I don't think House will be fired. I realize a lot of Pitt fans want him fired but after the Duke game I thought he did a solid job w/ the talent he had.

I tend to think either Brackenridge or Palermo will be gone as well as Haering as LB coach. I also wouldn't be surprised if Jim Hueber retires.

We really need a coach w/ contacts in the south to up our game recruiting.

Granted nothing may happen, but I think a thread is worth starting.

It too badBostard went to the nfl (and rightfully so). I think Pitt would have been in better shape. There should be 1 or two changes but I don't expect much.

Well, it looks Todd Rice - S & C coach - was let go........

I can dig that one. For whatever reason, esp early in the year, the offense and defense tailed off at the end of games.

Now that Schiano is fired....any chance Chryst brings back Bostad? He was the ol guru at uw and was the key staff member brought by Chryst when he was hired before leaving for the bucs. Hubert was coaching te's at uw.

Correction - Hueber coached ol at UW before bostad took over.

I don't think we'll get any of those guys unless they're willing to be an assistant coach

I would think they'd have better opportunities than coming back to be an assistant at Pitt after coaching in the NFL.

Chryst would probably welcome them back, though, as by all accounts they're good assistants and had a lot of success at Wisconsin.

Here is the somewhat frustrated rant I posted on the premium board at Pantherlair. The original question was, If MSU, UCF, and Duke can do it, why not Pitt?

Since 1973 Pitt has averaged a new head coach every 4.56 years. On average no kid who has come to Pitt in the last 41 years played all 5 years of their career under the same coach. Tino Sunseri's class had 4 head coaches and played for 3 of them in 4 years. They had 3 different offensive & defensive coordinators and two wildly different offensive & defensive systems that called for different types of personnel.

The average cited above doesn't include interim coaches like Sunseri, Bennett, or Patterson. It also doesn't include Mike Haywood who never coached a game for us. If we count Haywood it drops to 3.73 years. Since 2000 it is even worse. Since 2000 the average tenure of our head coach is 3.5 years without Haywood and 2.8 years with him.

Every time we change coaches we also change coordinators. This year was the first year since 2010 the kids weren't learning new offensive and defensive systems. Every time we change coaches we need to rebuild recruiting ties.

Just two years ago we were a national joke for going through 4 head coaches in 13 months. Yet somehow, there is an element of our fan base that thinks we should blow it all up and start over again. The lunatic fringe was calling for House's head after the FSU game. One whole game as the DC and they want to blow it up and give the defense a new scheme and terminology to learn. That would certainly have made the defense better. Sarcasm intended.

The reality is that the administration and the fan base are detached from reality and have a microwave mentality that demands immediate gratification. We would have fired O'Leary if he'd have gone 0-12 at Pitt his first year. Dantonio's first two years at MSU were very similar to Chryst's here, but still people question if he is the man for the job. Cutcliffe would have been fired for posting the records at Pitt that he posted at Duke for the first 4 years.

It is no coincidence that the coaches who gave us our most successful seasons recently, were both here for over 5 years. Walt and Wanny both had very good seasons. But they were never good enough. And we ran them off and we continue to follow the pattern we have pursued for the last 41 years. And we don't understand why we haven't gotten success.

Changing coaches is sometimes necessary. But have a damned plan when you do it. The last time Pitt had a transition plan from one coach to the next was when they rehired Jackie Sherrill to replace Johnny Majors. Not surprisingly, we continued our success. Do you think we would be further ahead if SP had thought, this Chryst guy runs an offense similar to the one we have now; maybe I'll hire him instead of Mike Haywood, or Todd Graham? I do. But again, no thought was put into that decision. We arrogantly thought we were too good to hire an assistant coach. We needed a coach with head coaching experience. We got two of them and ended up hiring the assistant anyway.

Paul Chryst and Matt House have not given indication that they are unable to win at this level. They are young and certainly they are learning and have room for improvement. They are our coaches and if people would just give them time to build a program rather than live recruit to recruit and game to game the way we have for the past 30 years. We might just get there in a couple of years.

The definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over again expecting a different outcome. We have about 32 years of insanity behind us. Let's try something different.

SP... If I could rep you again I would. Well said.

Thanks Joey. It it weren't for Penn State fans I would think we have the most delusional fans in the country. I am still pissed about how the Wanny firing went down. You never fire a coach without a replacement plan. Pedersen had none.

Count me in as someone that had enough of House after the Duke game (in particular). Now I think House made the proper adjustments and I don't worry about the D (for next season) as I did after that game. The defense in the bowl game was straight up nasty. Had like 6-7 sacks and was aggressive down the stretch. I don't think we're heading for a 11-2 Orange Bowl type season next year, but I think we'll likely have an 8-4 campaign leading us to Nashville or Annapolis.

As for coaching changes, I don't expect anything too major. Would like to see a ST coach and one of our DL coaches to go. What I think we really need is an defensive assistant coach that is a strong recruiter. Haering just doesn't seem to be that guy. On offense I wouldn't be surprised if Engram ends up at PSU as the WR coach.

It would be too bad if Engram left for PSU but that life as an assistant coach - always on the move.

The question about the defensive staff is interesting. I think a lot of angst from posters is the lack of experince in House and the defensive staff in general - especially when there seemed to be at least two guys out there who had experience and were available (well, one of them anyway) and were interested (?) in Mike Elko from BG and Todd Orlando, who was letgo from FIU (part of Cristobal's staff).

Chryst seems willing to make changes as shown with the S&C coach. Does he feel that anyone else isn't getting the job done? Aloso, Does he hire someone outside of his 'tree' (so far only for S&C)?

I just saw this site where they compare offense and defense for teams based on the how good (or bad) the offense or defense they were playing. This has come up because while Auburn's defensive statistics are bad (#95) but when you correct for how good the offenses they are facing, they come up to #13. For the record, Pitt's D was #44 while Pitt's O was #56.

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/feidef

https://twitter.com/mikevukkdka/status/4...2002234368

According to @coachingsearch Pitt will name Ross Kolodziej as new strength coach. Recently served Wisconsin defensive grad assistant.

He was already an assistant to Todd Rice at Pitt.

http://www.pittsburghpanthers.com/staffd...ffdir.html

It's strange because it seems he didn't have any S&C experience prior to his hiring at Pitt under Todd Rice.

I wonder if he has the same philosophy. Didn't Tags and a few others complain about Rice?

WR Coach Engram is heading to the Ravens to be their WR Coach.

Well that's certainly a promotion for Engram. Good for him. He was good for Pitt.

Looks like Pitt hired DB coach Troy Douglas from Iowa State. Now they need a replacement for Engram. Although, they'll probably have to shift some coaches around to make room for that.

Bollinger leaving.... Chryst to coach QBs, John Settle - former UWisky rbs coach - will now be doing the same at Pitt. Now, there is only the WRs coach to hire.