Pitt topped Georgia Tech on Thursday night, 34-20, in a heated game where the Yellow Jackets played catch-up most of the time. Things got even more intense afterward, specifically between the two head coaches.
Pitt’s Pat Narduzzi and Georgia Tech’s Geoff Collins met each other on the field for a postgame handshake — a tradition that should be postponed indefinitely during the COVID-19 pandemic — and it appeared to be a more fleeting exchange than Narduzzi expected.
The handshake barely lasted a second because as quickly as Collins extended his hand to the Panthers coach, he forcefully ripped it away and began walking in the opposite direction. Seemingly irritated, Narduzzi took off his face shield — why wasn’t he wearing a mask? — and pointed and said something in Collins’ direction as the Georgia Tech coach kept on walking.
After their game last night, Georgia Tech coach Geoff Collins ripped his hand away during a handshake with Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi, who responded with some words for Collins. pic.twitter.com/DA7Cov60Fl
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) December 11, 2020
What exactly happened here isn’t entirely clear and not really that big of a deal, but, on the surface, it’s not a great show of sportsmanship from Collins.
More from the Associated Press reporting in Atlanta:
“I told him, ‘Hey, you’ve got a great team,'” Narduzzi said. “He said, ‘Baloney,’ or some other nice words, and walked off. I don’t know. I thought it was a good game.”
Collins insisted that he didn’t intend to get into it with Narduzzi.
“I was just focused on getting our guys over to the band to celebrate,” Collins said. “I don’t even remember what I said, to be honest with you.”
Regardless, if college football is somehow still carrying on during a pandemic that’s killed nearly 300,000 people in the U.S., maybe it’s time we put postgame handshakes between coaches on ice for a bit.
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