Pitt Notes, Odds and Ends

Day Two of Notre Dame Week is in the books. But as I had written before, I was a little under the weather (OK, a lot) so there were a number of little odds and ends, some I've dealt with in the Q&A, that I need to wrap up. So here we go....

** A lot of people want to know and I've gotten plenty of e-mails about the Gator Bowl with respect to Notre Dame. Here is the best answer I can give you. If Notre Dame is 8-4, they are a lock to go to the Gator Bowl unless an 11-1 Cincinnati team is available. But even under those circumstances, there is still a chance Notre Dame could be selected because there is no offical "two-win" rule in any of the contracts. Now, the Gator Bowl has told the Big East it would honor the two-win rule if there was indeed a double-digit winning team available but there is nothing written in stone. So make it simple on yourself --  If Pitt finishes second in Big East at 10-2 and Notre Dame is 8-4, get ready to go to Charlotte or Birmingham. If Pitt finishes 10-2 and Notre Dame is 7-5, well, I suppose you just need to hope that the organizers of the Gator Bowl honor their word. It could be interesting, particularly since this is the final year in the deal and the Gator Bowl and thus there is no need for either side to try and play nice if push comes to shove.

** Another popular question - what is going on with Greg Cross? Well, I asked and the answer is this - he is indeed redshirtting this year, running the scout team quarterback and next year he'll be given a shot at either receiver or a Dorin Dickerson like role. Take that for what it is worth -- again, the use of this guy has been more puzzling than just about any player I've ever covered.

** One more very popular question -- When can Dion Lewis declare himself eligible for the draft? Well, this answer is not so cut and dried. It is true that he did not go to prep school as a post-graduate student - but he did enter high school in 2004-05 (and apparently repeated one year) which means he was supposed to graduate in May 2008. Why is this significant - because if you look at the NFL rules, it states "No player shall be permitted to apply for special eligibility for selection in the Draft, or otherwise be eligible for the Draft, until three NFL regular seasons have begun and ended following either his graduation from high school or graduation of the class with which he entered high school, whichever is earlier." (I got this straight from the NFL because I looked into this issue last week). The second part of that sentence is the significant part -- because that would seem to make it clear that he is eligible after his sophomore season. However, here is the rub - the people at Pitt believe he is not eligible until after his junior year for a variety of reasons and the people at the NFL, which obviously and for obvious reasons would not comment specifically about Lewis (nor did I ask them specifically because I wanted a better chance of getting a real answer), were not commital about whether or not being held back a year or repeating a year in high school counts the same as going to prep school or redshirtting a year. So the short answer is this - there is no definitive answer yet because all of the facts are not in but it is not out of the realm of possibility that he could be a two-and-done kind of player.

** Of course it is Notre Dame week and that means, yes, the annual "Notre Dame has a lot more material" lines from popular college football commentator and historian, Beano Cook. This year Cook has riled up the Pitt fan base because he said on several different shows that "Pitt only has two players that Notre Dame wanted" and also saying that in short, very few of Pitt players would start at Notre Dame. Now, I didn't hear him say it specifically this time, but enough people have talked to me about it and I've heard very similar sentiments from him in the past so here is what I'd say to Pitt fans who are all worked up about it -- he is probably more right than wrong when he says that Pitt only has two guys Notre Dame wanted.

   In fact, Chris Peak, the recruiting guru from Pantherlair.com - a very fine Pitt site by the way -- talked a lot about it today and he did a little research in his database and we could only come up with two guys on Pitt's roster -- Jonathan Baldwin and Shayne Hale - who actually had written scholarship offers from Notre Dame. A couple of the other guys who had big-time offers, like Aaron Berry and Dorin Dickerson, didn't seem to have an offer from Notre Dame and both said they couldn't remember. The bottom line is this - there probably is less than five guys on Pitt's roster who had an offer from Notre Dame. But that, of course, is only half the story -- there are a handful of others who Notre Dame wanted or would have taken had it not been for some academic issues (and that doesn't mean Pitt took bad students, but there are some academic challenges to getting certain kids with certain kinds of transcripts into Notre Dame) or had they not recruited for the same positions elsewhere. Remember, Notre Dame recruits nationally and Pitt recruits regionally, so naturally, there isn't going to be nearly as much overlap as there would if the Irish recruited the same areas as Pitt. And while there is no question that Notre Dame has better players from top to bottom and higher profile recruits - - I'd venture to say there are plenty of players in Pitt's two-deep who are not only good enough to play at Notre Dame but likely be starting. In short - while it is always fun to listen to Beano talk about Notre Dame's material and even more fun to watch the meltdowns among Pitt fans who take it very personally, the truth is the difference in talent is much closer between the two teams right now than recruiting rankings would seem to reflect. Sure Notre Dame has an edge and more depth of good athletes, but I'd venture to say if you put player for player among the starting 22 from both teams and said "pick the all star team among them" there'd be more than a few Panthers in that lineup. So relax because what Cook is saying about the number of Pitt players who were offered scholarships by Notre Dame is accurate - but it is incomplete.

** Here are some good news on next year's schedule - it appears as if the Panthers will avoid the dreaded "two Division I-AA teams in the same year" curse to fill that final opening. As I had written earlier, the two Division I-AA opponent route was looking more and more like it was going to become a reality to fill that spot but the athletic department is close to reaching some sort of a deal with a Division I-A team (not a BCS conference team obviously, but at least a Division I-A team). That means the non-conference schedule will be home against New Hampshire and Miami (Fla.), at Notre Dame and at Utah and at home against a mid-level or lower-level Division I-A team. I know the final game isn't likely to be a great one but it is important that it was a I-A team for a lot of reasons. And if the deal get finalized, Pitt won't have to make any apologies for playing two I-AA teams and that's a good thing because that's a public relation's nightmare for a program which has done well to build up good will over the past year or so.

** On another scheduling note - yes, I've seen the whole "Boise State will play anyone anywhere in 2011 with no return trip" story that has been circulating and I've also received plenty of "tell Steve Pederson about this, let's get them on Pitt's schedule" e-mails about it as well. Please stop dreaming about this matchup for this very important reason -- Pitt does not have an opening in 2011. The Panthers already have five non-conference games booked - Buffalo, Utah, Maine and Notre Dame at home and Iowa on the road. So there is no way Pitt could play Boise unless it broke a contract that has already been signed. It was a good thought, though. Now, if Boise has an opening in 2012, that could be a different story....