We like to say that Penn State can’t win the big game. They can’t. Unfortunately, Pitt can’t win the game that gets them to the big game. The Panthers can change that narrative next Saturday vs. the Hurricanes.
Pitt fans have gone through this before. Either as a favorite or an underdog, Pitt finds a way to lose the next game. We have allowed ourselves to believe that the Panthers are a good team. Like, really good. Then, as quickly as that belief sets in, it is ripped away.
That narrative can change next Saturday when the 8-3 Panthers host the 9-2 Miami Hurricanes. A victory puts Pitt in the ACC Championship game and a chance to win their conference and earn a spot in the College Football Playoff. Beating Miami will be a daunting task, but these are the games you have to win to ever be taken seriously.
Pitt just walked into #16 Georgia Tech’s house and walked out with the victory. It looked like it would be a relatively stress-free game. The Panthers were up 28-0 barely into the second quarter. Then, 28-0 became 28-14. You could feel the game getting away from them.
Missing a 35-yard field goal on the final play before halftime felt like an omen. Pitt fans had seen this movie before.
Then it happened. Georgia Tech was on the doorstep again, about to cut its once 28-point deficit down to 7. Star quarterback Haynes King then threw a pass that was intercepted by Pitt’s Braylan Lovelace, who raced up the sideline for a 100-yard pick-six. What once looked like a game that would be 28-21 became a 35-14 Panthers win.
Pitt managed to hold on, although the rest of the game came with too much drama. Facing a 4th and nine from their own 41-yard line and about seven minutes remaining, Pitt inexplicably called in a fake punt that lost three yards. The Yellow Jackets had life again. Barely two minutes later, the game was 35-28.
The Panthers needed someone on offense to make a play to win the game.
That someone was Ja’Kyrian Turner. He showed his game-breaking speed on a 56-yard rushing touchdown. Turner finished his career day with 21 carries for 201 yards and that game-sealing touchdown.
It was a great win–a win the Panthers had to have in order to achieve anything significant this season.
That brings me back to next week’s game against Miami. Lose that game, at home, and the Panthers will once again have gotten their fans’ hopes up only to crush them at the end. Win, on the other hand, and Pitt will finally find themselves in the big game that has eluded them far too often.
The ACC Championship Game and a spot in the CFP are there for the taking. Pitt can either write a new chapter in its proud and storied history or rewrite the same chapter we’ve seen from them time and time again.
It’s time for the Panthers to show the entire country what they are made of. It’s time for Pitt fans to have their belief in their team proven right.
Pitting is real. The year they did win, they had a QB in his sixth year and didn’t face one ranked team till the Almost Competitive Conference Championship Game. That’s right not one All Cupcake Conference team they faced in 2021 was ranked. They get blown out on national tv against every team with a pulse and they can’t even win the All Cupcake Conference. It’s why they haven’t won a major bowl game or finished in the top 10 of any season since 1982. NINETEEN EIGHTY TWO.