Pat Narduzzi said after last week's game against Akron that he wasn't sure about a starting quarterback, despite backup Nathan Peterman playing nearly the entire game in the team's win. He reiterated that stance at his press conference earlier this week, stating that he would go with whoever had the hot hand and had a better week at practice.
That leads you to believe that he would have a difficult decision, but judging by the reps have been distributed in practice, Peterman appears to be the guy.
In the 30-minute viewing window at practice on Tuesday, Peterman took all of the first team reps, according to the Post-Gazette. Second verse was same as the first on Wednesday as Peterman again got all of the first-team reps in that window.
Does that mean he's definitely the starter? As of Wednesday, not yet. The key thing here to remember is that the media at these practices (under Narduzzi) has only a 30-minute window to actually watch practice. A great smokescreen would be for Narduzzi to give Peterman the first-team reps there, knowing the information would get out, and then go with Voytik.
Do I believe that to be the case? Not really.
First, if he really wanted to go all deceptive on us, he could have split the reps evenly and still gotten Voytik first-team work while not showing his hand. The fact that Peterman got all of the reps during the viewing time is just too big to overlook.
Also, as I said before, I find it difficult to believe that Voytik would still get the start when he barely played in the last game. If Narduzzi was truly having a tough time with this decision, Voytik likely would have re-entered the game at some point to get him work (something Narduzzi has said was important to doing for Peterman).
All signs at this time point to Peterman getting his opportunity on Saturday. How much Voytik plays is anyone's guess, but it looks as if he'll miss his first start since the beginning of last season when he took over for Tom Savage. This week will be a pivotal one in the quarterback decision. If Peterman helps Pitt to a win, Narduzzi surely has to keep him locked in as the starter. If he falters and looks bad against an Iowa defense that has been tough against the run and will force him to throw, Voytik likely gets another opportunity.
We'll see how things play out.
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