'We definitely got dominated': Everything Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi said after losing to Notre Dame

Notre Dame made easy work of Pat Narduzzi’s Pitt Panthers at Acrisure Stadium on Saturday. The Fighting Irish won, 37-15, a few ticks in the wrong direction away from getting to the scores Narduzzi said last week he wouldn’t have minded occurring — “103 or 110 to 10.”

Here is everything Narduzzi said after the loss. (Spoiler: There isn’t anything as outrageous as what he said in the lead up to the game, but there probably won’t ever be again anyway).

Opening statement

I don’t think we played our best game today against a really good Notre Dame football team. But it starts with me. We’ve got to do a better job as coaches preparing. We didn’t convert enough third downs. We didn’t get enough stops on defense. They ran the ball on us, which they’ve done all year. They didn’t run it for 306 yards. So we held them probably to their average or less. But we didn’t get enough stops.

It starts with me. And every coach on down, and we’ve got to make more plays. But I’m proud of our football team. We don’t quit at the end. There’s no quit. These guys get a fourth down stop. Then we take the ball down and score a touchdown. There’s no quit in our football team.

We’ve got a lot of season ahead. We’ll get locked in and get ready for Georgia Tech on the road.”

On Pitt’s pass-catching drops

“They’re deflating. It’s a game of momentum. You’ve got to make those big-time plays. Again, our skill guys, they’ve done a great job all year. So I’m not going to complain. Big-time players make big-time plays in big-time games, and that’s what we have to do. If you don’t make those big plays, it’s a momentum change. I mean, Mason puts the ball on a dime. But, again, the game of football is not easy. But we’ll learn from it. We’ll bounce back. We’ll go on the road and get a W.”

On how the Pitt offensive line played vs. Notre Dame

“You know, it’s hard to say without watching the videotape. But, obviously, they put a lot of pressure on our quarterback, so we didn’t play good enough. And, again, they’re talented up front. When you put yourself in third down long, you were hitting a lot of different fronts and stunts and picks and all kinds of different stuff. We didn’t do a great job.

“And I don’t think we did a great job in scramble, too. When he’s scrambling, our receivers got to get open. It was very touchy out there today, as you guys probably know. But we got to make plays.”

On if Notre Dame’s three early sacks rattled the quarterback

“He’s not a guy that gets shaken up. But I think it would shake anybody up a little bit. You start to go, okay, I’m going to have to get the heck out of here. So, again, give them credit. They got a good front seven. As talented as you’re going to face in the country. And they’ve got good players.”

On responding to the long touchdown run by Notre Dame RB Jeremiyah Love

“Our kids, I think, responded well. I mean, there’s adversity in a game. I don’t think our guys ever put their head down. I think they popped a run on us, and we’ve seen that before. He’s talented, man. He’s a Heisman Trophy candidate. I mean, that’s a big guy with some speed that can go. We missed a couple tackles. Didn’t fit great. So we got to be more physical at the point of attack and make plays.”

“Pat, this wasn’t a must-win in your eyes, but—”

“They’re all must wins.”

On what he has to say to the fans who showed up at noon for Aaron Donald jersey retirement day and the big game

“I apologize to the fans. I mean, that was a great showing. I mean, I walked out to GameDay. It was a heck of a day, at least to start, for our Pitt fans, for the University of Pittsburgh, for the city of Pittsburgh. I appreciate everything they did. I wish I could have did more.”

On if Pitt quarterback Mason Heinstschel can keep progressing six starts in

“Yeah, no question about it, Paul. I mean, every player on a football team can learn from just the little details. When I watch stuff on defense, at least from the iPad, there’s so many details that we can fix and clean up that I look at and go, what are you doing, you know? That we haven’t done in the past. So that’s all part of it. I want to make sure the guys weren’t too hyped up. Maybe they were. But one of the keys to victory was making sure the guys didn’t get too cranked up. And when you start to drop passes, it gives me a signal that maybe you were too excited, you know? I didn’t want to be too darn excited because that’s how we beat you is by getting too hyped up.”

On attempting a 53-yard field goal with the backup kicker

“He’s hit him before. I mean, I think if you go back to the spring game, he hit a 52-yarder. We got a lot of confidence. That’s a long kick. But we had to take a shot at it. We weren’t in a fourth-down-and-go area of the field, and I wanted to see what he had. I mean, we do that every time, whether it’s Trey, with 52 yards, it’s not easy for any kicker. But we took a penalty on that series as well. And if we don’t get a penalty, Poppy caught a big ball, I think, on a dig inside, and we could have had a better field position. But, like, those details and the operation was not good enough on offense.”

On the reasons Pitt didn’t convert one third down vs. Notre Dame

“Pressure on the quarterback. You know, again, you have to go back and watch the game. Our guys weren’t getting opened or tugged or whatever else was happening in there. But we got to make plays, and we got to protect our quarterback. We didn’t do a good enough job across the board. When you don’t convert a third down, you convert a couple fourth downs. We get down to the one-yard line, to the half-inch-yard line, we don’t get a touchdown. I mean, it was just kind of one of those days, I guess. The game could have been a lot closer than it was.

“Our kids played their tails off. I love that team in that locker room. They played hard. They didn’t quit. And that’s what you love about this group. There was no hanging heads down there. Our guys were playing.”

On the short field opportunities for the Notre Dame offense

“Yeah, I mean, we had midfield across midfield for sure. I mean, that first series, I mean, 48-yard line. I mean, it was 43-yard line. I mean, it was not good field position in the first half. I don’t know what, but we definitely got dominated by field position. We can’t do that to ourselves.”

On how much Love’s touchdown and the ensuing pick-six changed the game

“Like I said earlier, it’s a game of momentum. I haven’t seen that pick six yet. I just saw the guy walk in the end zone, so I’m not sure what he saw, what coverage they were in. Obviously, we’ll check that out tonight. But it’s a game of momentum. Instead of us going out and scoring and making some plays, they turn around and get a big one.”

On how Pitt keeps this loss from snowballing

“Very easily. It’s my job as head coach to make sure that we don’t let it snowball to anything. We have a great Georgia Tech team now. We’ve got another top 25 team coming up this week, and that’s where our focus goes. But we’ve got to get ready to play down in Atlanta, and I’m excited. Our kids will be excited. This will not snowball into anything.”

On Pitt not scoring in the red zone vs. Notre Dame

“Yeah, I mean, you’ve got to convert. They’re one of the best red zone defenses in the country. And we didn’t make plays. We’ll look at the videotape and see what we were doing. I thought we had an excellent game plan going in. But good defenses change that.”

On Notre Dame coach Marcus Freeman lauding Mason Heinstschel’s escapability

“Yeah, I mean, he’s avoiding some really good players, and I wish he wouldn’t have to do as much of that as he is, but we’ve seen him do that all year. He’s made plays with his feet. I’m glad he came out healthy. And he’s a fighter. He’s a fighter. Mason’s a good player, and I was happy for Eli to come down and get a touchdown pass at the end as well, just to give him some time as well.”