got to hit those challenges square down the middle, and again, we had our opportunities on offense to expose them, and we didn't.

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