Tuesday, October 14, 2003

By Paul Zeise, Post-Gazette Sports Writer

Pitt coach Walt Harris acknowledges that the Panthers have some problems that need to be solved if they are to reach some of their lofty goals.

	Pitt needs more big plays -- such as defensive end Claude Harriott knocking the ball away from Notre Dame quarterback Brady Quinn -- in the second half of the season. (Lake Fong, Post-Gazette) Click photo for larger image.

But he believes all of them are correctable and is determined to make sure that the season does not slip away.

He also pointed out that although the Panthers (3-2) did not play particularly well against Notre Dame Saturday, they lost by only six points and that, had several plays gone their way, they could have won.

That's why he is still optimistic about the rest of the season and is looking forward to practice today. Pitt opens Big East Conference play Saturday at Rutgers (3-3), and has little room for error if it hopes to at least reach its eight wins from a year ago.

One major issue, according to Harris, is that the Panthers aren't physical enough along the offensive and defensive lines, and that is one area that he will concentrate on this week.

"In order for us to have a better chance to win, we have to, one, coach better," Harris said at his weekly news conference, "and 1-A, we have to be physical and we have to execute and not beat ourselves. It is always a challenge to improve your line on both sides of the ball so that you can become a physical football team. The bottom line is, if you are physical, you can, most of the time, win."

"You coach [being physical], you recruit it and hopefully before the guy goes out there and plays, he believes in it."

The need to become more physical is evident given the way the Irish dominated the Panthers in the trenches. Notre Dame running back Julius Jones ran for a school-record 262 yards and the Irish defense recorded eight sacks and made 12 tackles for losses.

But even before the loss to the Irish, the Panthers have not been particularly impressive on either line. They did show, however, a glimpse of what they could be in the second half against Texas A&M when they ran the ball in order to run the clock and preserve their lead.

Harris said part of the problem is execution but much of it is confidence. He said linemen must be aggressive at all times but that sometimes they are not because of the quality of the competition.

"Sometimes when you are up against someone who is very good, very strong, very athletic, very quick," Harris said, "it brings a hesitancy out of you, which negates your physicalness. There is doubt. We always say a confused football player is not an aggressive football player. I think confused is a little bigger word than what happened, but I just think we got a little hesitant and we weren't as physical as we needed to be, especially on offense, [against] the line of Notre Dame.

"It was a war and they won the war."

Harris said there were some techniques that the line didn't execute properly against certain defensive fronts and certain blown assignments that caused plays to fail.

Harris was asked why the team gave up on trying to run the football in the second half, and he replied it didn't.

He said down and distance dictated that the Panthers throw in most situations and the fact that they couldn't handle the Irish's defensive front.

But he maintained that despite being overmatched up front, the Panthers were their own worst enemy. And he said some of the veteran players need to step up and start making plays.

"When you are 3-2 you probably would generalize and say you aren't pleased with your leadership," Harris said. "All of us have to do a better job and then the leadership will fall into place. We have guys that work hard and want to be football players and we have coaches who want to be good coaches. We just all have to do a better job.

"Players have to understand what is on the line. We just needed to play better, coach better and I know our guys care and I know our seniors care, they just need to lead by playing better.

"In that game we drop a punt, we fumble right before the half, we drop six passes -- those things we don't normally do, you can't do. That's why I say it is just a couple plays we have to play better, even with, at times, a physical mismatch. We just didn't get it done."

Pitt and Notre Dame were coming off of a bye week. But while the Irish seemed to be prepared for what Pitt did, the Panthers were caught off guard by some of the things the Irish threw at them.

Harris said one reason was that he and the Panthers coaches were lured into a false sense of security because they had a winning record. He said they believed the offensive line had come together against Texas A&M and the problems the defense was having was caused mostly by the spread offenses they had faced.

"Notre Dame realized what their problem was," Harris said. "We knew our problem on defense was spread offense, so we worked hard on that and offensively we thought we had improved because we thought Texas A&M was a good front. So we didn't know what our problems were as well as maybe Notre Dame did. We thought [the offensive line] wouldn't be a problem but we know they were good."

Paul Zeise can be reached at pzeise@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1720.

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