Louisville football: Grading the Cardinals’ performance against Virginia

Defensive Backs

I have (mostly) good things to say about this group that was without starting corner Chandler Jones.

There were a couple of glaring plays that stand out at first. But, when you break it down, the defensive backs were actually (mostly) good today.

Kei’Trel Clark was his normal self. He was making plays on the football and locking his man up consistently. He did have a holding penalty in this one. But, he was very good again for the most part. Louisville has a special one in Clark.

I will say, he does need to grab some of these interceptions he has a chance at. Those are very key opportunities for the defense to make a play. If he grabs a couple of these footballs on defense, who knows how this game (and others) could have changed.

Marlon Character was the man making things happen on the turnover front today. In the first half alone, Character forced a fumble as Virginia-star tight end Tony Poljan was about to cross the goal line for a touchdown. Character laid a huge like and jarred the ball loose and the Cardinals recovered.

On the ensuing Virginia drive, Character fooled Armstrong in zone coverage and picked off a pass to give Louisville the ball back once again. Character gave up a couple of catches. But, he was the guy to step up and make a play for Louisville.

Character earned himself quite the honor from Pro Football Focus for his performance.

I thought the safeties weighed down the play of the corners today. Russ Yeast and Jack Fagot were the personnel at safety for most of the game.

Yeast had a missed tackle and a pass caught on him as the game was hanging in the balance. It’s unfortunate because it seemed like Yeast was having a solid game in coverage prior to that.

Yeast is playing deep coverage on most plays. That means that his opportunities for playmaking opportunities are few and far between because he plays so far away from the ball. When Yeast missed on those plays, it stuck out in a bad way.

Fagot, to me, is more of an athlete than a football player at this point in his career. He does not take good angles in run fits and I am not totally sold he knows what he’s doing in coverage either. That’s more of a talent deficiency at the position than anything.

I would not mind a young player having a chance at a safety spot opposite of Yeast to finish the season.

Overall, I am going to give a separate grade here because the corner and safety positions played at opposite ends of the spectrum.

Cornerback grade: A

Safety grade: C