Through the years, the Pittsburgh Panthers have consistently demonstrated a proclivity — much like a Michigan State and Purdue — at achieving peak performance against the Fighting Irish.
Since the 1950s, Pitt joins USC and Michigan State as the lone football teams to defeat Notre Dame in every decade.
From shocking a Frank Leahy team in 1952 (22-19) that would finish No. 3 in the country, to knocking out head coach Brian Kelly’s Fighting Irish from major bowl contention in 2013 (28-21), the Panthers have a long lineage of playing the spoiler role.
In the 12 meetings between the Fighting Irish and Pitt since 2002, all but two were determined by one score and came down to the final series of the game.
• In 2008, the longest game in Notre Dame history (in actual time played on the field) resulted in a four-overtime 36-33 conquest by the Panthers.
• A year later in 2009, Pitt won for the fourth time in the last eight meetings between the two schools, 27-22.
• In Kelly’s first season at Notre Dame in 2010, the Irish fended off Pitt for a 23-17 victory.
• A late drive at Heinz Field in 2011 that featured the Tommy Rees to Tyler Eifert passing combination enabled Notre Dame to emerge with a 15-12 conquest.
• Following an upset win at No. 8 Oklahoma in 2012, the 8-0 Irish went through a classic letdown while falling behind the 4-4 Panthers 20-6 entering the fourth quarter, and needed an officiating snafu in one overtime to survive a three-overtime 29-26 triumph.
• After losing at Navy in 2013, Pitt responded two weeks later with a 28‑21 win at home versus Notre Dame.
• The six straight one-score margins in this series ended at Heinz Field on Nov. 7, 2015, when Notre Dame built a 42-17 lead before Pitt tallied two touchdowns in the final five minutes to make the final score a more respectable-looking 42-30.
Irish quarterback DeShone Kizer was 19-of-26 passing for 262 yards with five touchdowns, and he ran for the sixth. Three of his scoring tosses were to wide receiver Will Fuller V (seven catches for 152 yards), while freshman Josh Adams’ 20 carries netted 147 yards.
• However, during Notre Dame’s 12-0 regular-season run to the College Football Playoff in 2018, the Panthers provided the biggest scare to the Irish once again in South Bend, just as they did in 2012.
Notre Dame trailed 7-6 at halftime and 14-12 entering the fourth quarter, while Pitt kept the Irish ground attack at bay, limiting it to 80 yards. Quarterback Ian Book responded by completing 13 of 14 pass attempts in the second half, highlighted by the perfectly placed 35-yard deep ball for a touchdown to Miles Boykin with 5:43 remaining in what would be a 19-14 win.
The Panthers left that game 3-4, but went on to win the Coastal Division of the ACC for the right to play Clemson for the ACC championship, won 42-10 by the eventual national-champion Tigers.
Pitt regularly “hangs around” in most games, too. Last year, it was 6-3 in games decided by seven points (one possession) or less.
This year in three consecutive games from Sept. 26-Oct. 10, it eked out a 23-20 win versus Louisville, lost an 11th-hour heartbreaker to North Carolina State (30-29) and then fell in overtime to Boston College (31-30) because of a missed extra point.
Minus starting quarterback Kenny Pickett (ankle injury) last week versus Miami, Pitt lost 31-19 the No. 13 Hurricanes. In Pickett’s place, Arizona State transfer Joey Yellen completed 22 of 46 passes for 277 yards with one score and no interceptions.
“We expect Kenny to be back ASAP,” Pitt head coach Pat Narduzzi said a couple of days ago. “Will he be back this weekend? I don’t know. There’s a chance.”
Kelly knows what can be anticipated, with or without Pickett.
“A Pat Narduzzi football team is tough, rugged and they’re always going to play Notre Dame hard,” he summarized. “They’ve got some game wreckers on defense. They’re going to get after the quarterback and play physical.
“They’re well-coached and also play great special teams. … That’ll keep you up at night.”
Giant Slayers
In some ways, sixth-year Pitt head coach Narduzzi’s reign has been similar to the one Steve Addazio had at Boston College in his seven years there from 2013-19.
Neither Narduzzi and Addazio can or could recruit at the level of a Notre Dame program, but both tried to compensate by developing a blue-collar physicality as the identitiy of their operations, and that has regularly made them a tough out for the opposition.
Addazio had only one losing season at Boston College, but he also reached a plateau where it couldn’t get beyond seven wins. His year-by-year record was 7-6, 7-6, 3-9, 7-6, 7-6, 7-5 and 6-6 last season before he was fired.
With Narduzzi, it’s been similar, but the ceiling at Pitt has been eight wins: 8-5, 8-5, 5-7, 7-7, 8-5 and a 3-3 start this season.
One difference has been Pitt’s proclivity to pull off stunning upsets, regularly achieving peak performance against the premier competition.
• In 2016, it defeated Penn State — that year’s Big Ten champion and Rose Bowl representative — 42-39, but it was only the second-most impressive conquest that season.
• Two months later, it traveled to Death Valley and shocked No. 2 Clemson 43-42. It would be the Tigers’ lone defeat that season while going on to win their first national title in 35 years.
• In 2017, hobbling into the Nov. 24 finale with a 4-7 record, Pitt shocked 10-0 and No. 2-ranked Miami 24-14, snapping the Hurricanes’ 15-game winning streak. Two weeks earlier, Miami had crushed No. 3-ranked Notre Dame 41-8.
• In 2018, Pitt nearly upset the No. 5-ranked Irish before falling 19-14, but did topple a ranked Virginia team, a win that helped them make it to the ACC championship contest.
• Last year, the Panthers rallied to end Central Florida’s 27-game winning streak in the regular season with a 35-34 conquest —Pitt had lost to UCF by a 45-14 count the previous season.
In the same way Purdue is often referred to as “Spoilermakers” instead of their team nickname Boilermakers because of their history of upsets, Pitt likewise has had a knack for rising to the occasion against highly ranked opposition — which means the encounter with No. 3-ranked Notre Dame this weekend falls right into its wheelhouse.
Narduzzi would prefer not to be known as merely a spoiler, which he views more as an insult than compliment because it basically translates to, “they’re not a real contender, but they can surprise every now and then.”
This was especially true after losing back-to-back heartbreaking one-point contests to NC State and Boston College this year.
“We’re a few plays away, and we’ve got to win it in the fourth quarter. Weve got to find a way to finish the darned game,” Narduzzi said.
The ideal opportunity awaits this week.
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