Focusing on 'skootching,' while mixing in some trash talk, Pitt safeties Javon McIntyre, P.J. O'Brien vie for playing time

He doesn’t know when it will occur, but Javon McIntyre believes Phil Jurkovec’s day of reckoning is coming.

McIntyre, a redshirt sophomore safety, can see it in his mind’s eye. One day at practice, Jurkovec will drop back and throw a pass into the Pitt secondary, and McIntyre will snatch it out of the air.

Then, when the two roommates and friends get back home after practice, let the trash talk fly.

“I’ll come back and talk smack to him, throw a little joke out there,” McIntyre said. “I didn’t get one yet. It’s coming.”

Pitt’s coaches decided to pair the two former Pennsylvania high school stars — Pine-Richland for Jurkovec and Philadelphia’s Imhotep Charter for McIntyre — during camp, and so far it’s worked out well.

“Phil is a really cool guy, down to earth,” McIntyre said.

Aside from their home state, McIntyre and Jurkovec share another commonality. Both will be difficult to keep out of Pitt’s starting lineup. Jurkovec is the starting quarterback, and McIntyre is showing the ball skills and ability to communicate that former safety Erick Hallett displayed last season.

“Corners feel comfortable with (McIntyre) because he’s giving them the call fast,” coach Pat Narduzzi said. “He knows exactly what he’s doing.”

McIntyre started at strong safety in the Sun Bowl, picking off a pass and leading the team with eight tackles. But when UCLA hit Pitt for a big gain on a pass play, McIntyre wasn’t where he was supposed to be.

“That was first-game jitters,” Narduzzi said. “He left Erick Hallett hanging out in the middle of the field. He’s gotten much better that way. The MAs (missed assignments) are down or nonexistent right now.”

While Pitt was winning its ninth game last season, several mistakes were giving coaches and players teaching moments to carry them through the winter.

“We had some MAs in the UCLA game that we have to make sure we clean up,” Narduzzi said. “We were awful in the two-minute situation against UCLA. There were a lot of young guys on defense that day. (McIntyre) had a lot of stuff on his plate.”

Said McIntyre: “I had my ups and downs. I had good plays, bad plays. It was a nice learning curve.

“I didn’t know everything. Hallett taught me a lot about the mental part of the game, consistently staying with it. Even after a bad play or good play, you have to be the same person every day, attack the day the same.

“I thought I played every play perfect, but I wasn’t. I have to be focused 100%.”

The safety position is a critical one in Pitt’s defense this season after losing Hallett and Brandon Hill to the NFL.

Hoping to line up next to McIntyre at safety is junior P.J. O’Brien, an excitable player with an outgoing personality from Pompano Beach, Fla.

O’Brien came to Pitt partially because his cousin, senior cornerback Marquis Williams, was already there.

“I used to talk to him on the phone,” Williams said. “It was imperative that he come here and join his cousin and join the team and try to be productive and get to the next level.”

They were teammates at Cardinal Gibbons High School.

“I played receiver, and he played DB,” O’Brien said, “and he always made the game look so fun with just trash talking, making the plays. He always gave me tips, and I always trusted him. I just took his word (about Pitt) and ever since then, we’ve been rocking out.”

O’Brien likes to tell the story of his first varsity start when he was covering wide receiver Anthony Schwartz, a world-class sprinter now with the Cleveland Browns.

“He got me first rep,” O’Brien said. “They threw the ball deep. It was a 50-50 ball. I came out with it, but he snatched it out of my hand. It was a back-and-forth matchup. I really loved it, though. That really showed I could play DB.”

There is competition at safety for McIntyre and O’Brien from junior Buddy Mack and former WPIAL stars Donovan McMillon (Peters Township) and Stephon Hall (Central Valley). The competition is expected to continue all season.

O’Brien said Pitt safeties play “the most uncomfortable position ever,” but he’s learning to live with the pressure — as long as he stays on his “skootch.”

As O’Brien explained it, skootch is a technique employed by defensive backs to keep pass catchers under control. “It’s like a backpedal, but it’s not. It’s letting the receiver come up on us, and we give them a press with the hand. You don’t want to backpedal too fast because you give the receiver too many options.”

While he’s learning the skootch, O’Brien is not afraid to talk smack.

“I try to talk a lot of smack just to keep myself going,” he said. “If I’m not talking smack, there might be something wrong. I’m not a quiet dude.”

Of course, there are limits, especially if he becomes a starter.

“I can’t imagine just talking trash every 70 snaps,” he said. “I’d be out of breath.”