9-3-15

The Pitt News T h e in de p e n d e n t st ude nt ne w spap e r of t he University of Pittsburgh

Time to Brawl

It’s past time for Pitt and West Virginia to renew their rivalry

September 3, 2015 | Issue 15 | Volume 106

PA. GETS ONLINE VOTER REGISTRATION

Dale Shoemaker and Elizabeth Lepro The Pitt News Staff

As of last Thursday, Pennsylvania residents can now do one more thing on their laptops and smartphones — register to vote.

After realizing a 2002 voting rights act amendment already gave them approval, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf and Secretary of State Pedro Cortes announced last week that Pennsylvania could begin registering voters online.

Wolf and Cortes previously thought approving online legislation would require additional legislation.

Pennsylvania joins 22 other states that already offer online voter registration. The new online registration form makes it easier for voters to register — and makes it more likely they’ll register in the first place, according to Wanda Murren, spokesperson for Cortes.

As of Wednesday afternoon, 4,859 people had already registered to vote through the new online form, which went live 10 a.m. Thursday, Aug. 27, Murren said. About two-thirds of those who have registered online since last week are new voters, Murren said.

“Everyone expects this to be welcomed by young people,” Murren said.

According to the Pew Charitable Trusts, online voter registration typically costs states approximately $240,000 to build and implement, but the savings and increase in voting participation quickly offset the startup cost. In Colorado, for example, voter registration increased 13 percent from 2008 to 2012 after the state introduced online registration.

See Voting on page 2

pittnews.com

Billy Bohner, Shawn Singh and Colin Grant practice outside of the O’Hara Student Center for the African Music and Dance Ensemble. Zack Williams | Staff Photographer

SGB TO FILL OPEN SEAT

Emily Brindley Staff Writer

Pitt’s Student Government Board is looking for a student to fill an open Board member seat by the end of September, President Nasreen Harun said.

SGB currently has one empty Board member seat to fill after former President Graeme Meyer resigned from his post and former Executive Vice President Nasreen Harun took over his position in May. Harun said applications will be available in mid-September

on its website.

Because SGB is filling the vacancy at the beginning of a new school year, all undergraduate students can apply.

“That isn’t something that usually happens,” Harun said. “I’m happy to expose them to the different opportunities of the SGB.” After Board members review the applications, the full Board will interview all eligible candidates See SGB on page 3

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News

PITT NEWS GETS NOMINATED Dale Shoemaker News Editor

The Pitt News received four national award nominations from the Associate College Press Wednesday for stories published from June 2014 to June 2015.

The ACP named four Pitt News student journalists as finalists for its 2015 Story of the Year, Spot News Photo of the Year, Sports Story of the Year and Multimedia Story of the Year. In addition to The Pitt News, the ACP finalists include student journalists from The Daily Texan at the University of Texas, Austin, The Temple News, from Temple University and the Indiana Daily Student from Indiana University, among many others.

The ACP will announce winners at its ACP/CMA National College Media Convention in Austin, Texas, Oct. 28-Nov. 1.

In the Story of the Year competition, Eliz-

Voting, pg. 1 A little more than eight million Pennsylvanians are currently registered to vote.

Murren said she expects that number to increase now that voters don’t need to fill out a physical copy of the form, drop it off at their local county building and field phone calls from staff to fix any mistakes they may have made. The online system will help prevent errors, Murren said, as it allow voters to submit incomplete forms. If they wish, Pennsylvanians can still register in person.

Murren said the online system will also save time and resources in county clerks offices, where staff members manually enter voting registration data into a computer system.

Pennsylvania State Sen. Lloyd Smucker (R-Lancaster) had introduced a bill in January to allow online registration, but the bill died in the House State Government Committee, according to Smucker’s spokesperson pittnews.com

abeth Lepro was nominated for her March 16 piece “Home, sweet zone: City officials crack down on overcrowding” in the feature story category. Lepro currently serves as The Pitt News’ assistant news editor. Jasper Wilson was nominated for his piece “Pit(t) stop: Former Panther wrestlers find work in NASCAR,” in the sports story category. Wilson currently serves as a senior staff writer for The Pitt News. Nate Smith and Mason Lazarcheff were nominated for their news video, “Candlelight Vigil For UNC Muslim Victims.” Smith graduated from Pitt in 2014 and Lazarcheff is a multimedia senior staff member.

In the Photo Excellence competition, Theo Schwarz was nominated for his spot news photograph from the Black Lives Matter protest in December on Pitt’s campus.

Schwarz currently works as a photography intern for Pittsburgh’s City Paper.

Diane McNaughton.

The Senator still got his wish though, as Cortes’ and Wolf’s staff later found a clause in a 2002 act amending a Pennsylvania voter registration statute that gave the Governor and the Secretary of State the power to put voter registration forms online.

The act, in part, said, “nothing ... shall prohibit the design and use of an electronic voter registration application.”

At Pitt, it is part of Student Government Board Governmental Relations Chair Pat Corelli’s job to raise student voting activity, and with the new online system in place, he can help register more students in less time, he said.

To take the hassle out of filling out a physical voter registration form and dropping it off at the county office, SGB previously told students to drop completed forms in the mail rooms around Litchfield Towers, where Corelli and other members of the governSee Voting on page 3

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Voting, pg. 2

SGB, pg. 1

mental relations committee would collect them and drive them to the county office.

Corelli said the governmental relations committee will market the online registration to students through a public service announcement on televisions around campus. Corelli said the committee will also hold registration drives where they will register students one by one on laptops.

Though he wasn’t sure of an exact number, Corelli said SGB registered around 40 students last year. Corelli said he expects online registration and the upcoming 2016 election to increase student participation this year.

Because Corelli also works closely with Oakwatch, a branch of the Oakland Planning and Development Corporation, and Pittsburgh City Council as part of his role as chairman, he hopes students will register so they can have a voice in local leadership.

“When we don’t vote, it becomes a problem because we don’t have a seat at the table, especially with local government,” Corelli said. “We want students to have a voice when it comes to City Council and OPDC.”

at two of its weekly public meetings.

Following these interviews, all of the current Board members, with the exception of Harun, will hold a vote to determine which of the candidates will receive the vacant position.

The new Board member will serve for nearly a full-length term, as the SGB is currently transitioning from calendar-year terms to schoolyear terms, which will end in April. .

In the last year and a half, SGB has become accustomed to filling empty seats. Since the beginning of Jan. 2014, four board members have resigned.

Harun and Board member Meghan Murphy have discussed creating a guide for the new Board member in order to help him or her acclimate to the role. Harun and Murphy plan on reviewing the constitution and governing code with the new member, and Harun

pittnews.com

Pitt’s Student Government Board has one empty seat to fill before the end of the month.| Nikki Moriello | Visual Editor

said that Chief of Cabinet and Vice President Natalie Dall will give the member an overview of the cabinet and the various committees involved with the SGB. Although any student can apply to the position, SGB advisor Steve Anderson said the ideal candidate is

someone who truly wants to make a difference at Pitt.

“What we’re looking for is students who care about the whole student body,” said Anderson. “Somebody that wants to get involved and get engaged.”

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Opinions

Column

from the editorial board

Classmates deserve proper pronouns Conservative watchdog groups, like Campus Reform, a project of the conservative Leadership Institute, are accusing a Washington State University professor of violating students’ free speech rights after she banned “oppressive” language from her classroom this semester.

Selena Lester Breikss, a culture, gender and race studies professor at Washington State University, banned her students from using “generally offensive language” such as “colored people,” “illegals/illegal aliens” and “tr*nny” in her classroom. If a student continues to use oppressive language, Breikss said that she will dock their grade.

“If I see it or hear it, I will correct it in class since it can be a learning moment for many students,” she writes in her syllabus for “Women and Popular Culture.”

To conservative groups like Campus Reform, the banning of certain words in the classroom seems, at best, like unnecessary censorship. However, Campus Reform is missing the point.

Discouraging misrepresentative terms in a humanities classroom is no different from discouraging false terms in the science classroom — it’s about education and understanding what or who these terms represent. It is also about fostering a positive environment, conducive to learning for all students — not just white, cisgender students.

Our own Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies Depittnews.com

partment at Pitt recognizes the importance of using accurate pronouns, emphasizing in their Gender-Inclusive Guidelines that students should “avoid unintentionally creating a sexist and homophobic classroom environment” by, for example, limiting themselves to male or heterosexual examples during discussion.

“Given contemporary life, news stories — Caitlyn Jenner being the most obvious and recent — and our students’ experiences, we realize it is an important and timely concern,” said GSWS professor Frayda Cohen “If you identify as male but someone uses female pronouns when addressing you, it would be, at best, awkward.”

In order to understand the people behind movements such as gender equality or LGBTQ+ rights, you have to attempt to empathize with these social groups. You have to understand who, exactly, these people are and the obstacles they face. As the Gender-Inclusive Guidelines state on the department’s website, we should “honor the breadth of experience and potential in students’ lives by discussing women, gender non-conforming and LGBTidentified people,” in the classroom.

Unlike Breikss, Pitt’s GSWS department does not require students to use another student’s preferred pronoun in class. But, according to GSWS director Todd Reeser, professors “do tend to talk to all students about how pronoun use is an important

element of a respectful and collegial classroom space.”

Reeser cited the GenderInclusive/Non-Sexist Language Statement included on all of the GSWS classes’ syllabi as an example of the department’s efforts to ensure that classes utilize appropriate pronouns.

According to the statement, “Non-gender-inclusive language excludes the experiences of individuals whose identities may not fit the gender binary, and/or who may not identify with the sex they were assigned at birth.”

As the GSWS statement illustrates, you will never be able to understand and connect to the movement if you refer to those involved using language that dehumanizes and delegitimizes them.

Reeser said GSWS “would be happy if more and more instructors used this statement on their syllabi.” Frankly, all professors should adopt this statement, because you can’t see the experience of an undocumented immigrant past the derogatory term “illegal alien.” And you cannot acknowledge the progress that the LGBTQ+ community has made by referring to transgender people as “tr*nnies.”

By encouraging the use of proper language in their classrooms, Breikss and other professor advance accurate, empathetic depictions of social groups and movements— developing respectful relationships that we hope will last long after graduation day.

SANDERS: WHAT KIND OF SOCIALIST IS HE?

Alyssa Lieberman For The Pitt News

A sea of Iowans greets an independent senator from Vermont. As he addresses issues like corporate dominance and media bias, the crowd erupts into cheers, waving signs that simply read “Bernie” — he likes to keep himself on a first-name basis with those who support him. After all, he is the candidate they trust to change the game of U.S. politics.

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has quickly become a candidate to watch for the 2016 presidential race. Sanders repeatedly draws large crowds, having filled 19,000 seats at a stadium in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 10, for his largest event yet. In comparison, only 5,500 were present for considered front-runner Hillary Clinton’s largest campaign event, according to CNN. But because pundits simply label Sanders as a “socialist,” his platform automatically loses legitimacy, and he is written off as too radical — an unfair summation of what he stands for and what he want’s to accomplish as President.

Since the First Red

Scare, many Americans have held a deep-seated distrust of economic beliefs that fall outside of the capitalist norm. This fear is especially persistent among America’s oldest citizens — only 15 percent of those over 65 have a positive view of socialism.

But the trend exists among young Americans too, as only 36 percent of those under 30 have a positive view of socialism, according to a poll conducted by the online market research company, YouGov. In American politics, the label “socialist” carries a pejorative connotation and has been used as an insult time and time again by the right wing, as we have witnessed during Obama’s time in office. Fox News commentator Sean Hannity even went as far as to say that Obama is the “most radical president” in American history because of his “socialist” policies — one can only imagine what he would say if Bernie Sanders were president, seeing that he actually describes himself as a socialist while Obama does not.

The country’s irrational fear of this ideology is unfortunate, because many See Sanders on page 5

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Sanders, pg. 4

The Pitt News Crossword, 9/3/2015

Americans — especially college students — could stand to benefit from Bernie Sanders’ brand of “socialism.”

Classic socialism, the one many pundits seem to be afraid of, advocates for government control or ownership of the means of production and certain sectors of the economy.

Sanders, however, is not a classic socialist — he is a self-described democratic socialist. Democratic socialism stands for those who want a more egalitarian economy — one in which all citizens, not just elites, are involved in economic policy.

Democratic socialism is currently employed by many Scandinavian governments. Their version is known as “the Nordic model,” and it promotes a combination of a free market economy and a welfare state. A piece in The Economist titled “The Nordic Countries: The next supermodel,” describes nations that use the Nordic ACROSS 1 Big name in arcades 5 Show pride 9 Speck 13 A or B, in preparations 14 Hard to watch 15 Baseball commissioner emeritus Bud 17 Affectionate moniker for a holy river?

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model as “stout free-traders who resist the temptation to intervene even to protect iconic companies,” while also looking for ways to offset capitalism’s negative effects by providing strong public safety nets and by nationalizing services citizens may need to stay above the poverty line — like pensions, health care and higher education.

This has worked out very well for the people in Scandanavia. The Gini coefficient, the world’s standard measure of income inequality, measures Sweden as having the smallest gap between the rich and poor in the developed world.

Nonetheless, when Americans hear the word “socialist,” many are reminded of dictators and tyrants like Joseph Stalin or Mao Zedong. Yet, democratic socialism directly concerns average citizens, as the policies surrounding it work to support all participants, or future participants, in the economy — not just a wealthy few.

The vast majority of Americans

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business.

Sanders and his promotion of democratic socialism provide the best solution to this problem. Capitalist rationale would allow this student debt debacle to continue, as traditional capitalist thought encourages non-interventionism. And this same thought process has forced universities themselves to focus more on profits than on students, because of a lack of funding from the state.

Of course, some will continue to be wary of Sanders’ “socialism,” and the label may very well cost him the election.

Nonetheless, his political stances would allow us to work toward building a society and economy that allows all of us to thrive, not just the top one percent.

But first, Americans need to get over the rhetoric of “socialism” for this to ever become a reality.

Write to Alyssa at aal43@pitt.edu

9/4/15

By Jeffrey Wechsler

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would like to see this. Ninety-two percent say they believe our country’s wealth should be more equally distributed. Sanders, who believes that our current economic system is “immoral” and “unsustainable,” echoes this popular sentiment.

In line with his democratic socialist beliefs, Sanders says spreading the wealth could directly benefit universities. In fact, he advocates for free higher education, which he proposes to finance through a relatively small transaction tax on Wall Street trades.

This is crucial, as the issue of free higher education is becoming increasingly urgent as student debt continues to mount. Currently, two-thirds of American college students graduate with some level of student debt, totaling to $1.2 trillion. This has a crippling effect on our economy. The average student has to pay $320 a month over a ten-year period toward student loans, which inhibits their ability to buy a car or home, start a family or open a small

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Colin Van’t Veld | Staff Photographer

Culture

SEEING GREEN: ‘EMERALD CITY’ COMES TO OAKLAND Jack Trainor Culture Editor

Pittsburgh now has another reason to thank the late philanthropist and political activist Elsie Hillman: she brought the “Emerald City” to the Steel City.

Over the summer, the Pittsburgh nonprofit Hillman Foundation donated a collection of abstract statues, entitled “Emerald City,” to the Hillman Library.

The statues, which resemble an assortment of turquoise towers with one or two wide-open eyes, were created by New York animist sculptor Jeffrey Maron.

Maron originally showcased the statues, which stand several feet tall, in 2012 as part of a 35-piece exhibition called “Devotion” in New York. William Hillman, a fan of Maron and son pittnews.com

of Elsie Hillman, curated the exhibition.

Together, he and Maron named the collection “Emerald City.”

Maron met the Hillman family in the ’80s when an art dealer sent William Hillman, who is also an artist and collector, to Maron’s studio. According to Maron, Elsie Hillman suggested the statues stay together after the exhibition ended and gifted them to the library .

“When Mrs. Hillman saw the grouping she was very taken with it,” Maron said in an email. “[She] has always been an inspiration to me and the installation is dedicated in her memory.”

The sculptures’ organic appearances reflect Maron’s animist style, which is “the worship of an inclusive natural order,” according to his website. He spent two years working in Japan on a Fulbright-Hays Grant for sculpting,

where he “continued to be influenced by cultures of the world dedicated to animism.”

The three-part collection reunited in the library on July 28, forming the collective “Emerald City” on the first floor.

Before their reunion, Maron, William Hillman and Elsie Hillman separately owned the three pieces named “Heartsong,” “Open Form” and “Luz,” respectively.

The collection is just one of the Hillman family’s many gifts to the University. The library, which was built on land also donated by the Hillman Foundation in the early ’60s, is named after the Hillman family for their political and philanthropic contributions to both the city and the University of Pittsburgh.

The foundation also arranged for Pitt to borrow pieces of art from the Carnegie

Museum of Art, which the library and other parts of campus host.

“Emerald City” is Maron’s third piece of public work on display in Pittsburgh. The other two are “Spirits’ Flight,” a dreamy flower-like sculpture in the Hillman Cancer Center and an abstract imagining of Pittsburgh’s history, titled “Pittsburgh Haiku,” which hangs in the Hartwell Building in Shadyside.

The library’s Director of Development Julie Seavy coordinated the installation with Maron and the Hillmans, calling it a “stunning addition to the first floor.” Seavy arranged the collection, which now stands together against the wall in the left study room.

“There’s a great view from the second floor,” Seavey said, noting that most See Statues on page 8

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ULTRA LAME ‘American Ultra’ fails to captivate audience

by Matt Maielli | Staff Writer Everybody can be a superhero. Even your local junkie.

That’s the theme of “American Ultra,” the latest in the super-spy genre. The movie follows Mike (Jesse Eisenberg), a phobia-ridden mini mart owner and repeat drug offender who gets in hot water with the law — but not quite how you’d expect.

Mike, formerly Agent Howell, gained super-spy instincts as part of an experimental government program. But when the program failed, the CIA wiped Mike’s memory — but not his skills — reserving him as a “sleeper agent” who could someday pop back into action.

That day comes as Mike is forced to defend himself against a new breed of successful CIA experiments, “Tough Guys,” created by Agent Yates (Topher Grace).

Yates is out to eliminate Mike, an asset of the previously failed program under Agent Lasseter (Connie Brit-

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al ex

American Ultra

C-

TNS

ton), in true secret government fashion: by assassinating him. However, as Mike’s memory begins to return in flashes, he uses his Bourne-like abilities to protect him and his girlfriend, Phoebe (Kristen Stewart), from the ensuing onslaught of agents.

Whereas most summer blockbusters take place over a substantial timeline, Max Landis’ (“Chronicle”)

script spans the course of a single night, making it an anomaly within the genre.

Eisenberg and Stewart, who were previously paired as stoner screw-ups in “Adventureland” (2009), seem sub-par at first glance but then reveal their characters’ intentional lack of backstory. As the CIA reveals details See Ultra on page 8

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Statues, pg. 6

Ultra, pg. 7

students might not think to look down on the work.

Jeff Wisniewski, web services and communications librarian for the Hillman Library, said one of the statues’ most impressive qualities is how well they blend in with the existing architecture of the building.

“The colors, the patina on the metal just works with the wood that’s behind [them] and with the general pallet in the building,” he said. “Despite the fact that they’re so big and dramatic-looking, they feel like an integral part of the building.”

“Emerald City” has a soothing quality, Maron said, that makes it ideal for a place as quiet and meditative as a library.

“I hope they offer a moment of contemplation for those involved with improving their minds,” he said. “Just a look up or by that captures the viewer for that moment, when the art tells its story and the viewer finds that empathic moment.”

about the characters’ pasts, their performances deepen, with 2-D characters turning into 3-D stony-faced killers.

With director Nima Nourizadeh (“Project X”) at the helm, the action is visually inconsistent. A shaky camera and quick cuts ruin shots and obscure scenes. The pace is similarly jarring, stopping and starting as characters yell something akin to “What is going on?” after scenes.

The film makes an early attempt at emphasizing the “weapons” that Mike uses to dispatch mercenaries, usually whatever is in grabbing distance — a spoon, a cup of hot noodles and a dustpan, among other obscure items. As the movie progresses, it fails to make them stand out. It’s comparable to Q presenting Bond with new gadgets and then viewers never seeing those gadgets again.

As the action fluctuates, so do the

jokes. Some are great, like Yates incredulously asking his sergeant how Mike killed two men with a spoon. Others are downright insulting, with scenes where Yates and Lasseter use Mike’s “sleeper” status as an excuse to use the phrase “stillborn baby” as a punchline. “You’re coming after my stillborn baby?” is a hard line to handle in context, nevermind out of context.

Overall, Grace’s antagonistic Yates strikes somewhere in the middle of comically over-the-top and excessive, with few laughs in between.

The movie is, for the record, an action-packed romantic comedy, exemplified by the oddest marriage proposal in action movie history — and possibly rom-com history — which begins with Yates’ CIA goons doing battle with Mike and Phoebe and ends with the couple — spoiler alert — getting tazed.

Especially annoying is Walton Goggins (“Justified”) as a toothless mercenary named Laughter, who laughs while

T P N S U D O K U

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hunting his targets. This is supposedly a commentary on current movie baddies, but his underdevelopment instead pits him as the very cliche it’s trying to critique. Unfortunately this isn’t solely Laughter’s problem — the film’s attempt at humor via mindless, obvious cliches is what does it in.

At best, “American Ultra” could become a niche, B-movie cult classic, likely remembered as the experimental cousin of “Pineapple Express” (can you imagine Seth Rogen in a Bourne sequence?). It’s a shallow dive when it should’ve been a cannonball, spending too much time discussing itself, saying “Hey, watch me do this dive,” instead of jumping right in and going for the full, campy splash.

It may be an original work amid summer reboots and sequels, but “American Ultra” ultimately struggles with juggling its multi-genre workload.

Sadly, this assassin is a little off the mark.

Today's difficulty level: Hard Puzzles by Dailysudoku.com

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Sports

PLAY BRAWL

ld Renew THE Pitt-W WHY We shou est Vir ginia R IVALR Y

Nate Byham celebrates at the 2006 Backyard Brawl. Pitt News File Photo

Column

Stephen Caruso

pittnews.com

Assistant Sports Editor

As a junior, I’ve engaged in countless Panther rites of passage — having the Cathedral’s victory lights guide me home, eating at Primanti’s, singing “Sweet Caroline” at football games and promptly leaving after the last verse. Yet one item on my checklist remains unmarked — attending the Backyard Brawl.

The rivalry game used to feature battles between Pitt and West Virginia and was a mainstay of college football for decades. As the 14th-oldest rivalry game in college football, the two teams first squared off in 1895, and played 104 total games over an 116-year span until the duels ended when West Virginia bolted the Big East for the Big 12 in 2012.

The ending came just as the

Brawl was heating up again, as Pitt and WVU traded upsets in 2007 and 2009, respectively, with the unranked team topping the ranked team both times. It deserved continuity, not an abrupt ending. Panther and Mountaineer fans alike deserve the rivalry — it has to be revived.

Pitt does have frequent football foes aside from West Virginia, of course, such as Notre Dame, which I had the pleasure of watching Pitt knock off in dramatic fashion in 2013. Pitt added Penn State to future schedules, and new Pitt coach Pat Narduzzi told ESPN’s Brett McMurphy in July that while he’d love to play WVU someday, “our in-state rivalry is bigger than an out-ofstate rivalry.”

I understand why Narduzzi wants to focus on Penn State — playing the Nittany Lions has many more implications on recruiting prized in-state prospects. But this is no reason for the Backyard Brawl to fall to the wayside. My opinion doesn’t carry much weight in Pitt Athletics, and the University probably won’t resurrect the Brawl in the near future, as Pitt filled its last non-conference spot for 2016 with Oklahoma State.

The home-and-home agreement also left Pitt with only one empty spot for a non-conference game in 2017. WVU, part of the Big 12 Conference, plays nine conference games — not eight like Pitt — meaning there is even less room for Pitt in WVU’s future schedules.

But the two programs should not throw a rivalry as vitriolic, as intense and as historic as the Backyard Brawl to the side so easily. A fiery hate still links the teams since their last matchup four years ago. Just last season, WVU fans serenaded ESPN’s “College GameDay” with a sarcastic rendition of “Sweet Caroline” in an unrelated game against Texas Christian University, interspersing the chorus with chants of “Eat Sh*t Pitt.” Delightfully, the Mountaineers lost that game, 31-30.

Even if Narduzzi says Penn State is his focus, he hasn’t left the Mountaineers’ slights undisputed. After WVU head coach Dana Holgorsen commented in an interview with ESPN’s Brett McMurphy that he was “begging to play Pitt,” Narduzzi pithily shot back, “I never beg.”

By claiming to value Penn State more as a rivalry, Narduzzi is increasing the tension, unwilling to give the Mountaineers the response they crave -- great news for any fan, like myself, who wants to see this rivalry renewed.

Narduzzi’s comments seem to imply that the same relationship exists between Pitt and WVU. The Mountaineers can sing as many parodies of “Sweet Caroline” as they want, but what does it matter if we don’t want to play them? While Penn State may be an in-state rival and Notre Dame shares a storied history with Pitt, both schools don’t take Pitt as seriously as Pitt takes them. West Virginia does. The rivalry matters between the two.

It makes sense that Notre Dame and Penn State fans do not take Pitt seriously. Notre Dame See Brawl on page 10

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PITT VOLLEYBALL SETS SIGHTS ON HOME OPENER

Amanda Orchard goes up for the kill. Pitt News File Photo

Logan Hitchcock Staff Writer

After a successful triad of matches in Lincoln, Nebraska, the Pitt women’s volleyball team will hit familiar hardwood for the first time this season.

The Panthers will debut in front of their own fans, taking on a trio of opponents during this weekend’s

Pitt/Duquesne Invitational. The matches themselves will take place over the course of two days at two separate venues.

Pitt will play host to Youngstown State Friday at 7 p.m. in the Fitzgerald Field House, and then Colgate on Saturday at noon. After that, the Panthers will travel downtown to the AJ Palumbo Center at Duquesne

University to take on the Dukes at 7 p.m. on the same day.

The Panthers will head into the weekend with some momentum, as the team performed well in the Nebraska Invitational, where it faced Grand Canyon University, Tulsa and Nebraska.

After winning its first two matches against Grand Canyon and Tulsa, Pitt fell to No. 5 ranked Nebraska in four sets but didn’t come away without attempting to reap benefits from the matchup.

“We made a few mistakes offensively, but part of that is the environment,” head coach Dan Fisher said.

“They have 9,000 people at every game. We’re hopeful that the experience will help us moving forward.”

Find the full story online at

pittnews.com

pittnews.com

Brawl , pg. 9 has contended for national titles since 2010. Meanwhile, Penn State dealt with the Jerry Sandusky scandal, with sanctions that would have killed other illuminous programs. Instead, Joe Paterno became a martyr, the NCAA lifted sanctions early and the Nittany Lions returned to a bowl game with a dramatic overtime win.

Meanwhile, what has Pitt done since the final Backyard Brawl?

It fired successful head coach Dave Wannstedt after an above-average season. It then fired Wannstedt’s replacement, Mike Haywood, before he coached a single game. Pitt then went through two more head coaches in Todd Graham and Paul Chryst. This is without even mentioning the circumstances of their departures.

Pitt played four straight 6-6 seasons, somehow getting four bowl games and winning only one of them. It became a footnote to Notre Dame’s undefeated season because of kicker Kevin Harper’s missed field goal in double overtime, which also was my first clear memory of Pitt football. And finally, Pitt football suffered one of the most embarrassing losses in college football in recent memory, surrendering a 25-point lead in 11 minutes to Houston in the Armed Forces Bowl last season.

And this is the team that claims it doesn’t care to play West Virginia?

I can only assume that Narduzzi must know the real opposite of hate isn’t love — it’s indifference.

I shouldn’t expect any less of a veteran of another historic beef. Having been at Michigan State for eight years, Narduzzi has navigated the school’s rivalry with the University of Michigan, as well as other contentious battles with Notre Dame and Nebraska. He has more than enough experience navigating rivalries to add some Mountaineers into the current mix.

So even if Narduzzi meant it when he said that Penn State “is bigger,” there can be no better way to restore Pitt’s most contentious rivalry with the school in Morgantown, West Virginia.

Hell hath no fury like that of a rival scorned.

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