Pitt Football: 3 reasons the Panthers will beat Syracuse in Week 3

1. Pitt has an offense?

Is this the year Pitt can pair a component offense with a top-level defense? For the first time in his career, senior quarterback Kenny Pickett is in the same offensive system as the year prior, which lends to a belief that maybe this offense can improve.

Against Austin Peay, Pickett looked good, completing 14-of-20 passes for 277 yards. Nothing too special but he made the right decisions and was able to spread the ball around to almost every skill position guy.

Pickett has a speedster in four star freshmen Jordan Addison that he can get the ball to. The two seemed to already have a solid connection as Addison had seven catches last week. This week, Pickett is getting Florida transfer tight end Lucas Krull back after he missed the first game.

This game is for sure a step up for Pickett and this offense against a Syracuse defense that gave Sam Howell and North Carolina problems for three quarters. We may see more from the running back trio of Vincent Davis, Israel Abanikanda and A.J. Davis, who combined for 21 carries and 93 yards this week. Carolina’s Michael Carter was able to torch the Syracuse run defense for 78 yards on just seven carries.

How serious of a contender Pitt will be this year comes down to how improved this offense actually is, we’ll have a better idea come Saturday afternoon.