Amid all the conversation surrounding conference realignment and the chatter about how the Big Ten and SEC are poised to dominate college football as a pair of “superconferences,” Pittsburgh head coach Pat Narduzzi recently took a shot at the Big Ten and Michigan State, where he served as the Spartans’ defensive coordinator from 2007-14.
Narduzzi’s Pitt squad and his former MSU program clashed in the Chick-Fil-A Peach Bowl last season, with the Panthers falling to the Spartans by a score of 31-21.
“We talk about Big Ten and SEC and ACC. That was one of the best Big Ten teams last year, then let’s go to the Big Ten and win it every year. So I don’t want to hear about this Big Ten dominance and SEC dominance,” Narduzzi said on the Bazzy’s Black and Gold Banter podcast.
On Thursday at the 2022 ACC Football Kickoff in Charlotte, Narduzzi was asked if he wanted to elaborate on those strong comments and explain why he felt that way.
“Not really,” Narduzzi said, laughing. “I guess it was a long summer.”
“You hear all these things during the summer about the Power 2s and all this stuff,” Narduzzi continued. “We’ll just start there. You know, we play some darn good football in the ACC, and I think people forget about it.”
Narduzzi went on to discuss the strength of the ACC and the strangeness of the 10-win season Dabo Swinney’s Clemson team posted in 2021 being perceived as a “down” year.
“I think Dabo made a comment yesterday about everybody talks about, oh, Clemson had a down year, and he is exactly right. People need to wake up,” Narduzzi said.
“How about the teams that are getting better? I think Pittsburgh is getting better, so we’ll start there. Again, any time you get — I’ve coached in the Big Ten for eight years, so I know it. I don’t know the SEC, so I’m not going to claim. I’ve never coached in the SEC, but I do know the Big Ten. I feel very confident — and, again, it’s not being arrogant. It’s just kind of knowing the landscape and knowing what we played against in the Peach Bowl, just would have liked to have our backup quarterback to play the whole game.”
“That’s just confidence,” Narduzzi added. “That’s no disrespect to the Big Ten or Michigan State. It’s just about Pitt and about the ACC.”
Narduzzi then clarified the point he was trying to make.
“I think ACC football is really, really good, and that’s really the comment there that I was trying to get across,” he said.
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