Louisville football: 3 trap games to watch for in 2020

at Boston College – October 10th

We’ve seen Louisville football struggle with Boston College each of the last few seasons, winning their first game in three tries last fall. Much like against Wake Forest, it took incredible play down the stretch from Louisville’s backup quarterback and it just so happened to be one week prior to their matchup.

In front of an incredible ruckus crowd, Louisville got out to a bad bad start against Boston College – giving up what felt like hundreds of touchdowns in the first half to their tight ends from starter Anthony Brown, and his backup Dennis Grosel, who was forced into action due to a lower-body injury.

Louisville and the Golden Eagles went back and forth nearly the entire game, as the offenses combined for 1,227 total yards and scored 80 points. An injury to Micale Cunningham forced true freshman Evan Conley into the game for what would be his first real “extended action” and he did not disappoint. He’d go 10/16 with 140 yards and a touchdown while driving Louisville down the field in the closing seconds to set up the game-winning field goal for Blanton Creque.

Things never got better from there for BC, as they’d finish 6-7 with a loss to Cincinnati in the Birmingham bowl which led to the firing of head coach Jim Adazzio, setting off a firestorm of moves including AJ Dillon leaving for the NFL Draft and Anthony Brown transferring to Oregon.

Boston College has since hired a new head coach in Jeff Hafley, the former defensive coordinator at Ohio State, and landed prized quarterback transfer Phil Jurkovec as well as Ohio State pass-catcher Jaelen Gill.

While they’ll still have to wait on a decision regarding a waiver for Jurkovec, Hafley will return his top three receivers in TE Hunter Long, and receivers Kobay White and Zay Flowers, along with four-five offensive line starters. That means BC will likely once again be a run dominant team, who will benefit greatly from a player Louisville fans are far too familiar with, David Bailey.

Hafley will have the potential to take what was already a very solid BC defense and turn them into one of the better units in the ACC. It’ll take time, as Hafley’s defenses have revolved around having athletes and speed all over the field, something BC really didn’t prioritize under Adazzio.

As mentioned, Louisville’s struggled with BC for quite some time now and a lot of it has come from the inability to stop the run. In three years the BC has totaled nearly over 1,000 yards on the ground against Louisville, most from Dillon, showing the major flaws time and time again in the run defense.

The same could be capable of happening again this year, and as we saw last season when paired with a dynamic throwing game it can be extremely dangerous. Louisville gave up over 500 total yards to BC, making them look like one of the most electric offenses in the country along the way.

Louisville will have to come ready to play against BC in a game that takes place the week before the bye week. Teams occasionally can slip up if they’re looking ahead to their time off, and you’d hope that wouldn’t be the case for a veteran-laden team.