After a thorough but brief coaching search, Pitt athletic director Steve Petersen was excited Thursday afternoon to introduce Wisconsin offensive coordinator Paul Chryst as the Panther’s fourth head coach (sixth including two interim head coaches) in a year.
“It’s interesting how things work,” Petersen said. “We are anxious for our players and fans to get to know him in the coming days and years.”
Chryst’s first order of business after getting off the plane in Pittsburgh Thursday morning was to race to the team’s practice facility and address the players. He was introduced to the team by former Wisconsin running back Zach Brown who played for Chryst before finishing his college career at Pitt this season.
“Everybody loves Coach Chryst,” Brown said.
The players and fans are expected to like Chryst for a lot of reasons, mostly because he seems to be a polar opposite of former coach Todd Graham who did not leave Pitt on good terms. Graham abandoned the team only 11 months into his tenure and told his players via text message that he had already left town.
Among Chryst’s fan club were Wisconsin’s athletic director and former head coach Barry Alvarez who is a Western Pennsylvania native and former West Virginia coach Don Nehlen who hired Chryst as a graduate assistant in 1989. Even Badgers’ head basketball coach Bo Ryan recommended Chryst via Pitt’s head basketball coach Jamie Dixon.
“I know of the great tradition at Pitt. Tony Dorsett, Dan Marino, Mark May, there’s too many Panther greats to mention,” Chryst said. “I didn’t just want to be a head coach. I wanted to be a head coach where there was a great opportunity. I understand this is the ‘City of Champions’ and I just learned Pittsburgh was rated the number one city.”
He stressed that he is a man of action rather than words and made no promises concerning what fans should expect from him ahead of time. That was a sharp contrast to Graham who arrived at Pitt last year promising a lot more than was delivered.
“It’s really shallow to announce what you’re going to do ahead of time,” Chryst said. “We’re going to let our actions speak for themselves.”
He also felt Pitt was not a temporary post until a better opportunity arose. He turned down other opportunities over the last few years including an invitation by Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones to be the quarterbacks coach there.
“I would never take a job simply because I thought it was a stepping stone because then I couldn’t live in the moment and enjoy what I was doing,” Chryst said. “Pitt is a place with tremendous tradition and where football is important to people. I got excited about the chance to be part of this.”
Also, he is known as a coach that can adapt to the players he has and change the system to match the players’ skills and abilities. Graham failed miserably in trying to turn Pitt into a spread offense and in particular, turn starting quarterback Tino Sunseri into an option quarterback when neither the team nor Sunseri was equipped for such a radical change.
“Our offense has played to people’s strengths, not try to fit the players you have into a certain mold,” Chryst said. “Whether we have an athletic quarterback or a different type of quarterback, our goal is to help players be the best we can be.”
The 46-year-old Chryst spent 16 seasons at the collegiate level and seven years at the professional level. Hisplans are to coach Wisconsin (11-2) in the Rose Bowl and watch Pitt’s Compass Bowl game from the stands. He’s also going to try to assemble most or all of his new staff in the upcoming weeks and will be talking to current Pitt assistants during his search.
For further information: Pitt web site
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