Freshmen provide depth in Panthers’ kicking game

With the graduation of kicker Kevin Harper last year, head coach Paul Chryst had yet another question to answer as he entered training camp earlier this month. Two likely candidates to fill the void in training camp were Chris Blewitt and Brad Lukasak. 

Lukasak, who redshirted as a freshman, will compete against highly recruited incoming freshman Blewitt. With all of the talk behind Blewitt’s unfortunate last name, his incoming stats seem to prove otherwise. 

Throughout his career at West Potomac High School in Virginia, he set two school records — longest field goal of 51 yards and longest punt of 72 yards — and kicked for over 70 extra points. Although these stats seem impressive, Blewitt must start with a clean slate entering the 2013 season.

With that clean slate in mind, Blewitt kept his focus narrow as training camp began.

“I’m just going to try to do the best I can and if that’s what the coaches think, then that’s what the coaches think,” Blewitt said. “I’m going to come in, practice and do my work, and whatever happens, happens.”

Blewitt’s main competition, Lukasak, a Pennsylvania native, has been on the team for a year. Unlike Blewitt, he knows the dynamics of the team and playing at a higher level slightly better than the incoming freshman. 

Upon entering Pitt, Lukasak’s high school stats were noteworthy. The kicker was chosen to play in the Pennsylvania Scholastic Football Coaches Association East-West All-Star Game, in which he made a 48-yard field goal during the contest. 

Also in his last two years of high school, he was selected as a first-team All-Berks League Section 2 placekicker at Blue Mountain High School.

Despite the one-year age difference, both kickers come from similar backgrounds. In high school, both players started off playing soccer, eventually switching to football due to having friends on the team.

“Going into my freshman year, I played soccer, so I just said I was going to be a kicker and go out and play football with my friends,” Blewitt said. 

In addition to playing with his friends, Blewitt also cited that he likes “crushing the ball more” than he was able to do on the soccer pitch.

As first-year kickers, both players will face tougher opponents and the difficulties of playing under pressure. The pressure gets no greater this season when Pitt opens its season at home against No. 11 Florida State Monday. 

As training camp progressed, though, Chryst found a solution to his kicker question as Blewitt emerged as the front-runner for the Panthers’ starting kicker job. While Blewitt sustained a minor injury to his kicking foot, Chryst expects him to be ready for action coem game time. 

“Right now, I think Chris will be ready to go. If not, we’ll just put out another freshman kicker,” Chryst joked. “I’m all for a freshman kicker.”

Playing at Heinz Field means they will be playing in front of over 50,000 people, including the Pitt student section — the Panther Pitt — which was recently ranked as the seventh-best student section in the nation according to ESPN

A crowd can either be a kicker’s best friend or worst enemy. It only takes one kick to make or break the crowd’s trust, as Pitt fans saw time and time again in the era of Kevin Harper.

Pitt should be in a good spot with Blewitt, who said his most pressured kick in high school was one that didn’t come in the fourth quarter, or the third, or second. 

“It was our home-opener game against the defending region champs, which is a pretty big deal in high school. It was going to be my longest attempt, 51 yards, and it would break the school record,” Blewitt said. “I knew what it meant to me. After three years of kicking, it was all I wanted — that record — and sure enough, I made it, and it was really what decided the game.”

“It was actually the first quarter, but we won by six.”