Desperation, thy Name Is Wannstedt

Everything one needs to know about tonight's game against Navy happened on one play with less than five minutes to go in the fourth quarter. That's when, with the game tied, Dave Wannstedt opted to go for it on 4th and about 4 -- inside his own 30 yard line.

What?

It doesn't matter that they made it. What matters is that Wannstedt knew his "heralded" defense was unlikely to be able to stop Navy, again -- and so the only chance that the proud University of Pittsburgh Panthers had to beat a quite average Navy team was to go for it on fourth down inside Pitt's own 30 -- even though the game was tied -- and hope for the best. At home.

Pitt fans, are you getting this? Pitt is now a team that has to take comically nonsensical chances just to be within the realm of possibility of beating bad teams.

Here are two fun facts about this year's Midshipmen. Let me preface this by saying that I live closer these days to the Academy than I do to the Cathedral of Learning, and I at least read the (Baltimore) Sun's coverage of Navy sports, and I am a big fan of Paul Johnson. Still, despite the fact that Navy might take the Commander-in-Chief trophy for a record fifth consecutive year -- this is really an off year for them.

• Navy lost to Ball State, 41-38, in Annapolis, surrendering 539 yards of total offense.
• Navy needed a field goal as time expired to beat Duke, 46-43, again in Annapolis. The Blue Devils rolled up 506 passing yards.

This game is still in overtime, but I'm going to post now anyway, because the final score doesn't matter. Congratulations, Dave Wannstedt: win or lose, you are as good as Ball State and Duke.

The present state of things

It's 8:20 p.m. EDT on the fifth full college football Saturday of the season. Pitt trails Virginia 30-7 -- with time left on a second quarter clock. And the Panthers are, at this moment, unarguably the worst team in the Big East.

Tonight's grease fire will drop the Panthers to 2-3.

Let's take a spin around the conference as it's currently constituted.

South Florida topped West Virginia Friday night. It was a sloppy game, to be sure, but no one is disputing that West Virginia is still a top 15 team, and with as much wreckage as has been seen around the country today, USF might yet crack the top 10.

Rutgers was, um, devoured by Ralph Friedgen's Maryland Terrapins this afternoon, and while it's true that the Terps were SUNJ's first true test, this is another team that won't exactly fall out of the top 25.

All Cincinnati does is kill teams. No major tests, but the win over Oregon State was convincing.

Connecticut is simply 5-0 and -- by the way -- they embarrassed the Panthers 34-14.

Louisville. Okay, the season hasn't gone as planned for the Cards, and no amount of garlic sauce can make the hurt go away. But they gently kissed N.C. State good night a couple of hours ago (29-10) and besides, apparently losing to Kentucky is nothing to get worked up about this year.

That brings us to Syracuse, which stands at 1-3 after a sheepish loss to the hated Miami Foreskins. (Miami sucks.) But remember, we're not nominating Syracuse for the Zweibel Prize. We're trying to argue that they're better than Dave Wannstedt here.

Syracuse and Pitt have both notched a single Flawed-Playoff Championship Subdivision win. The Orange took out the aforementioned bunch from Louisville -- in Louisville. Pitt's gauntlet took them through Eastern Michigan at Heinz Field.

Fire Dave Wannstedt. His vaunted recruiting classes are, assembled as a group, the actual worst team in the Big East.

Raison d'etre

Resolved, that Dave Wannstedt should be shown the royal blue and mustard yellow door.