AP: No. 17 Pitt cracked the top 20 for the first time since starting the 2010 season at No. 15. The last time the Panthers were ranked this high this deep into a season was when they reached No. 8 and finished No. 15 in 2009.
Among teams ranked the previous week the
PSU fell the farthest, 13 places to 20th.
Somehow Coastal Carolina managed to stay in the top 25 despite losing to Appalachian State. The "Chanticleers" fell ten spots to 24th.
Okie State fell seven places to 15th.
At the top of the table, Georgia is a unanimous, and deserved, number one. Cincinnati again second. Alabama and Oklahoma switched places. OU now fourth, Bama third. The "Sooners" flip-flopped once before, with another team I think, I don't think with Bama. Ohio State and Michigan stayed where they were, fifth and sixth; Oregon rose three places to seventh, East Lansing Spartak one to eighth; Iowa rose two to ninth and Ole Miss two to round out the top ten.
Pitt people: I cannot ring the alarm bell louder than what I am about the Miami game. Win and we win the Coastal, win out and we win the ACC championship over Wake and Kenny Pickett will win the Heisman Trophy. Lose Saturday and we can forget about those and will plummet down and perhaps out of the top 25. Tyler Van Dyke, the Miami freshman quarterback, said earlier this week about 18-ranked NC State, "We feel really confident. I don't think they can stop us." From the Miami Herald after NC State showed they could not stop UM: NC State players used that as motivation both during the week and before the game, making sure to get in Van Dyke's ear during warm-ups. Coach Manny Diaz: "We knew it was going to rile up NC State's guys. Let's let it rile up our guys...Tyler with what he said, and that confidence he exerted, that's a confidence our team had been missing. We doubled down on what he said."
Pitt people, we ain't stoppin' this kid. If we let him throw he'll go 25/33 and 4 TD's on us too. I know what you're thinking: "Heck, between two gunslingers I'll go with Kenny every time." Right, this is a "man's" game, my dick's bigger than yours. That's just stupid. How do you stop a great drop-back passer? Strong rush, blitz, stunt, tight man coverage, knock the snot out of him every chance you get: the chalk. The one thing that TVD lacks is experience. He hasn't seen it all. You can confuse him by showing multiple fronts, causing him to cycle through his reads more quickly than he'd like, causing him to think. Of course you do all that, that's defense 101. But isn't the best defense a good offense? Fundamentally you stop a great offense by keeping it off the fucking field. You run the ball. Not all the time! Of course not. We have had balanced offenses most of this year but not balanced productivity. One 100+ yard game. Against Clemson we thew the ball 39 times, ran it 43. But Izzy Abanikanda only got nine carries for some goddamned reason. Vincent Davis led the team with 12 rushes. Izzy was third behind Rodney Hammond, Jr. Izzy averaged 6,2 yards per carry and Rodney 6.0. Vincent, 2.5. What's up with giving the most carries to your least productive back? Who had the only 100+ yard game rushing this year? Izzy. You know what Kenny's yards per completion was? 7.7. Not much to choose from between Kenny and Izzy or Kenny and Rodney. Point being: We need 15-play 7 minute drives to keep TVD off the field. You do that by running the ball, not passing, 15 times.
Win out and you win the world; lose this game and you lose everything. Be smart. Go
