Pitt rallies past Syracuse
PITTSBURGH – After losing four of its first five games this season, the Panthers continued their mid-season-salvaging efforts yesterday at Heinz Field. They reached the .500 mark (4-4) and improved to 3-1 in the Big East conference after a 34-17 win over visiting Syracuse (1-6, 0-4) in front of 33,059 cold, wet fans. “It was a good win for three reasons,” Pitt head coach Dave Wannstedt said. “We evened up our record, we can now go into a bye week with some confidence, and we got another conference win.”
Tyler Palko led the scoring charge by rushing for two touchdowns, a single-game career-high, and throwing for one touchdown. He leads the team with five rushing touchdowns and has nine for his career.
“We just tried to execute the game plan and I thought everybody did their part today,” Palko said. “We still have a chance to win the Big East and this game kept us on course.”
LaRod Stephens-Howling made his first start and responded by rushing for 101 yards on 23 carries, both career-highs at Pitt. Wannstedt plans on using Stephens-Howling more after he proved he can carry the ball that many times in a game.
“I love LaRod because he really gives our offense another dimension, so we’ll continue to get him the ball as much as we can,” Wannstedt said. “We still need to get much better though, because we’re striving for perfection.”
The Panthers played far from perfection on the wet, cold field in the first half, but luckily for them, so did Syracuse.
Pitt committed three turnovers, including a Palko interception in the end zone early in the first quarter after H.B. Blades recovered a fumbled punt to give the Panthers the ball in the red zone. Pitt also had a punt blocked that was returned for a touchdown and had a 27-yard field goal blocked.
“I think I need to change the times of our meetings because everybody must have been asleep this week when we talked about punt protection,” Wannstedt said. “We only addressed one player from Syracuse we were worried about blocking a punt [Anthony Smith] and he ends up getting free on a twist and charging in to block a punt.”
For the second time in two weeks, the Panthers fell behind 10-0 in the first quarter and came back to win the game.
“I don’t know why we keep coming out flat and falling behind in the first half,” Palko said.
“I really can’t put my finger on it, but we’ve been able to recover and win, so I guess we’re doing a good job in staying focused.”
Pitt’s defense did all it could to keep the Panthers in the game and eventually, the offense caught up. H.B. Blades intercepted a pass two minutes into the second quarter and returned it for a touchdown and closed the gap, 10-7.
“That interception for a touchdown kept us in the game,” Wannstedt said. “This could have gotten real ugly early, but our defense kept it close.”
It was Blades’ first touchdown at Pitt.
“When I grabbed the ball in the air and took off toward the end zone, it felt like I was in high school again playing running back,” Blades said.