The biggest “what ifs” in Louisville basketball and football history

What if Charlie Strong had said no to Texas?

Great question Craig. From what we saw during his time at Louisville and have seen since he departed, Charlie Strong really prefers to play with pocket-passers in more traditional offenses that are focused on running the football with the running back and using play-action to open up the passing game.

Louisville did offer Lamar (I believe) during the time Charlie was here, as they obviously had a pretty strong pipeline built in Miami and South Florida and there were reports that Lamar really liked what he saw from Teddy – but my guess to the second part of that is no, they don’t bring in Lamar Jackson and they are still likely waiting on their first-ever Heisman Trophy winner.

Now to the more important part. What if Charlie Strong said no to Texas? Well honestly, Louisville would look completely different as there would be no Bobby 2.0, but probably would have achieved similar results to the first few years of Bobby 2.0. They still would have had an elite defense in 2014 and could’ve been even better with Strong running things, rather than Grantham (which isn’t a shot at Todd by any means).

Louisville’s 2014 offense was built to run the football, and you probably would’ve seen a lot more of Brandon Radcliffe and Dominique Brown, than you would have seen Will Gardner. Gardner would’ve been better suited in my opinion, as there would have been less focus on making big plays down the field and the run game would’ve been far superior.

Obviously what Charlie was able to do at quarterback during his time with Teddy Bridgwater was one of the biggest reasons he had so much success. Could he have recruited another great QB to follow in his path? I believe the answer to be yes, but we just don’t know.

Louisville still would’ve run into the Clemson’s and Florida State’s of the world, and without a star quarterback, you aren’t going to overtake them.

But say Charlie did land another elite talent at quarterback and say he was able to continue recruiting at a high-level and developing the elite talent he had on defense. I think it’s fair to say Louisville could’ve been right up there, even more so then they were, in competing for an ACC title and they would have done it in a way where the players were taken care of and there was no controversy surrounding bringing in a coach who was labeled as a bad guy and endless amounts of baggage.

The one thing that would have been an issue with Strong staying was how long it would’ve been for. Obviously, hindsight is 20/20, but several jobs in Florida opened up over the course of the next few seasons, including Florida, Miami, and Florida State.

Texas was clearly not a great fit for Strong, as he struggled to build the recruiting ties he needed in the state of Texas to develop the overall talent and winning mentality that he did at Louisville. Boosters weren’t receptive of him from the start (at least that’s what the story always was) and it seemed from the outside that no matter what he did was right.

Would Charlie have left a year later than he did once Will Muschamp was fired at Florida? Would Miami have come calling for Strong after they let go of Al Golden in 2015 rather than bringing in Mark Richt considering his age? Would Florida State been too much to pass up in 2018 after Jimbo Fisher left for Texas A&M?

The what-ifs tend to snowball, and just like all the scenarios we’ve laid out before, this one has many tentacles with ongoing ramifications.