Football
- Title:
- Defensive Quality Control
- Phone:
- 412-648-8700
- Email:
- pdecapito@athletics.pitt.edu
Phil DeCapito enters his sixth season as Pitt’s defensive quality control assistant and ninth overall with the Panthers. He has been an invaluable contributor to a defensive unit that annually ranks among the nation’s very best.
Over the past five seasons (2019-23), Pitt has collected a combined 230 quarterback sacks, the highest total in the nation.
During that same span, the Panthers have finished in the nation’s top 12 in rushing defense four times.
DeCapito initially served on Pat Narduzzi’s staff from 2015-17 as a defensive graduate assistant. He served in that same capacity during the 2018 season at Memphis, which finished as the American Athletic Conference (AAC) runner-up and earned a Birmingham Bowl berth.
Following the 2018 season, he was named the defensive coordinator at Lake Erie College, an NCAA Division II program in Ohio, before ultimately reuniting with Narduzzi at Pitt.
DeCapito worked at Youngstown State as a defensive line assistant from 2012-14. His father, Philip, played on a pair of NCAA playoff teams at YSU under the late Bill Narduzzi (Pat’s father) in 1978 and 1979.
A native of Warren, Ohio, DeCapito was a standout football player and wrestler at Warren John F. Kennedy Catholic School, garnering first-team All-Trumbull County honors as a senior lineman. He went on to play four seasons at Emory & Henry College, earning his bachelor’s degree in education and physical education. DeCapito got his start in coaching working with the offensive and defensive lines at Emory & Henry during the 2010 and 2011 seasons.
He and his wife, Mara, were married in February 2020.
