UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 18, 2021

Pat Narduzzi

Press Conference

Western Michigan 44, Pitt 41

PAT NARDUZZI: Obviously a disappointing performance by our guys today. Starts with me. Obviously I didn't have them ready to go, and we'll go back and watch the tape.

I'll give credit to Western Michigan. The Eleby kid on offense was on fire. He put balls in small windows like I told you they would and could. He's a good football player. They nickel-and-dimed us. We couldn't get off the field. We lost the time of possession by over 20 minutes, I believe. We weren't on the field enough. Three turnovers on offense.

You're going to have a hard time winning a football game. And then you can talk about two turnovers on downs, as well, on 4th down, where we don't get it, so that's a total of five turnovers.

Defensively we couldn't get off the field.

Felt like we didn't have any juice or energy today. I don't know what it was, but we'll look at it, we'll go check the tape out.

But I'll give Western Michigan credit. They're a good football team.

It was more about what we did than what they did. We didn't make plays. That's it.

Questions?

Q. You said the team didn't have juice. When did you notice that?

PAT NARDUZZI: You know, just during the game. I just felt like there was not a whole lot of energy. I don't know why. It's hard to tell why, but again, I'm not -- that's not the reason. You've got to execute. They executed better than we did, and we didn't make plays.

Q. You were 1 of 8 on 3rd downs and that was a strength last week. What happened today?

PAT NARDUZZI: Yeah, I don't know. We'll go back and watch the tape. I have no idea. We were 1 of 8 and 1 of 3 on 4th downs. It's not a good percentage.

Q. Did you give the running game enough of a chance to get going?

PAT NARDUZZI: You know, at times -- we'll go back and look at the tape. I couldn't tell you. But we certainly had some runs -- you try to run it on a P and 10 and it's a minus -- TFL, minus 1 one it seemed like every darned time. We were throwing the ball well, and Kenny was throwing it well. He had one pick, but we'll go back and look at the tape.

Q. Do you guys feel like you blitzed or pressured too much especially on 3rd down defensively?

PAT NARDUZZI: I don't know if we blitzed enough. Seemed like a lot of four-man pressure to be honest with you. I don't think we blitzed enough. They do a good job of looking to the sideline and getting themselves in a good play, and we didn't adjust good enough.

Q. What was Western Michigan able to find in your coverage to seemingly continue to complete those passes?

PAT NARDUZZI: It comes down to RPOs. They were running it, and your backers are getting sucked up. They're throwing skinny posts, we call them glance routes, we call it almost kind of a slant route by No. 2, and that's stuff we practiced all week. But give Skyy more credit and Crooms, I think. Those are two guys that had a lot of catches, and they made the plays that we didn't. Had a couple missed tackles on a one long where Brandon Hill comes in, knocks our safety out, knocks him off the play, and just can't happen.

Q. What went into the personnel change on the offensive line?

PAT NARDUZZI: Which one?

Q. Your center and your guard.

PAT NARDUZZI: Owen was out, so we moved Kradel in and moved Keldrick Wilson to guard.

Q. You asked a question (indiscernible)?

PAT NARDUZZI: Mine you mean?

Q. Yes.

PAT NARDUZZI: God, it was so long ago I don't remember. It was about a communication error where they didn't communicate. I don't even remember. I'll have to go back and watch the tape. It was stupid on my part. MAC officials, I don't know. Never seen some of the things that got called out there, but we've got to go make plays.

Q. Were you upset that the flag picked up when Kenny got --

PAT NARDUZZI: That's what it was, thank you very much. Yeah, the quarterback got hit, they throw a flag. Same thing happened last week, and they picked it up. I don't get it. And there's no communication, as well.

Q. How do you guys move forward from this loss?

PAT NARDUZZI: We will move forward. It's one game. It's not an ACC game. All our goals are still ahead of us, and it's one ballgame.

Q. You talked about the RPO this week was something you guys keyed in on, and it still was a problem, defending over the middle after last week, defense struggling as well. What kind of message do you send to your defense about picking this back up next week?

PAT NARDUZZI: There will be a strong message delivered. It was delivered after the game here, and we'll address it as coaches, and we've got to get better. Again, it starts with the coaches. We obviously didn't do -- we got out-coached today, and we've got to do a better job.

Q. What did you see from your 3rd down defense specifically? I think they were 6 of 17 or something like that.

PAT NARDUZZI: Yeah. I've got to go back and watch the tape. I can't tell you. They executed a couple runs where they got us on a draw and some different stuff, but we've got to be better.

Q. Was Kenny injured after Brandon Hill hit him?

PAT NARDUZZI: Yeah, he got injured after -- he got -- friendly fire.

Q. When Kenny came back in and needs a couple of touchdown drives, do you feel like that could have been the momentum swing you had hoped for? What would you say about his performance?

PAT NARDUZZI: Kenny I think had a good day besides his pick. He's a competitor. He made some great throws and the receivers made some catches. Near the end it seemed like in the second half we didn't have as good a protection, he's scrambling out of there, and we'll see what happened on tape, but wasn't good enough.