Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt was looking through West Virginia's roster and searching for the names of the Mountaineers he has become familiar with over the years.

To his pleasant surprise, many of the household names were gone, but his joy was tempered when he got to the bottom of the roster and saw this name:

Pat White.

"Yes, unfortunately he's still on the roster," Wannstedt said with a laugh yesterday at his news conference. "That's the one name I was looking for that I was hoping that was gone."

The good news for Wannstedt is that White is a senior, which means he'll be graduating and moving on to the NFL.

The bad news for Wannstedt is that White will line up under center for West Virginia Friday when the Mountaineers (7-3, 4-1 Big East) and Panthers (7-3, 3-2) meet in the 101st edition of the Backyard Brawl.

Wannstedt said White is the best quarterback in the country at running the spread offense.

White recently became the NCAA's all-time leading rusher among quarterbacks (4,292 yards); he has been responsible for 98 touchdowns -- the Big East's all-time leader; and he has scored 35 rushing touchdowns in 28 games.

And his numbers against Pitt from the 2005 and 2006 games were downright scary as he rushed for a combined total of 440 yards in those two blowout victories.

But a funny thing happened last year: The Panthers' defense played a near-perfect game, held White to 41 yards on 14 carries and knocked him out of the game for a few series. Since then, the Panthers had done a pretty good job against mobile quarterbacks and spread offenses because they had upgraded their athleticism and speed on defense.

That is, of course, until Saturday night, when the Panthers were tortured by Cincinnati's Tony Pike in the Bearcats' 28-21 win at Nippert Stadium. Pike didn't run for huge numbers -- he rushed nine times for 33 yards -- but his mobility and his ability to break out of the pocket kept Pitt's defense off-balance.

Pitt's defenders know that Friday will be a very long day if they fail to get to the quarterback and tackle him when they have the chance. The one key difference between the two players, however, is that while Pike would use his legs often to buy time and move out of the pocket to throw down the field, if White gets outside of Pitt's containment he'll be off to the races.

"We got back there [against Cincinnati] but Pike's pocket presence was really good and he was able to escape us," defensive tackle Gus Mustakas said. "We have to keep our gaps and our responsibilities and make sure we are all doing what we are supposed to because when [Pike] hit the gaps, he'd run for 10 yards or whatever but if Pat White hits the gaps, he can take it all the way to the end zone every time.

"But I think if you look at last year's game, we really didn't try to do too much, we all just tried to stay in our gaps and win our one-on-one battles. But the problem is, if you leave one gap open, he's going to hit it for 50 or 60 yards every time."

Wannstedt said the key to stopping the Mountaineers last year was the ability to execute a fundamental of football -- tackling.

After grading the film, Wannstedt and the Panthers coaching staff determined that Pitt missed two tackles in that game that went for 6 yards. That's probably about as well as any defense has tackled against West Virginia, and it is an effort, Wannstedt said, the Panthers had better duplicate if they want to have any chance to win.

"One of the best things we did last year defensively against them was that we tackled in the open field," Wannstedt said. "We didn't give them the 40- or 50-yard runs. It's going to have to be the same this year. Pat White can make you miss and he can outrun you. He's going to have the football in his hands come Friday and we're going to have to deal with him.

"Pike ran a couple of quarterback draws coming into our game, but in our game he tucked the football and ran more than any game this year. Does Pat White do that more than Pike? Not necessarily.

"If it's there he's going to take it, but we learned this lesson two years ago. We went in with the mentality that we were not going to let him run the ball and we were going to make him beat us throwing."

NOTES -- Pitt's only injury is defensive tackle Tommie Duhart (ankle). ... Freshman cornerback Antwuan Reed could see more playing time this week as Ricky Gary and Jovani Chappel have continued to struggle. ... Heinz Field has been re-sodded in the wake of the four WPIAL playoff games on Saturday.