4-1-Zoo: Pitt's Putrid Offense
PITTSBURGH (93-7 The Fan) — Pitt's offense quite simply put forth its worst outing of the year Saturday against Utah.
Head coach Todd Graham knew it, the players knew it and the fans sure as heck knew it, too. If you missed the game, a quick look at the boxscore and stats will tell you just about all you need to know.
Pitt had just 12 first downs, two by way of the pass. The Panthers managed just 120 yards of total offense — 70 on the ground and 50 through the air — while failing to manage a single point (both touchdowns were scored on special teams).
Pitt quarterbacks Tino Sunseri and Trey Anderson combined for just 9-of-30 passing and two interceptions (both by Anderson). Both combined for six sacks as well — Sunseri was sacked five times and Anderson once.
After the game, Todd Graham and his players were pretty honest, taking the blame for the loss and saying there was a lack of execution in all phases of the offense. They also noted that Utah did things to confuse them up front and played an outstanding game.
It was a pretty somber atmosphere in the post-game press conference. The best way to get a feel for the mood is to present you with what everyone had to say regarding the offense, so here are some quick quotes from Todd Graham and his players after the game...
Todd Graham:
"Absolutely abysmal performance by our offense."
"They physically dominated us up front. They took Ray away. We absolutely ... just (a) dismal performance. Just embarrassing the way we performed offensively."
"It's been a long time since I've lost a ball game that you've done both of those (score a touchdown on a kickoff return and block a punt for a touchdown) in."
"They were dominating the line of scrimmage up front," Graham said when asked why it was tough to get Ray Graham going. "The other thing (Saturday), for the second week in a row we had nine penalties, a lot of illegal procedure penalties."
"We just absolutely didn't execute anything in the passing game at all."
"We've gone from our best performance against South Florida to two weeks of absolutely on the complete other end of the spectrum. The ownership for that goes right to our coaches."
"I thought that Notre Dame and Utah were probably the two best defenses that we had faced to this point, but they're not as good as we made them look today. It's just unacceptable. Very disappointing."
"It's our job (coaches) to teach the system. Obviously we're not doing a very good job at that. It doesn't look like our system at all. We've got to get that corrected and it's on our coaching staff to do that."
"I told (the players), I said 'you're gonna get a lot of negative. You're gonna hear a lot of negative, you're gonna hear a lot of negative from the stands.' And deservingly so. I don't blame the fans for being upset. I'm upset, too."
Chas Alecxih:
"Very frustrating. I think we finished with 16 tackles for loss. Yea, what do you say after that? Gotta get better in certain areas."
"It can be frustrating," he said in regards to the offense's inability to score. "I support my teammates in win, loss, whatever. But when our defense and special teams play that well ... I mean, you really can't do anything about it. We gotta get better."
Matt Rotheram:
"I don't really know what to say. We just had a tough time getting things going. There's just really no words for it."
"We need to play better on the offensive line, overall."
Ray Graham:
"There was a spy everywhere I went. Kind of got frustrated out there. It seemed like everywhere I'd go, someone was there."
"We've just got to execute better. We've got to give our quarterback more time out there, all 10 of us."
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Chris Gates | Area 4-1-Zoo Blog
Twitter.com/Chris_Gates
Chris.Gates@cbsradio.com
