Clayton Welch ran a lot on Friday night. He ran because Syracuse needed a spark, and his quarterback keepers jump started a drive. He ran because Taj Harris was in the end zone some 94-yards away and needed someone to celebrate a touchdown with. He ran because the pass rush was closing in. And that’s when he stopped.

Welch had nowhere to hide. The white jerseys of Pittsburgh defenders were seeping into the backfield once more and there was no escaping that mess. 

“They brought the house on Tommy,” Welch said. “They brought the house on the me. I don’t think they changed much.”

Syracuse fell to Pittsburgh (5-2, 2-1 Atlantic Coast) in the Carrier Dome, 27-20, allowing nine sacks in the process. It’s the most sacks allowed by the Orange since a 2013 matchup with Clemson and puts SU two sacks behind its season total in 2018 through seven games. Syracuse (3-4, 0-3 Atlantic Coast) clawed for 328 yards, including Welch’s 94-yard heave. The offense finished 5-of-18 on third down. 

“Right now everybody’s job is in jeopardy,” Syracuse head coach Dino Babers said. “We’re going to go through the tape and if guys haven’t done the type of job they need to do then we need to start getting some other guys in there. It’s not fair to keep playing the same guys if the results don’t change…the other guys have to be good too. It’s not intramurals.”

Max Freund | Staff Photographer

Syracuse entered this game at 3-3, stuck between a team that’s shown glimpses of hope on the defensive side of the ball while playing paralyzingly bad on offense. The Orange, perhaps more than it needed a win, needed to show life. Could the offensive line keep the quarterback upright? Could the offense finally move the ball consistently? 

Against Pittsburgh, the Orange offense flatlined with a few brief jumps in the cardiac monitor. Syracuse’s first two drives ended in sacks and the third should’ve ended on a quarterback hurry, had Pitt not dropped the ensuing punt. The pressure, as it had a week ago against NC State, came from blitzes all over the pocket. DeVito didn’t have room to maneuver, often shifting past the first rusher only to find a second defender looming elsewhere. 

When the offense needed a spark, it turned to Welch and designed quarterback runs. His first scamper — a fake jet sweep that he kept up the middle — went for 26 yards on third down. His next went for 18 and another third down conversion. Then, the collapsing pocket found Welch, too, leaving him 8-of-20 for 176 yards and two touchdowns at the game’s end. 

In the third quarter, the hits had piled up on DeVito, who entered the game as he had the week before, with additional padding over his ribs. On his final play of the game in the third quarter, DeVito once again tried to avoid the rush. He ran three yards past the line of scrimmage before his lowered shoulder collided with Pittsburgh defensive back Paris Ford’s lowered shoulder. The ball popped loose. DeVito lay motionless on the turf. He slowly rose up without the help of trainers and jogged off the field where he was eventually evaluated in the medical tent. 

DeVito was cleared to come back in the game medically, Babers said. But Babers didn’t want to see DeVito hit anymore. 

“You’ve done enough for this one,” he said to DeVito. 

A third down heave from inside the Syracuse end zone provided the games’ lone spark. Welch, with a defender running unblocked at him, slung a deep pass to Harris for a 94-yard touchdown. The next drive ended with a quarterback hurry and an incompletion. 

Syracuse just wasn’t opportunistic. With a trick play looming — a handoff to a tight end Aaron Hackett — Syracuse was called for a false start. Then, another sack set the Orange back and a drive headlined by three penalties in the Pitt secondary ended in a missed field goal.

“We’ve been close but we need to clean up stuff,” guard Evan Adams said. “Me myself, I had false start today. That’s inches that we could’ve used.”

Max Freund | Staff Photographer

The mishaps came on defense, too. A personal foul call extended a Pittsburgh drive into field goal range and the Panthers capitalized. The Orange made contact with running back A.J. Davis ahead of the final third down carry but couldn’t get him to fall. The first down all but ended Syracuse’s game. 

“We need to regroup,” Babers said. “We need to go back and we really need to check ourselves. And we will do that as a family. Then we will come out and try to do a lot better than what we’ve been doing.”

Last week, it was a double pass that gave an otherwise stagnant opposing offense life. This week, it was a triple pass. Last week, Syracuse turned to the wildcat offense and direct snaps to running back Abdul Adams. This week, SU elicited similar duties to backup quarterback Welch. 

Last week, Syracuse scrambled back to nearly salvage a dismal offensive outing at North Carolina State. This week, it was nearly identical, if not worse.

And so the Orange left the field losers by one score for the second week in a row, though the issues loom deeper. Like a disease, the symptoms are repetitive. They’re worsening. If the Orange are to turnaround their slipping season, they need an antidote.

Published on October 18, 2019 at 10:51 pm

Contact Josh: jlschafe@syr.edu | @Schafer_44