Pat Narduzzi Wants Furious Run Game Against West Virginia

Pat Narduzzi wants the Pitt Panthers to establish the run against West Virginia.

PITTSBURGH -- The Pitt Panthers threw three times on their first drive of Week 2 and failed to complete any of them. From there, Cincinnati laid the foundation a convincing road win that was deflating on the Pitt side of things. 

Panthers head coach Pat Narduzzi believes that many of the ills that plagued the Panthers in their last time out - from slow starts to porous run defense to poor quarterback play to subpar pass protection - stem from their inability to get the run game starting.

"You know what we do to take care of the pass pro problems is run the ball, But you know what we do to help run the ball is we don’t fall behind 20-7 or whatever it was," Narduzzi said. "When you fall behind, you’re going to be passing it more and the defense is pinning their ears back and they’re going. That’s going to be the key to victory is running the football, being balanced 50-50 and not let them know we’re passing the football."

The Panthers fell behind Cincinnati 10-0 after two drives and were forced to play catchup for the rest of the game before ultimately falling 27-21. That artificially limited their opportunities to get a deep running back room involved in the game plan, and Narduzzi is hell-bent on making sure that doesn't happen again. 

The tailback listed at the top of his depth chart, Rodney Hammond, has carried the ball just 11 times this season but that should change this week. Both offensive coordinator Frank Cignetti and Narduzzi said they will let Hammond tote the ball more against the Mountaineers. 

"I’d like to hand the ball off 50 times," Narduzzi said. "And if it goes 50 times, he’s going to have 25 carries and he’ll be exhausted after the night’s over. We have to keep the run involved in our game, period."

To prepare the team for this challenge, Narduzzi said he's directed coaches to ramp up the intensity at practices. Blaming himself for a practice plan that didn't have Pitt ready to go for Cincinnati, Narduzzi is changing things up this week to avoid a similar result.

"I saw some things in some periods that I didn’t like and knew I didn’t like it but didn’t say anything," Narduzzi said. "It starts with me. I didn’t like it. And it’s too early in the season to go ‘Oh we can’t get hurt, we got to make sure we have this guy,’ all that stuff. Like you got to play the game of football and I feel like we did not play the game of football last week." 

To Narduzzi, an emphasis on the run game and physicality isn't just a good strategy but also how the coaching staff will get the Panthers to set the tone. Last week, Cincinnati was the aggressor and Pitt played the entire game on it's own heels. 

"That corrects a lot," Narduzzi said. "When you put someone on their back and you smack them in the mouth."

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