Pitt's 13-9 upset of West Virginia at the end of the 2007 season was a defining moment for the Panthers' defense because it showed it had caught up to the Mountaineers' offense after two years of getting torched.

And the formula for that success -- a lot of nickel and dime defenses, some five-man line formations and mixing in some run blitzes -- has been a blueprint for the Panthers against spread offenses and option offenses since.

According to Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt, the trendy spread offenses and the read-option offenses haven't forced defensive coaches to design new schemes or use new concepts, they merely have had to reach back to the days when teams had to defend option football.

Wannstedt said many of the principles Pitt incorporated into its schemes for that 2007 game and against teams which run similar offenses are similar to defenses he used to design to stop wishbone teams in the 1970s and '80s.

"Any time you defend the option -- be it the spread, the quarterback read or the Navy triple option -- there are certain concepts that are universal for defenses," Wannstedt said. "And any offense that has the possibility of having a quarterback run or pass it, you have to do certain things in order to be effective -- some with the front and some on the back end -- and they haven't changed over the years.

"There is a lot of carryover from defending the wishbone -- but it is no longer just the option teams like West Virginia but other spread teams like South Florida, with a lot of quarterback running plays, those concepts you have to get your defense to understand."

Wannstedt, who prefers the Panthers to play in their base 4-3 defense, said Pitt plays some five-man line against the spread, but also plays some three-man line and tries to get as many formations in the game as possible

Pitt used Jemeel Brady as a hybrid linebacker/safety that game in order to get more speed on the field and had two -- and sometimes all three -- linebackers blitz to keep the Mountaineers out of sync.

The Panthers have continued to use these concepts against spread teams since and it is clear they are no longer overmatched.

Safety Elijah Fields has become the hybrid player and because he has been so good, the Panthers have been able to use five and even six defensive backs at a time.

Some of that has to do with the fact that the Panthers' defense is faster and is more athletic and better up front than it had been in the final few years of the Walt Harris era and the first two years of the Wannstedt era.

"You ultimately do have to have the players," Wannstedt said. "I mean, we were physically able to match up with West Virginia in 2007 and then last year [the Panthers beat West Virginia, 19-15] and some of these other teams and that helped.

"But we also had to tweak some things we were doing because we knew that we had to try and defend the entire field out of our base defense, but if mixed a few things up we gave ourselves a shot to take away some of the outside stuff and force them to where we had help.

"I think it has been a sound scheme but we have to keep working with it because every team does something a little bit different with these spread offenses."

One other important factor is that the Panthers have become much better tacklers over the past three years.

That game in '07, the Panthers missed a total of two tackles that went for only an extra 6 yards in that game.

"The thing about that offense is it forces your defense to make plays, one on one, in space," Wannstedt said. "And regardless of what we do, we need to make tackles because if you don't, you have no chance to be successful."

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