INDIANAPOLIS -- Even with a change in coaches, Pitt's players got too full of themselves after reaching a major bowl game, and they played down to their potential, linebacker H.B. Blades said yesterday.

"We went to the BCS game my sophomore year, and then we got kind of complacent,'' said Blades, one of 326 college prospects auditioning for the pros this week at the NFL Combine. "It was one of those things where we had guys that weren't thinking about the games. They were thinking about what they were going to do after college football."

Pitt followed its Fiesta Bowl appearance -- a 35-7 loss to Utah -- after the 2004 season with a 5-6 record in 2005 and 6-6 in 2006 with no bowl games either season.

"Personally, it was heartbreaking," Blades said. "You play this game to win, especially as much as you put into it through spring ball and winter conditioning and the summer camp, then to go .500 or don't even make a bowl game, it's heartbreaking."

Blades, son of Bennie Blades and nephew of Brian Blades, both former NFL players, is a 5-foot-10 linebacker trying to make it in a world where giants tread.

"Coach [Dave] Wannstedt just told me not to stress about things that I have no control over," said Blades, who weighs 236. "I can't control that I'm short. God made me this tall, and this is what I am. What I can control is how hard I work and how hard I play and the intensity that I bring to the game."

Posluszny fits inside or outside

The Steelers consider 6-foot-1 Paul Posluszny an inside linebacker who can play outside. Others list him as an outside linebacker. Yesterday, the man Jack Ham called the best linebacker in Penn State history weighed in at a solid 238 pounds and said he prefers any position his next team wants him to play.

"It doesn't matter to me, depending on the scheme and wherever I fit best," Posluszny said.

A former halfback and linebacker at Hopewell High School, Posluszny wouldn't mind moving from Linebacker U to Ham's old team.

Posluszny is ranked the best available outside linebacker by NFLDraftScout.com, ahead of Florida State's Lawrence Timmons.

Still puzzled

Andy Alleman still does not know why Walt Harris would not let him switch from defensive end to guard in 2004, but he made the switch anyway -- from Pitt to Akron and then to guard.

Perhaps Pitt's problems in the offensive line might not have been as severe in 2005 under Wannstedt had Harris allowed Alleman to switch.

Yesterday, Alleman ran the sixth-fastest 40 among linemen at the combine at 5.07 seconds, and he is ranked No. 6 among guard prospects with a bullet by NFLDraftScout.com.

"I approached Walt Harris, who was the head coach at the time. I actually approached him in the spring of '04," Alleman said here. "I expressed to him along with Charles Spencer, who is now an offensive tackle for the Houston Texans, that we both kind of as a package wanted to move.

"He allowed [Spencer] to move to tackle. He decided it was in the best interests of the team for me to stay on defense."

Turned out, it was not in Pitt's best interests when Alleman soon transferred.