The Pittsburgh Football Podcast

By Chris Gates | The Pittsburgh Football Podcast

When the ACC preseason poll came out earlier this month, Pitt landed ninth out of 17 teams.

At first glance, that feels about right if you’re looking at the Panthers from 30,000 feet.

• They lost some key players to the NFL and the transfer portal.
• They have a young quarterback.
• There are questions along the offensive line.
• Nationally, there just isn’t much buzz surrounding the program.

But here’s the thing about preseason rankings: they’re often more reflective of perception than reality.

Every August, college football is filled with teams that are overrated because of their name and teams that are underrated because people aren’t paying close attention. Pitt has almost always fallen into the second category.

Preseason Polls Are Built on Assumptions

This time of year is full of optimism.

• Every coach says camp is going well.
• Every quarterback is taking the next step.
• Every freshman is turning heads.

Without actual games to evaluate, voters are left filling in the blanks.

Sometimes (oftentimes) they default to brand names.

For years, Virginia Tech seemed to start every season in the Top 25 simply because it was Virginia Tech, even after the Hokies had stopped playing like a Top 25 program. It took years before preseason expectations finally caught up with on-field results.

That same tendency still exists throughout college football.

Programs with national recognition often receive the benefit of the doubt. Programs like Pitt usually have to earn it all over again every season.

Why Pitt Is Being Viewed Conservatively

The national outlook on Pitt isn’t difficult to understand.

• The Panthers lost players like Kyle Louis to the NFL and Rasheem Biles to Texas via the transfer portal.
• There are legitimate questions about offensive line depth.
• Mason Heintschel enters the season as a first-year starting quarterback, and anytime a program like Pitt is relying on young players, national analysts tend to be cautious.

That’s especially true in today’s transfer portal era.

Teams outside the sport’s financial elite simply don’t have the same margin for error anymore. One or two injuries can completely change a season because quality depth has become much harder to retain.

Those concerns are reasonable.

What isn’t as reasonable is pretending they’re the entire story.

Last Year’s Team Was Better Than People Remember

One thing that gets lost in the conversation is just how solid Pitt actually was last season.

The Panthers won eight games while breaking in a new quarterback and finished with losses to Miami (the eventual national runner-up) and Notre Dame, another College Football Playoff-caliber team.

Those blowout losses seem to have shaped the national narrative.

Instead of viewing Pitt as a good team that simply wasn’t at the level of the country’s elite, many people came away acting as though Pitt wasn’t good at all.

There’s a huge difference.

Not making the College Football Playoff doesn’t automatically make a team average. There’s a wide gap between national championship contender and mediocre football team, and Pitt comfortably fit inside that middle ground last season.

Why Pitt Could Outperform Expectations

The biggest reason I’m more optimistic than the preseason poll is simple.

I think Pitt is positioned for natural internal growth.

• If Mason Heintschel takes the expected next step at quarterback…
• If Ja’kyrian Turner continues to develop…
• If Kade Bell’s offense improves in Year 2…
• And if the receiving corps continues to emerge the way reports from training camp suggest, there’s every reason to believe Pitt’s offense will be better than it was a year ago.

Defensively, I’m not nearly as concerned.

Yes, Randy Bates retired, but Corey Sanders has been part of Pitt’s defensive staff for many years. More importantly, this is still Pat Narduzzi’s defense. The scheme isn’t changing dramatically simply because the title on the organizational chart changed.

The defense has consistently given Pitt opportunities to win games.

The offense simply needs to cash in on more of those opportunities.

7.5 Wins Feels Like the Floor, Not the Ceiling

Vegas currently lists Pitt’s win total at 7.5 games. That’s a familiar number because Pitt has consistently lived in that seven-to-eight-win range for years.

But when I look at the schedule, I see a path toward something better.

Games against Syracuse, North Carolina, Boston College, Florida State, and Cal all come against teams projected in the bottom half of the ACC preseason poll. Add Miami (Ohio), Bucknell, and UCF, and it’s easy to see a realistic path to eight wins if Pitt simply handles the games it should.

From there, everything comes down to the swing games.

Road trips to Virginia Tech and Louisville will likely determine whether Pitt finishes as another solid bowl team or enters legitimate ACC Championship and College Football Playoff conversations.

Don’t Confuse Preseason Rankings With Actual Ceiling

Being picked ninth doesn’t mean Pitt is the ninth-best team in the ACC.

It means that’s where voters are comfortable placing them before they’ve seen a snap.

History tells us preseason polls regularly miss on multiple teams every season. Some programs rise much higher than expected. Others fall apart despite lofty expectations.

Pitt has spent years proving it can outperform outside expectations. In nearly the entire Pat Narduzzi tenure at Pitt, the Panthers have finished higher than their preseason ACC ranking in the media poll.

There’s no guarantee that happens again this fall.

But if the offense develops the way it appears capable of, the defense continues doing what Pat Narduzzi defenses typically do, and the Panthers stay healthy, this team has every opportunity to finish much higher than ninth in the conference.

That’s why preseason rankings are worth acknowledging — but they’re rarely worth obsessing over.