Louisville football: 3 final thoughts from blowout loss to Miami
In hindsight, the scoreboard wasn’t everything
Yes, it did feel like once the game started, UofL didn’t have much of a chance of leaving The U with a road victory. They were down early and often. But would you believe it if I told you Louisville actually won the yardage battle?
Louisville loses 52-27 despite outgaining Miami 496 yards to 449 yards.
— Kelly Dickey (@RealCardGame) November 9, 2019
Louisville accounted for 496 yards of total offense while the Canes finished with 449. It felt like both the Cardinal offense and defense didn’t have it Saturday, but when you look at that, it perhaps wasn’t as bad as we thought.
Turnovers killed Louisville Saturday. Miami played a smooth, mistake-free football game and the scoreboard reflected that. Louisville’s two interceptions and one fumble lost drastically affected the result of this contest. It’s pretty simple, that’s three times Louisville could have put points on the board, in each opportunity they did not and that resulted in more points for the Hurricanes.
When you’re playing a good, top 20-30 football team, those are the kind of mistakes you can’t make. But I think Louisville still competing on the stat sheet, outside of turnovers and penalties, speaks to the talent that exists within the UofL football program. Javian Hawkins still found his way to 131 yards rushing/receiving yards, Hassan Hall looked fantastic in his return, rushing for 79 yards on only six carries.
This cut while maintaining balance was incredible by #Louisville RB Hassan Hall. Even more impressive was the initial burst to accelerate out of the cut and hit the edge quickly showing off tremendous speed. There’s definitely something there with him #devy pic.twitter.com/nW5uGgnvfW
— Jason DiRienzo (@allpurposescout) November 12, 2019
It wasn’t just on the ground either. Whenever Louisville’s offensive line was able to provide time for quarterback Micale Cunningham, he was more times than not able to find an open receiver. Louisville had the 80-yard touchdown to Tutu Atwell, the 40-yard catch and run by Hawkins, as well as plays for 36, 23, 22, and 20 yards all through the air. Cunningham finished the game going 12/18 for 219 yards and two touchdowns, and did so while taking shot after shot after shot from Miami’s defensive front.
If Louisville had been able to take care of the football a little bit better offensively maybe things would have been different. But there are still plenty of positives to take away from this one. It’s just a game that makes you want to get to the next one as quickly as possible.