Pittsburgh’s football headquarters, a facility the Panthers share with the Steelers, overlooks the Monongahela River from the southern bank east of downtown. That’s where you could find Aaron Donald after games last season.
His sanctuary was the defensive tackles’ meeting room. It’s through the right front door and up the stairs, down the hallway on the right, beyond the wall listing Pitt’s all-time All-Americans. Donald brushes his hand against the wall each time he walks past.
That room is where film study became his obsession.
Inoke Breckterfield, Pitt’s defensive tackles coach, witnessed it up close. He arrived to work Sept. 3, the morning after Pitt lost its season opener to eventual national champion Florida State 41-13 in a home game that ended about 11:30 p.m. He saw notes scribbled on the dry erase board, questions Donald had in his search for feedback.
“He was in there until 2 o’clock in the morning watching film,” Breckterfield said. “And every game after that, every time, he wouldn’t go home. He’d sit there and wait for the film to be uploaded, and away he went.”
Donald refined the routine as a senior. He would turn off the lights, leave the door cracked, settle into the big leather chair in front of the projection screen, grab the remote control and watch each play two or three times by himself before reviewing them again with coaches and teammates the day after the game.
“I’ve got to see everything I did good, did wrong before anybody else sees it,” he said. “Otherwise I won’t be able to sleep. I’m tossing and turning just thinking about it.”
Sometimes Donald wouldn’t bother to drive the 10 minutes across the river and up the hill back to his apartment. He would arrange the meeting room chairs to form a bed and sleep for a few hours.
“Then he’d wake up and watch some more film before practice even started,” Panthers receiver Ed Tinker, one of Donald’s closest friends, said with a laugh.