We Remember the Underdog 1976 Pitt Panthers & the Sugar Bowl Triumph

There are few teams in modern history that capture the imagination as the underdog.

They had a Heisman Trophy winner, a quarterback that not too many people had heard about, and a college coach that was on the rise to great stardom.

The Pit Panthers book is written by Dave Foley, who joins us tonight to tell us about the history of this famous team back over 50 years ago.

Hello, my football friends.

This is Darren Hees of pigskindispatch.com welcome once again to the Pig Pen, your portal to positive football history.

And welcome to another trip back in time to some great football history.

And this is one that I actually remember and really I'm quite fond of.

We have our friend joining us, David Finoli, a great author of some Western Pennsylvania sports.

David, welcome back to the Pig Pen.

Well, thank you.

Glad to be back.

Dave, you have a really interesting book that, that you suggested talking about it and I just love the topic because I just love this team.

Why don't you tell us about the title of your book and what it's about?

Miracle on Cardiac Hill.

And I'll tell you what, there has never been.

Say what you want about Indiana building a national champion in a short period of time.

Of course they have transfer portals at their disposal that Pitt did not have.

Yeah, it was really remarkable that what they did in that short of time and to have a lot of local kids around the Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania area to be a part of it, that's almost unheard of nowadays in major college football.

But yeah, I mean, but let's talk about that team.

Nobody wanted the program.

Frank Kush, who was the hall of Fame coach of, of Arizona State, was a Windberman.

He was a Western Pennsylvania guy.

He actually accepted the job before Carl de Pasqua took it in.

And then he decided at the last minute, I don't see this program going anywhere.

And stayed at Arizona state.

Well, in 72, they're looking for a coach.

Ask Kush again.

And Kush absolutely did not want it.

Nobody wanted the program.

Kaz Mislensky was their new ad, and he had talked to a young head coach by the name of John Majors, who was at Iowa State and doing miraculous things there at a program that had never been anywhere near competitive before.

They had just been to a couple bowl games.

Well, Michigan State was also talking to Majors.

He was the hot commodity.

Nobody thought he'd come to Pitt, but Pitt found the money, and Pitt coerced his ego of, you know, trying to do the impossible with this program.

And out of the blue, he decides to come to Pitt.

And that's where the world changed for Pitt.

They tie the Georgia Bulldogs, stunningly tie the Bulldogs that first game in 73, go on to a 6 and 4 season and 6, 4 and 1 and get a bull bid.

Gator Bull would have been the last bowl they went to.

And, boy, I'll tell you what, it just.

It just took off from there.

Yeah, I mean.

I mean, we sit back and we talk about, you know, Johnny Majors now, and everybody says, you know, wow, this guy was, you know, he was the.

The cream of the crop coach at the time, but really he wasn't.

He was a great college star at the University of Tennessee when he played, you know, outstanding player, but as a coach.

Yeah, okay.

Iowa State and everything, but really, I think he really got his footing and really propelled his career those, Those days, those years at Pitt, that he was.

There, without a doubt.

I mean, he did great things at Iowa State, but great things was 6 and 4, 7 and 4.

So you didn't know Johnny Majors was going to be a Hall of Fame coach at that time.

He was a young coach who took a gamble.

So you're absolutely right.

He wasn't.

It wasn't like getting Lou Saban to.

To come to.

To Pitt or Nick Saban.

Lou, I'm.

I was reading about the other day.

I apologize.

Nick Saban to come to Pitt, a.

Lou Saban would be good at the time to have.

Football coach in his own right.

Absolutely right.

But he really.

He built this thing they had 73 was the last year where you had unlimited potential recruits come.

And the team had an agreement with Penn State, West Virginia and Syracuse that they would keep academic standards in Recruiting well, the other schools didn't necessarily adhere to them the way they promised Pitt did.

And that's one of the reasons Pitt failed.

They cut that agreement that year.

And I think Jackie Sherrill at Last count recruited 76 players, one of which was a running back from Alec or Hopewell by the name of Tony Dorsett.

Now Tony Dorsett, little guy, homesick as hell in, in 73 he was about to go back home because he was, he was homesick, decided to stay at Pitt.

They hadn't had a thousand yard rusher in the history of Pitt before that time.

But the thing people don't realize about that team, in 74, they improved slightly at 7 and 4.

They were kind of stuck in, in neutral at that point.

And in 75, which is when they actually set up the title, they're sitting down.

And if I look at that, they got.

They had Notre Dame and Penn State to end the year.

They were 6 and 3 with those two.

Both nationally ranked teams.

Both teams, I mean Pitt had never beaten Penn State in the Joe Paternity era.

And it had been ages since Notre Dame.

It was ranked in the top 10 when they played Pitt.

So they take on Pitt at Pitt Stadium and stunningly, Tony Dorsett has the game of his Life running for 303 yards.

He caught up about a 50 yard pass from Matt Kavanaugh who I hadn't realized until a few years ago, hadn't remembered he was actually the starting quarterback in 75 for that Notre Dame game.

And Tony Dorsett runs.

They win the game 35 to 20.

Stuns the nation.

All of a sudden this team that was about to be because they finished six and five again.

I don't know that Johnny Majors is there again because this team is now stuck in neutral.

Three straight six and five seasons, seven and four the one year, but they're stuck in neutral.

Get, get your fire now.

Get your fire back then too.

Then they outplay Penn State.

The next week they lose seven to six.

Carson Long, who one of the great kickers in school history, misses an extra point and two field goals or else that would have been a huge upset to go to go to camp or go to the Sun Bowl.

Just rip, rip Kansas apart.

34 To 19 was the final.

That game they have 300 yard rushers.

Dorset, Elliot Walker, who would become the second thousand yard rusher the year after Dorset leaves in 77, the second to get a thousand.

And Bobby Haygood the quarterback, not much of a passer, but man, he was, he was an excellent runner.

And they just crush nationally ranked kids.

Kansas, that sets up this team next year they go to Notre Dame again.

Notre Dame grows the grass.

So Dorset slows them down in the opener.

They get the first touchdown up seven nothing.

Gets inside the 10 yard line on the first play of the game and Pitt doesn't look back.

From there 31 to 10 they get.

And Dorset is Ross Browner's nightmare for four years because he just runs roughshod through Notre Dame like nobody had before or since against them in the program's history.

They got on a run, but it wasn't an easy run.

Georgia Tech the next week.

Bobby Haygood is running that offense, the Veer offense, which, which basically was an option offense.

Their offensive line wasn't the biggest so it took advantage of the speed of it running to the corners.

He gets injured, oh my God, it's been done.

So they call on Matt Kavanaugh.

Matt Kavanaugh goes in and he adds something to that Veer offense that Bobby Haga did not have.

And that was a passing attack.

Throws for over 300 yards.

The next week against Duke and they go from there and you think okay, now we're going again.

But against Louisville in a one sided win, he breaks his ankle.

So you're going to a third string quarterback, Tommy Usyk who was, it was a walk on at the beginning of the year.

And this is, this is the thing that just, you got to love about this team, just the fight of it.

You know, Usick manages the game.

He doesn't, he doesn't lose the ball.

But Dorset goes nuts and goes over 200 yards for four consecutive games.

And you know, just, just takes it.

Against Navy, you know, he breaks the all time rush.

Archie Griffin's one year rushing record.

And in college football on again a dramatic long touchdown run.

And it's just the amazing thing about this team was there was no quit in it.

You think about the talent on that team.

After Dorsett was drafted first by the Cowboys, nobody was drafted in that draft from this team until Larry Swider the punter got taken in the seventh round.

So you want to talk about a well coached team and a gutsy team.

I, I mean truly a miracle, right?

They weren't part of the.

Any major conferences at all.

They weren't.

You know, Pitt eventually joined with the Big East, I think is the first one.

They joined the Big east in the late 80s.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's about time.

Penn State was thinking about joining the Big Ten and.

Yeah, everything like that.

But back then, that's why they're playing the Georgia Techs and playing Notre Dame every year.

In Penn State, they were all independence.

And it was.

It was a great little series with all these independents.

It was basically almost like being in a conference.

But it just brings some more amazement to.

To, you know, what Pitt did with those that year.

Absolutely.

And back then, there weren't 40 bowl games.

There were just a handful of bowl games.

And a Fiesta ball.

Bed.

Fiesta bowl back then was a minor bull.

So you had that going against you too, because the, the Independence does not have those contractual obligations with the big balls.

Yeah.

And there wasn't ESPN back then.

That's part of the reason why there wasn't that many bowl games.

Exactly.

That's a great.

I can remember this.

This team, I mean, just to put the impact on.

Like, I forget what it was called.

Scholastic Books.

Yes, Scholastic Books.

Yeah.

And there was like two or three books on Tony td, Tony Dorset, you know, having his initials and TD and being touched down.

And I can remember that vividly.

I'm like, you know, wow, I can't believe this guy's on there.

And, you know, this is a guy I watched on Saturday.

And it was, it was national.

It wasn't just Western Pennsylvania.

These things were all over the country.

And that's how popular this team was becoming.

It was really phenomen across the nation.

Absolutely.

I mean, you know, they, they go on.

They really only have two nip and tuck games.

One against Syracuse and then technically against West Virginia.

I think they beat him by eight points.

But it was because Pitt dropped the ball a lot that game.

But it was never a game that was.

Was really in doubt.

But that last game of the regular season hadn't beat Joe Pa in 10 years.

Had never Beaten him and Penn State goes up in that game and you thought oh gosh, here we go again.

And Majors goes into the eye, puts Dorsett in the fullback slot and just crushes them in the second half.

Joe, Joe.

Pa didn't know what to do.

He didn't know how to make the adjustments and and Pitt went on to a 247 victory that game to get their Sugar bowl bit against Georgia in the Southeast, the fifth ranked Georgia Bulldogs.

And well I'll never forget that game they came in and Gordon Jones and it was a freshman that had a great touchdown catch.

Matt Kavanaugh was a games MVP.

Dorsett ran for over 200 yards, 202 a Sugar bowl record.

And it was never a game pit Georgia all week.

Vince Dooley, you know, had his guys under curfew and you know, was tough with them and he was going to kick Pittsbutt.

The fans they said were just outrageous on the.

The Georgia fans, like irritating pit fans and irritating the players.

Johnny Major said you guys go out and have fun.

You know he let him out, he let him let lose have their fun.

And that game was never closed.

Pitt went up 21 nothing ended up winning 27 to 3.

And boy at the end of the game you knew it was coming.

He announces he's going to Tennessee.

But he set this program up for greatness and Jackie Sherrill took it over at that point and you know, unfortunately Ed Boza killed it.

But you know we did have some fun though for those.

Yeah, Fog Fazio and yeah those days too.

So something maybe you know we, we've been talking about and everybody wants to remember the, the Panthers back then as an offensive team.

But think about these scores you're talking about.

They're playing these big time teams and winning 21 to three and beating Penn State, you know, only score seven points and you know, a couple of the other games you talked about, that's a pretty good defense because these are some very potent offenses they're playing.

These are, you know, powerhouse teams in college football at the time.

Let me tell you, they had a great defense.

It was led by Al Romano who was a first team all American.

You had a defensive backfield, Jeff Delaney, Leroy Felder was back there.

Bob Jury who led the nation if I'm not mistaken with 11 interceptions and he still is still in the area.

These are some great defensive backs at the time.

11 Interceptions in one season or is that.

Oh yeah, wow.

That's yeah led the nation.

That's more than one a game, right?

Yeah, I believe Al Chesley was, was still there.

I mean this was, this was a tremendous defense, without a doubt.

It was fast, it was athletic and you know there was no.

It was well rounded.

Carson Long and Larry Swider were two tremendous kickers.

Carson at the time set the all time NCAA scoring record for a kicker in a career.

So you didn't have a weakness on this team really.

The offensive line was small but quick and very good with.

With in a veer offense and.

And again you can go down to your third string quarterback who was a walk on and still you were successful.

I mean he reminded me a lot of what Mike Kruzek did for the Steelers that year when Terry Bradshaw got injured at 1 and 4.

Didn't set the world on fire, but he controlled the game.

He didn't make any turnovers and he got it a potent running attack and Tommy Usack did that for the couple games he was.

Until Kavanaugh came back against army and again just a gutsy performance.

Coming back a couple weeks after a fracture in your ankle.

I mean and he goes on to a great, A nice career in the pros as a quarterback and a great coaching career.

You know, so this, there's just so much about this team.

It wasn't a bunch of guys you had to pay to get on this team.

It wasn't five star recruits left and right.

But it was a team that showed this.

Johnny Majors makes the hall of Fame in my eyes.

Just on what he did there.

Forget about what he did in Tennessee, which he did great things in Tennessee.

You know, nobody has ever done or built an offense like that out of nothing.

Nobody has built a team like this out of nothing.

Yes, you had Dorset there but again he's a tiny guy, you know, against.

And not exactly a Nebraska type offensive line that was going to open gaping holes for him.

But he figured it out and Johnny set him up for greatness.

And Johnny Majors had, I mean just his, his surrounding family around him.

You had.

Lee Majors was a six million dollar man right about that time who was married to Farrah Fawcett Majors who was, you know, the.

Everybody's sweetheart had everybody had her hanging.

Yeah.

Every dorm room at Pitt and every other college she was on.

Absolutely.

And you know, Johnny Majors was a relative of theirs and just fascinating, you know, start lit type thing.

But having these great players and a great team and having the Heisman trophy come to the pit in the national championship and it was just everything in a, you know, a bag of gumballs too.

You know, it was Just tremendous.

He was tremendous.

And when he took over this team, nobody was going to the stadium.

Nobody cared about pit football.

Nobody cared.

He made Pittsburgh care in, in 73.

He got him fired up with, with his enthusiasm.

He, he got the stadium, a weight room that could attract people and a practice facility that could attract people.

He, he talked the recruits into it, he pumped them up.

He got a coaching staff there.

And I mean, the legacies go on.

I mean, Jimmy Johnson was a pit coach.

Dave Wonstadt of course, was, was a smallish lineman on that 73 PIT team who went there.

You know, they're just, just such a legacy that built there.

Jackie Sherrill, of course, of course created his hall of Fame career at Pitt.

So this is all Johnny Majors doing.

And he made Pittsburgh give a damn before that national championship team and, and.

That set it all up and that allowed them to have the momentum to get the Hugh Greens and the Dan Marino's and everybody else that came after them too, so.

Oh, absolutely.

And that's, that's always a great story of them recruiting Rooster Jones who was a running back, like one of the best running backs in high school at the time.

And they're watching Rooster Jones on tape and they see an opponent by the name of Hugh Green stuffing.

And that's how they recruited Hugh Green.

They weren't looking for Hugh Green.

Oh really?

So give a huge assist for Rooster Jones who ended up with a nondescript career at Pitt.

For Pitt, having the greatest defensive lineman or linebacker.

Let me take that one level.

The greatest college defensive player in the history of the sport for that.

Yeah, that was all Johnny Majors because I don't think Rooster Jones would have cared about Pitt without Johnny Majors and without Rooster Jones, you don't get Hugh Green.

But Rooster Jones has one of the greatest football names probably in college football history.

Absolutely.

That's a great, great nickname.

Yeah, it was tremend.

Yeah.

All right, well, Dave, why don't you give us the name of your book again and where folks can get a copy of it?

Sure, sure.

It's.

You can get it on Amazon.

Most stores still should carry it and Barnes and Nobles and you can get it on the History Press website, Arcadia Publishing website.

So really any, any online bookstores and, and a Barnes and Noble.

But out of all the books I've done, I got to tell you, this was probably the one that brought me the most joy.

Just telling that story again.

Yeah, well, it's one that I think most fans around the country will enjoy, too.

And so, folks, if you missed the links, don't worry.

We have them in the show of the YouTube and the podcast that you're listening to get you connected to David's site and to get to his books and get a copy of that 76 PIT team.

Thank you, David.

We appreciate you coming on here and we'd love to have you have you on again.

And thank you for preserving the football history.

I appreciate being on here.

Thank you so much.

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