Captain's Quarters: Panthers’ Defensive Leaders Steady Ship After Finding Feet in New Roles
Report by Matt Schmidlin | November 4, 2022
LEFT: Malachi Bordeaux forces a fumble against Virginia Tech. RIGHT: A'Darrion Mitchell in pursuit in a game against Coastal Carolina.
After a regression to the mean with 'only' a 9-win season, Pitt needed some star presence to emerge following a solid but unspectacular 2021 defensive campaign.
Enter seniors
Malachi Bordeaux and
A'Darrion Mitchell.
The duo emerged as vocal leaders during camp, with a fire and ice style as Bordeaux provides a cool, steadying presence up front while Mitchell shines when displaying his explosive qualities and splash plays.
Both players needed time and development to reach their full potential as leaders of the Panther defense. Bordeaux came in as a 4-star (#2 DE in 2018) recruit, but the Bangor, Maine-native needed to grow from being a big fish in an extremely small football pond to a much larger water source.
"I think I had to really learn at Pitt and I thank all my coaches, both [head coach
Pat] Narduzzi and [DL coach
Charlie] Partridge, for developing me to my full potential," Bordeaux said. "I needed that time to become the player I am now."
What elevated Bordeaux's play was a move from end to tackle, where he uses his immense pass rushing abilities to feature almost as a new age
Aaron Donald-lite. His speed in the interior has allowed him to heavily influence opposing offenses and let him make constant plays on the ball, with a combined 13 sacks the past two seasons and a team-leading 3 forced fumbles this year after having little impact his first two seasons.
Mitchell's ability was never in doubt, with the former 4-star (#4 OLB) recruit from Tifton, Georgia showcasing his ability as an athletic freak from day one. However, Mitchell struggled to harness his speed and power on a play to play basis, with his motor constantly questioned through his first few seasons on campus.
"A'Darrion is a tremendous athlete," Narduzzi said. "All we've ever needed to know from him is that we could rely on him from a play to play basis. Once he got that dialed in, we knew that he was that guy for our defense, that real X-factor getting after the backfield."
After a moderate improvement as a junior starter, Mitchell has burst onto the scene in his senior campaign, exploding for a team-leading 18 tackles for loss while adding a growing total of 5 sacks. He's been a ball hawk as well, sitting second on the defense with 48 tackles and constantly making big plays time and again.
Coupled with
Sedric Granger's move to free safety paying huge dividends,
Jalen Hills's steady pass-rush presence, and Pitt's star trio (now quartet) of corners locking down opposing receivers, Pitt ranks as the nation's 10th-best scoring defense.
For the Panthers to keep succeeding, it's all going to rely on their unit continuing to play 'follow the leader(s)'.