Pitt lineman Justin Morgan dismissed from team

Offensive lineman Justin Morgan, a redshirt sophomore, was dismissed from the Pitt football team on Friday, which was the Panthers’ first day of training camp. Pitt head coach Pat Narduzzi noted Morgan’s dismissal while addressing the media after the team’s first preseason practice.

“So we do have 110 [players] in camp,” Narduzzi said in a statement. “We have a couple on the fringe. We had to dismiss one from our roster to start off who will no longer be with our program, Justin Morgan, so he was not out here today if you were looking for him. But we will focus on the 110 we have out there today, and that’s the most important thing.”

Narduzzi did not provide any additional details on Morgan’s dismissal. However, he is the second player to be dismissed from the program in the last month, as tight end Charles Reeves Jr. was kicked off the team on July 13 as a disciplinary measure for an unspecified issue.

At 6’6” and 350 pounds, Morgan was Pitt’s largest offensive lineman by a full 25 pounds. Prior to his arrival in Pittsburgh, he was the top offensive line recruit in New York and held a three-star rating from 247Sports, ESPN and Rivals. However, despite the promising resume he brought with him in 2016, Morgan saw no playing time in 2017 after redshirting his first season.

While the development is certainly disappointing, given Morgan’s untapped potential and sheer size, the Panthers are also particularly deep at offensive line at the moment.

After accounting for Morgan’s departure, Pitt has 18 offensive linemen on the roster, and Narduzzi described them as a “confident group that fundamentally is, I think, a lot better than they were a year ago” during an interview Friday on “The Fan Morning Show.”

Morgan flipped to Pitt in December 2015 after initially committing to Rutgers, which had fired its head coach, Kyle Flood, the month before. In addition to Pitt and Rutgers, Morgan also held an offer from Illinois. However, his next move remains unclear at this point.