Where The Panthers Have Been: It's hard to waste a really, really great back. Yet Dave Wannstedt managed to do just that last season as the Panthers failed to have any offensive variety outside of LeSean McCoy. Maybe it was because of McCoy that they didn't have anything else, but still, this team was a major letdown. To put Pitt's roller coaster of a season into perspective, the Panthers opened with a loss to a MAC team (Bowling Green), then still manages to beat Pat White and West Virginia and ends its season with a Sun Bowl loss to Oregon State in which it generates a whopping 148 yards of total offense. Somehow the 'Stache gets to keep his job. Only in the Big East.Where The Panhters Are Going: Stop me if you've heard this one before, but Pitt could actually win the Big East this year. The defense returns sevens starters, led by junior end Greg Romeus and should have no equal in the conference.
But with this team the biggest question marks are on the offensive side. With McCoy gone, the lion's (or in this case, Panthers') share of carries goes to Shariff Harris, a sophomore who ran for just 21 yards on 12 carries last season. At 6-foot-1, 215 pounds he's bigger than McCoy and is a downhill, between-the-tackles runner, far different than the elusiveness of McCoy. But he will benefit by running behind a line that lost just one starter and a veteran quarterback in Bill Stull. While you wonder if this offense could actually be better without relying so much on McCoy, it's inevitable there is going to be a drop-off when you lose a player of his caliber.
Luckily, the schedule is tailor-made for a team trying to remake itself offensively. With a first six games that go Youngstown State, at Buffalo, Navy, at North Carolina State, at Louisville and UConn, it would be a colossal disappointment if the Panthers aren't 6-0 or 5-1 going into key back-to-back games at Rutgers and home with USF.
Anything less than a double-digit win total should get Wannstedt a ticket out of town.
The Señior says: 10-2, second in Big East.
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