Louisville Cardinals @ Cincinnati Bearcats Football Preview

It will be hard to see how the Louisville Cardinals will find the firepower needed to keep up with the Cincinnati Bearcats this weekend. It’s always possible to lean on one unit in football, but at some point, the other side of the ball has to fulfill its part of the bargain, and that’s where Louisville finds itself as it heads to Nippert Stadium in Cincinnati.

Louisville’s defense is getting the job done. The Cardinals, under second-year head coach Charlie Strong, are standing tall against opponents, allowing only 16.2 per game, good for 13th in the United States out of 120 Football Bowl Subdivision programs. Louisville was staggered by the speed of Florida International receiver T.Y. Hilton in a week two loss, but even on that night, the Cards surrendered just 24 points, a season high. When 24 points is a season high in terms of points conceded, it’s clear that a defense nearly halfway through its season is performing up to expectations. It’s true that the Cardinals haven’t faced many high-powered offenses – Kentucky and Murray State are particularly fragile – but the North Carolina offense Louisville contained this past weekend owns some playmakers in the backfield (Giovani Bernard). The Tar Heels made unbeaten Georgia Tech sweat earlier in the season, taking the Yellow Jackets to the limit in Atlanta because they were able to answer a Tech touchdown with one of their own through three and a half quarters. Louisville’s ability to hold that UNC offense in check represented a significant accomplishment, a feat which backed up the Cards’ impressive September on the defensive side of the ball.

There were just two problems with the North Carolina game: First, Louisville’s defense made one bad play. Second, Louisville’s offense couldn’t overcome that one bad play.

The one and only time when Louisville’s defense truly dropped the ball – or a ballcarrier, as it were – was on a 43-yard touchdown pass from UNC quarterback Bryn Renner to receiver Dwight Jones. About 20 yards of the play represented a pure pass; about 15 more featured the running of Jones along the sideline, but the final eight yards were the picture of complete defensive ineptitude. Four Louisville defenders were smothering Jones inside the 10-yard line, but they all somehow slipped off the tall, rangy receiver and allowed him to jog into the end zone over the final three yards before the goal line. The comical sequence was no laughing matter for Louisville and since the Cards’ offense mustered just a single touchdown, that one play made the difference. UL absorbed a 14-7 loss on a day when its kicker, Chris Philpott, missed two field goals.

Now, as Louisville heads to Cincinnati, it must realize that seven points, or even 13 – with two made field goals – probably won’t be enough. The Bearcats are averaging 45 points per game, and while they have a long way to go to establish themselves as the class of the Big East, they’ve probably done better than most people expected. Quarterback Zach Collaros is presiding over a very effective offense powered by running back Isaiah Pead, but it’s the defense that has stolen the show for Cincy, allowing just 16.5 points per contest. In many ways, UC is a two-way team with competence on both sides of the line of scrimmage. UL is a one-way team blessed with a flinty defense, yet lacking a potent offense.

We’ll see if the one-way team can double-cross the two-way team this weekend.

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By: Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Senior Staff Writer