2 holes in Pitt's football schedule

Pitt now has two holes in its 2012 football schedule to fill as the Big East officially settled its dispute with West Virginia and cleared the way for the Mountaineers to join the Big 12 July 1.

The first hole, created when TCU was released from its contract with the Big East late last year, almost assuredly will be filled with a team from Division I-AA.

But the new hole will be trickier to fill, and Pitt athletic director Steve Pederson said it likely will require the help of the Big East because there are not many teams out there with available dates -- especially since the Panthers need another home game.

He also said the future of the "Backyard Brawl" is not known yet and, given all the things facing both schools at this point, finding ways to keep it alive is not a priority right now.

"The Big East communicated to us it had reached a settlement with West Virginia and would work to find us a replacement team for that home game," Pederson said in a statement. "We will keep our fans informed as that develops.

"Given the conference transitions both schools are currently undergoing, it is difficult to speculate on the future of our series with WVU. Our more immediate focus is on finalizing our upcoming football schedule."

Originally, Pitt hoped that if West Virginia prevailed in its lawsuit against the Big East in order to leave the conference before the mandated 27-month period was up, it would clear the way for the Panthers and Syracuse to leave the Big East and join the ACC this year.

Now that West Virginia has won, most people at Pitt have begun to accept the fact that the school likely will be stuck in the Big East for at least one more season.

Part of it is because the school is adamant about not paying a huge exit fee -- it will cost West Virginia and the Big 12 a reported $20 million for the Mountaineers to leave early -- but Pitt also would rather not burn its bridges with conference members by forcing an action that would leave this Big East season in chaos.

Also, unlike the Big 12, which accepted West Virginia in part on the condition the Mountaineers would join the conference for next season, the ACC is not pushing Pitt or Syracuse to join this year and is willing to wait until 2014, if necessary.

Nobody involved in the process believes Pitt and Syracuse will remain in the league beyond the 2012-13 season, and commissioner John Marinatto, who previously had taken a hard line about keeping both schools in the conference, told The Associated Press Tuesday that the conference is open to discussions about letting the two schools out in time for the '13 football season.

"But given the strength and speed of our expansion efforts, I think our board might be open to a discussion about 2013," Marinatto told the wire service.

With Pitt likely staying in the Big East, some work needs to be done with the football schedule and, regardless of the solution, it is unlikely to be a schedule that excites fans.

Pitt has 10 games scheduled -- home games against Youngstown State, Virginia Tech, Louisville and Rutgers and road games against Buffalo, Notre Dame, Connecticut, Cincinnati, South Florida and Syracuse.

Pitt wants to play six home games, and the addition of the Division I-AA team only would give the Panthers five.

The two most viable options to fill the other opening seem to be that the Big East gets one of its seven incoming teams to join the conference a year early to restore it to eight members for '12 or it flips one of Pitt's conference road games to a home game, giving the Panthers three home and three road games in the league.

The second option would leave the Panthers one game short of a full 12-game schedule, but it would give them six home games and enable them to play another non-conference road game if that is the only choice available.

As for Pitt facing West Virginia any time soon, both sides seem to be saying the right things about wanting the rivalry to continue while acknowledging that it is not likely to happen.

"We've had, as you know, a tremendous rivalry with Pitt in all of our sports. In football, we've played 104 times," said West Virginia athletic director Oliver Luck. "Pitt is going through a lot of change with their imminent joining of the ACC.

"They're going to nine conference games. It'll be difficult to schedule. I certainly would welcome a conversation with Steve Pederson, my counterpart at Pitt."

Paul Zeise: pzeise@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1720.

First published on February 15, 2012 at 12:00 am

Source: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/12046/1210217-142.stm?cmpid=sports.xml

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