Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi will wait until after the Panthers’ bowl game to hire an offensive coordinator, he said following the team’s practice today.
Tim Salem will call plays for Pitt in the Military Bowl against Navy on Dec. 28, moving from tight ends coach to quarterbacks coach. Graduate assistant Dave Bucar will coach the tight ends.
Salem will be a candidate for the full-time offensive coordinator job as well, Narduzzi said. Salem previously served as an offensive coordinator at Purdue (1994-96), Eastern Michigan (2003) and Central Florida (2004-08).
“We’ll see how the game goes,” Narduzzi said. “Tim, like I said, has called it before, he knows our offense. The kids have responded to him in the last couple of days, too.”
For his part, Salem said he would absolutely be interested in the full-time job.
“Why would you not be?” he said. “You coach to be at that level. Be a head coach, be a coordinator.”
Beyond him, Narduzzi said he has not yet reached out to any other candidates, preferring instead to focus on Pitt’s bowl game a week from today. Ideally, he’d like to have a hire in place by mid-January, but said finding the right candidate is more important than any specific date.
Narduzzi declined to say if he had a particular offensive system in mind, but noted that he “likes pounding the football.”
He did say he’d prefer a candidate with playcalling experience, as well as someone who would like to stay at Pitt for longer than one season. Former offensive coordinator Jim Chaney bolted for Georgia last week after just one year with the Panthers.
“We don’t need a great coach to come in here and be here for a year,” Narduzzi said. “That does me no good, that does our football team no good.”
Narduzzi said he did make an effort to try and get Chaney to stay, and said athletic director Scott Barnes and chancellor Patrick Gallagher “probably went above and beyond what they should have or could have done.”
“The commitment’s there, big-time,” Narduzzi said.
Sam Werner: swerner@post-gazette.com and Twitter @SWernerPG
First Published: December 21, 2015, 9:24 p.m.
Updated: December 21, 2015, 10:25 p.m.