Louisville football had a heartbreaking season-opening loss last Sunday against Ole Miss. In a game that came with so much hype, it certainly lived up to it all. A 10-6 score at halftime turned into a 41-38 Ole Miss victory on a last-second, game-winning field goal as time expired. While the rest of the country enjoyed a great prime-time game, Card fans are left wondering what could have been if Louisville had just played a little better earlier in the game.
The good news is that the Cards proved their preseason ranking by performing well on a big stage against a top-10 opponent. With many people viewing this game as a potential upset opportunity for Louisville, it was encouraging to see the Cards put up a fight. However, while moral victories are nice, Louisville is still 0-1 and only has a couple more résumé-building games left on its schedule.
Friday night’s upcoming game against FCS opponent Villanova is much less of a résumé builder and more of a game where Louisville can fine-tune some things before ACC play begins. Looking ahead, they have what many consider their most important game of the season in Week 3 against SMU. Before they get there, though, they have plenty of things to work on this week in practice and against Villanova.
Here are three things Louisville must work on this week to prove they are better heading into ACC play.
1. Get Isaac Brown going
The running game is perhaps the biggest indicator on this team of whether or not they are playing well. Against a team like Ole Miss, you need to have a balanced attack, both running and passing the ball, if you are going to have success on offense.
The good news for Coach Brohm is that the Cards' rushing attack is not a one-man show. While Isaac Brown struggled to get anything going against Ole Miss, others picked up the slack. Both Keyjaun Brown and Lincoln Kienholz combined for 125 rushing yards. That, along with a big 30-yard rushing touchdown by wide receiver Tre Richardson, helped spark the offensive explosion everyone saw in the second half last week.
That may have been good enough to keep Louisville in the game against the Rebels, but if Louisville wants to have a full game of offensive production and sustained success over the course of the entire season, Isaac Brown will need to get back to his old self.
Isaac rushed for just 36 yards on 16 carries, which translates to 2.3 yards per carry. Last season, Brown had just one game where he averaged under 5.0 yards per carry. In fact, he averaged 9.06 yards per carry over the final five games of last season. Isaac Brown is not the end-all-be-all of this team’s rushing attack, but if Louisville wants consistency, they need to get him back to last year’s production. Hopefully, a game against Villanova’s defense will help expedite that.
2. Capitalize on turnovers
Louisville is now 17-1 under Coach Brohm when winning the turnover battle. That may seem like an amazing stat — and it is — but losing for the first time under Brohm despite being up 2-0 in the turnover battle is something that is fixable. When it comes to close games, turnovers should be a major indicator of a win or loss. Five of Louisville’s last six losses have been by three points or less, and that seems like it could be the beginning of a trend rather than a coincidence.
Last week against Ole Miss, Louisville was able to force a fumble and an interception from quarterback Trinidad Chambliss. That is no small feat, considering it was his first lost fumble at Ole Miss and just his fourth interception in 13 career starts. As great as it was that Louisville created those turnovers, they went three-and-out after both of them.
When you are an underdog against a top-10 team, you have to capitalize on their mistakes. Coming away with no points when you could have stolen all of the momentum of the game — especially in a first half that only saw 16 total points and a game you ultimately lost on a last-second field goal — is a missed opportunity. Even one touchdown or two field goals on those possessions could have been the difference between winning and losing this game.
3. Start Faster
As mentioned before, Louisville finished the game with 38 total points but had just six at halftime. It truly was quite the turnaround for a game that saw just 16 total points in the first half and finished with 79 combined points in regulation. The problem for Louisville was its slow start.
The Cards were able to force two first-half turnovers from Ole Miss that resulted in zero points. There was also a missed field goal from Ole Miss that Louisville turned into three points of its own. But when the opposing team is giving you three opportunities to grab momentum in a close game, you need to come away with more than three total points.
Besides Ole Miss trying to give the game away, Louisville also hurt itself in the first half. On its first possession of the game, Louisville had two delay-of-game penalties on the same drive that turned a first-and-goal from the six-yard line into third-and-goal from the 17-yard line, forcing the Cards to settle for a field goal.
They also had three three-and-outs in the first half, two of which came immediately after Ole Miss turnovers. Finally, a bad snap on a punt set Ole Miss up at the 12-yard line, where the Rebels scored a touchdown just four plays later. All of that happened in the first half and was a major reason why Louisville found itself trailing 10-6 at halftime.
In the second half, the Cards fixed most of these issues. Of their seven possessions, they scored on five of them, only punting twice. Despite having nine penalties in the game, Louisville had zero penalties on its four touchdown-scoring drives in the second half. That further proves that when the Cards don't hurt themselves, good things happen for this offense.
Louisville enters Friday’s game against Villanova as a 36.5-point favorite. It should be an easy win for the Cards and, more importantly, a game where they can work on all of these issues before suiting up against a vulnerable SMU squad next week.
If Louisville can avoid hurting itself, get Isaac Brown going and build off the offensive production we saw in the second half against Ole Miss, Friday night could provide an encouraging glimpse of what this team can become.
The loss to Ole Miss may have hurt, but Louisville has no time to dwell on it. The real test is whether the Cards can learn from the mistakes that cost them the game.
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