Louisville football opponent preview: Western Kentucky

Western Kentucky defense

Last year’s 38-21 win over Western Kentucky came in a game where the outcome was never really in question, as Scott Satterfield and the Louisville football program led wire-to-wire. However, the game seemed to be closer than it was at times because of the struggles the offense had against Western Kentucky’s defense.

If you remember back to last season, it took Micale Cunningham a little bit to get going in what was his first start of the season following the injury to Jawon Pass. The numbers overall add up to give you a fairly impressive performance, as Louisville totaled over 400-yards of offense, but it never really felt dominant.

Everyone struggled, and while obviously it took time for Cunningham to gel as the starter, the WKU defense was the real deal. After giving up 35-plus points in two of their first three games they would go on to only allow one more game of that magnitude, while holding seven others below 20 points.

That would be good enough to give head coach Tyson Helton a top 25 defense nationally, and a group that in year two with the same coaching staff may be one of the most underrated on all of Louisville’s schedule.

WKU returns six of their top eight tacklers from 2019, including leading tackler Kyle Bailey and the leader in sacks and C-USA Defensive Player of the Year, DeAngelo Malone. Not to mention they’ll return their top two defensive backs Devon Key and Antwon Kincade, as well as linebacker Clay Davis, defensive linemen Juwaun Jones, and several other key contributors from a year ago.

Malone is a guy who will be more than likely playing on Sunday’s in 2021 and because of that Louisville will have a real test in the pass blocking department from the get go. Last season the Cards gave up three sacks to Western, along with countless other pressures that resulted in short gains for Cunningham (remember, he rushed the ball 16 times for 46 yards) and they are more than capable of repeating that effort, especially with Adonis Boone and Renato Brown settling into their roles as the new starting left and right tackle.

Things won’t be easy, but don’t expect Western Kentucky to shut down the Louisville offense by any means. As mentioned, UofL finished with over 400-yards of total offense, including 145 yards and three touchdowns from Tutu Atwell.

The defense is very experienced and will be prepared following what happened last season, but in week one I think Louisville’s offense will be laser focused and that’s not good for WKU’s defense.