Long makes our job very easy

We here at Panther Rants like to have a lot of fun with University of Pittsburgh athletics. As avid readers have probably noticed, we liked to use our "telepathic" powers to get great inside interviews that tell the "real" story.

However, God's gift to this blog is Jeff Long. What's great about Long is he will almost always say things that eliminate our need to put our telepathic powers to work. In today's PG, for instance, Long said the following:

"I'll reiterate, it is my desire to play at least three BCS conference teams every year and, if we can add a good MAC team in there as well, that's a pretty good non-conference schedule no matter who we fill the fifth game with."

It's good to know that we're shooting to have a schedule with three BCS out of conference games. As Paul Zeise so aptly points out, Long is failing on his own directive as it stands at the moment. Only once during the next seven years does Pitt have a schedule with three out of conference opponents coming from BCS conferences.

Panther Rants' favorite line is Long saying that if the magical formula can be reached, whoever the fifth opponent might be is irrelevant. Now, pretty much every program in the country is forced to have one DI-AA date on their schedule. With Long's statement, we can be assured that of the six or seven home games we'll get that one of them will - hopefully - be a DI-AA opponent.

However, Long's continued incompetence has Panther Rants worried. We see a day coming when among those three BCS teams that Pitt will be treated to home-and-home series with programs like Duke, Kentucky and Kansas, those that would pale in comparison to MAC opponents. We also fear that some dayDuquesne, St. Francis and Robert Morris may fit the bill as DI-AA opponents.

Pray that there's truth to the word that Grambling's bringing it's band this season, Panthers fans. It might be the most entertaining element of any of the "fifth" games we'll be seeing at Heinz Field for quite some time.