DETROIT (AP) — At the beginning of November, the Pittsburgh Panthers were 7-0 and dreaming of finishing the season in the College Football Playoff.
Instead, they were spending their Christmas in Detroit.
Pitt went 0-5 in November, losing to SMU, Virginia, Clemson, Louisville and Boston College before accepting an invitation to the GameAbove Sports Bowl on Thursday at Ford Field, where they face Toledo.
The Panthers have made this trip before, beating Mid-American Conference opponents in Detroit in 2013 (30-27 over Bowling Green) and 2019 (34-30 over Eastern Michigan), but this trip is a little different. More than a dozen players have left the program to enter the transfer portal, and the Panthers will be missing one of their top offensive weapons.
Konata Mumpfield, who caught 52 passes for 813 yards and five touchdowns, is preparing for the NFL draft and won't be participating in the bowl game. Pitt expects to have quarterback Eli Holstein back after he missed the BC game with an injury sustained against Louisville. Holstein threw for 2,225 yards and 17 touchdowns while rushing for three more.
Even with the missing players, coach Pat Narduzzi was not treating the game as an afterthought.
“I'm always looking forward, not backward,” he said. “Every win is important, and we want to play the best possible football game.”
For Toledo, playing at Ford Field is practically a home game. The drive is only about an hour, and whatever name the bowl game at Ford Field goes by, it often draws some of its biggest crowds when the Rockets are representing the MAC.
“It's a great opportunity for our fan base to support the team in our last game of the season,” Toledo coach Jason Candle said. “We could have been out of the country or in one of many distant cities, some of which aren't easy to get to, but this is accessible and I think our fans are excited.”
With Mumpfield gone, the Pitt offense is fairly simple. Desmond Reid is the team's leading rusher, with 794 yards and four touchdowns, and he's now the leading receiver, with 564 yards and four more scores. He didn't reach 100 yards rushing in any of the five losses to end the regular season, but he did reach triple figures in total yards in three of them and had 99 against Virginia.
There's not much behind him — Holstein (328) is the only other rusher with more than 250 yards, and wide receiver Kenny Johnson (520) is the only other player with more than 400 yards receiving.
While Toledo quarterback Tucker Gleason threw for 2,457 yards and 22 touchdowns, including 949 yards and 11 scores to wideout Jerjuan Newton, they don't pose much of a threat on the ground.
Connor Walendzak led the team in rushing with 457 yards but scored only once, and Gleason is second with 330 yards. He did score six times, but the Rockets were likely to struggled badly against a Pitt defense that allowed only 3.1 yards per carry and held opponents to 17 rushing touchdowns in 12 games.
Although Pitt and Toledo are separated by only 230 miles, the football rivalry has never taken off. The Panthers and Rockets have faced each other three times, all between 2002 and 2006.
Pitt won twice at home, including a 45-3 victory in 2006, but Toledo pulled off a 35-31 victory at the Glass Bowl in 2003.
If Toledo beats the shorthanded Panthers on Boxing Day, Candle will tie Gary Pinkel's school record of 73 career victories.
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