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Spring superlatives: Pittsburgh
ESPN Big East Blog, By Brian Bennett on Thursday, March 11, 2010

Since we're going in reverse alphabetical order for this spring superlatives series, Rutgers should be up now. But there has been a lot of Scarlet Knights' content on here of late, so I'm going to flip flop and have Pittsburgh go today. Let's look at where the Panthers are strongest and weakest among position groups heading into spring practices: Strongest position: Defensive end Key returnees: Greg Romeus (eight sacks, 11.5 tackles for loss) and Jabaal Sheard (five sacks, 10.5 tackles for loss). Key departures: None. The skinny: Pitt has several strong groups, not least of which is running back with the return of Big East offensive player of the year Dion Lewis , plus Ray Graham and Henry Hynoski . But I'll give the slight nod to defensive end, where Big East co-defensive player of the year Romeus is back for his senior year, along with classmate and fellow standout Sheard. They give Pitt the best pair of ends in the league, and they're backed up by promising youngsters Shayne Hale and Brandon Lindsey. Weakest position: Cornerback Key returnees: Ricky Gary (16 tackles, one interception), Antwuan Reed (13 tackles, one interception) Key departures: Aaron Berry, Jovani Chappell. The skinny: Both starting corners from a year ago have moved on, and it wasn't exactly a position of great strength beforehand. Gary and Reed have playing experience, with Gary starting the final five games of '08 and once last season. But Pitt is counting on junior college transfer and midyear enrollee Saheed Imoru to claim one of the starting spots. If Imoru lives up to his billing, this could turn out just fine. If not, the Panthers may have to scramble to find answers in their pass defense.
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