The biggest “what ifs” in Louisville basketball and football history
By Jacob Lane
What if William Gay hadn’t gone offsides against Rutgers?
This was probably the first and last time I will cry over a football game. And, to be fair, I was only twelve at the time. Everyone remembers the collapse at Rutgers in 2006- the game that effectively kept Louisville football out of their first, and still only real shot, at a national championship game appearance.
The 2006 Cardinals were firmly in command of the game through the first half of one of the highest stakes games in program history. People often forget that Rutgers was amidst one of their greatest seasons ever under the tutelage of Greg Schiano. Like Louisville, the Scarlet Knights came into the game undefeated.
However, Louisville was in the middle of their dream season. Even after the loss of one of the program’s all-time great running backs in Michael Bush during the season opener to Kentucky, the Cardinals had two program-defining wins against No. 17 Miami early in the season and No. 3 West Virginia the week prior to their match-up in Piscataway, New Jersey.
But, like their match-up just seven days prior, Louisville was going into an environment where the opponent was looking to notch a win against the No. 3 ranked team in the country. Louisville jumped out to a quick lead and was ahead at halftime 25-14. But it was Rutgers who dominated in the second half, holding Louisville’s high-powered offense to virtually nothing on the ground or through the air.
After a solid first half, quarterback Brian Brohm and running back Kolby Smith could not get things going, and Rutgers kept Louisville on their own side of the field. Adversely, Rutgers pounded the ball on the ground with future all-pro running back Ray Rice and played ball control, keeping it out of Louisville’s hands while shortening the game and stringing together first downs.
All Louisville had to do was escape with a win, and the rest of their season was smooth sailing on the way to what seemed like a likely national championship bid. The remaining schedule saw the Cards play host to overmatched South Florida and UConn, and a road trip to Pittsburgh.
On a drive that ate up the remainder of the game clock, Rutgers had a chance to break a 25-all tie and take the lead with only seconds left in the game. Rutgers kicker Jeremy Ito missed a 33-yard attempt wide left. Another chance for Louisville… until it wasn’t. The Cardinals’ William Gay jumped offsides moments before the ball was snapped, giving Ito a chance at redemption. And he nailed it.
A lot of things could have gone differently in the second half of that game to put the outcome in Louisville’s favor. Louisville was not shut out for another half all season, and was rarely shut out for a half for any game under Bobby Petrino in his first stint.
The Cardinals’ Juwan Spillman was one block away from returning the ensuing kick-off all the way for a touchdown. And the Rutgers fans poured onto the field to celebrate prior to the game’s ending- oftentimes, said behavior would result in a penalty that would have gone in Louisville’s favor. The point is, pretty much everything has to go wrong for Louisville to lose that game. But it did. Gay was offsides, and Louisville did lose.
One is left to wonder about the possibilities of that season. Overcoming the Bush injury en route to two massive, program-defining wins during the regular season is still quite a feat. The Cardinals did go about their business and took care of the remainder of their schedule with ease before solidly beating Wake Forest in the 2007 Orange Bowl.
But, what would have happened if Ito missed that field goal? Presumably, Louisville would take over and just take a knee. At that point in the game, Louisville just wanted to make it to their side of the field. With college overtime rules, Louisville would have instantly been in a position to score. Even after a trainwreck of a second half on offense, you have to like your chances in a back-and-forth shootout with a more defensive-minded Rutgers team.
If Louisville finished off that game, they were staring a BCS national championship game squarely in the face. That season, Florida finished the season with an 11-1 regular-season record and would have been on the outside looking in while an undefeated Louisville squad would have likely faced Ohio State.
As we now know, Ohio State was manhandled by Uban Meyer, Chris Leake, and the Gators. It’s not a stretch to think that Louisville would have been able to hold their own against Ohio State and Jim Tressel that season.
Regardless of winning or losing in the title game, one must consider the possibility of Bobby Petrino staying in Louisville. What if Petrino felt the experience of being in the national title game and knew that he had a perfect opportunity to stay and build his own college football powerhouse from the ground up.
What if Atlanta came calling and Petrino said no? Maybe Petrino would never have left Louisville in the first place. After all, he ended up back in The Ville. There’s a possibility that Petrino would have wanted to keep what was virtually the same squad for another go-around in the Big East in 2007. Maybe Petrino would have never dealt with the Michael Vick scandals in Atlanta, never landed in Arkansas, and never became embroiled in his own personal off-the-field issues.
You could go on for days about the possibilities, but this one play is killer because that missed field goal was the closest Louisville ever came to being a national powerhouse.
One season later, a Steve Kragthorpe-led squad went 6-6 in Brian Brohm’s final season and did not even play in a bowl game.
But, damn, what could have been.