"Dave Andrews (ND) will be Pitt's Strength and Conditioning coach and Andre Powell (Maryland) will handle Special Teams" according to Rich Walsh at KDKA.
Powell didn't have nearly the success with Maryland's running backs as he did with Clemson's, but the special teams unit improved tremendously under his tenure. After finishing 101st in special teams F/+ in 2012, Maryland was 58th in 2013 and 6th in 2014. On the recruiting trail, Powell covers much of Virginia for the Terps Indianapolis, Southwest Florida, South Carolina, Indiana, Baltimore City and Harford and Cecil Counties. His most notable commitments were Will Likely and Caleb Rowe, and he has not current commitments attached to him in the 2015 class. We'll have more on Maryland's search for a replacement Thursday.
A couple of friends who are big-time ND fans said the players there absolutely loved working with Andrews. S&C coaches spend more time with the players than just about anyone else on the coaching staff, so that's good to hear. Seems to be quite qualified, too.
Powell could be terrific. Chris Dokish tweeted that UMD's special teams were ranked 6th in the country this past year and has a pretty strong recruiting background. He was RB coach for CJ Spiller and James Davis at Clemson, Willie Parker at UNC and Tiki Barber at UVA.
Like Slappy said, it's unsure yet whether he'll have anything to do with the RBs here. At the very least, he should be an upgrade over Haering with the special teams.
There were a lot of rumors going around at the end of last week that Pitt was chasing New Orleans Saints RB coach Dan Roushar. Roushar just finished his 2nd year in New Orleans, but was at Michigan State from 2007-2012. He was most recently MSU's offensive coordinator and tight ends coach from 2011-12, which put him there during Le'Veon Bell's MSU career. His first four years there, he was MSU's offensive line coach.
Interested to see who else they bring in. It sounds like they may announce most of the staff all at one time.
Trey Anderson transferring as well. Dude was a good soldier here. For his sake I hope he transfers to a team where he can see a little playing time.
This seems to coincide with the news from earlier in the week that RS freshman DB Jaquan Davidson will be moving back to QB, where he played in high school.
Trey Anderson transferring as well. Dude was a good soldier here. For his sake I hope he transfers to a team where he can see a little playing time.
This seems to coincide with the news from earlier in the week that RS freshman DB Jaquan Davidson will be moving back to QB, where he played in high school.
Andersen was a Graham recruit right? Spread QB is what I thought I read about him. Hope he does well wherever he transfers.
Trey Anderson transferring as well. Dude was a good soldier here. For his sake I hope he transfers to a team where he can see a little playing time.
This seems to coincide with the news from earlier in the week that RS freshman DB Jaquan Davidson will be moving back to QB, where he played in high school.
Andersen was a Graham recruit right? Spread QB is what I thought I read about him. Hope he does well wherever he transfers.
Indeed he was. He was basically unrecruited and was about to attend a junior college in Texas when Graham convinced him to come to Pitt as a walk-on about two weeks before camp started.
Trey seems like a really good kid and has been through a lot. I'm happy for him and hope he goes somewhere where he can start. That said, if we had a competent backup instead of his terrible self we wouldn't have had to endure 3 years of Tino. That was the most depressing part.. Knowing we've actually had some decent QBs that weren't afforded 3 years of starting time, and Tino had that little of competition that there was no realistic replacement. Sigh.
Trey seems like a really good kid and has been through a lot. I'm happy for him and hope he goes somewhere where he can start. That said, if we had a competent backup instead of his terrible self we wouldn't have had to endure 3 years of Tino. That was the most depressing part.. Knowing we've actually had some decent QBs that weren't afforded 3 years of starting time, and Tino had that little of competition that there was no realistic replacement. Sigh.
Pitt's QB situation really went to hell that year. Bostick quit. Graham came in. Tino was the starter, Trey was a walk-on who was named backup, Gonzalez was suspended and moved to H-back before being moved to linebacker, and Mark Myers wasn't athletic enough to run TG's offense and was stuck in the third string doghouse. Next season Chryst comes in and Tino is the starter with Myers the backup, but Myers transferred before camp leaving Pitt with Tino-Trey-Voytik, with The Savage sitting out his transfer season.
Ugly, ugly, ugly and its not necessarily going to get any better. This year looks to be Voytik-Bertke-Davidson (who just spent his RS season learning a position other than QB) and Hornibrook isn't showing up for his early enrollment until he knows who the OC is.
Luckily Voytik isn't Tino. I think he's gonna have a pretty good year. If there's a legit #2 WR for him, at least.
Voytik is solid. He took a lot of flack this year (from myself included) but he improved and is better than most people gave him credit for. As far as WR goes, I saw a tweet this morning that if Ronald Jones doesn't return (no idea what his status is, feels like he's been here forever and is always injured or suspended), Pitt will be returning 6 WRs who combined for a total of 4 receptions and 55 yards. That's pretty scary. JP Holtz and Scott Orndoff might actually get the ball thrown their way next season.
Tino was a special brand of awful. Voytik has his faults, but he's much better than Tino was. Tino couldn't throw an accurate pass beyond 10 yards if his life depended on it.
