Louisville football: What the hell just happened?

When your gut is wrong

As I strode across the parking garage of my condominium complex at halftime on Saturday night, I cheerfully dodged puddles en route to the car.

Jack, my 9-month-old Golden Retriever/ Jack Russell mix pranced alongside me as we sauntered our way to the liquor store. Fabulous Liquor Land is close enough that we may have walked on a clear night. But far enough away that the rainy drive allowed for some time to ponder what transpired over the first half.

Deep down, the pathos part of my brain believed Louisville football- Trailing 17-7 at the break- would right the ship, take over on offense, and cruise to victory in the second half in Syracuse, New York.

The logos portion made me beeline it to the door, clip the leash on Jack, and jaunt it to the car as soon as the first half clock hit double zeros. Logos was a little worried.

“They taking care of business?” a man in front of me in line at FLL asked. He peered over his shoulder, awaiting reassurance that his team was quickly covering the closing 5.5-point spread. Apparently on his way home from work, my brother in UofL fandom needed good news just as much as I did, but no redeeming words came to mind.

It’s at these moments that you learn how you truly feel about a situation.

You can tell yourself you’re ready for that big presentation moments before “umm” and “err”ing your way through a PowerPoint. You can talk yourself into keeping your composure on a first date before doing something embarrassing.

By the same token, you can tell little lies to yourself while your team continues to drown as the tide of the JMA Wireless Dome crowd swiftly carries your squad into the middle of an unsalvagable season opener.

“It’s ugly, man,” I instinctively responded, quickly looking away as I slid a bottle of Elijah Craig and a bag of Sour Cream and Onion Ruffles across the countertop.

“Damn, for real? I thought they had their shit together this season,” the stranger responded, backing into the door and sounding the security bell.

I gave him a reassuring smile and line about how they were a second-half team in 2021 (lie).

Elijah Craig in hand, and a smiling Jack half in my passenger said, half sprawled across my console, I optimistically trudged through the rain back to my house.

I’m not too worried, I texted the group chat (I was worried). Bad start but we will bounce back.

“We” didn’t.

Syracuse continued to pile it on while proving stout on the defensive end.

Louisville football imploded. Its best players performed uncharacteristically badly. Cunningham looked like a shell of his usual self- His worst performance of his 5-year career.

Syracuse looked like a team out for revenge.

We documented in the offseason the beef between Cunningham and Syracuse linebacker, Mikel Jones.

A senior in Syracuse, Jones was ejected early during the Orange’s most recent trip to Cardinal Stadium. Louisville scored 41 unanswered en route to a blowout victory. The year before, Jones played the whole game but Louisville outscored Cuse 30-0.

While Cunningham seemed motivated by a lot of trash talk and mind games from the Syracuse crew, the reality was that Cunningham looked like a lesser version of himself while Jones and the SU linebacking unit seemed workmanlike.

The third straight loss for the Cardinals, dating back to 2021. The second of three in embarrassing blowout fashion.

Nothing went right. An all systems failure at a crucial time.

How did we get here?

The 31-7 shellacking comes as a serious blow to the unprecedented momentum established this summer by the Louisville football program.

This offseason, undoubtedly, was the best in school history in terms of recruiting momentum.

Louisville landed half of its top 10 would-be signees all-time. It replaced everything it lost in 2021 with someone better, while shoring up its deficiencies with power-five level transfers.

UofL lost CJ Avery. The Cards replaced him with Momo Sonogo of Ole Miss. The Cards lost depth in the secondary and brought in two starters in Jarvis Brownlee and Quincy Riley.

Louisville landed an elite crop of commitments from the class of 2023- Many of which would be immediate game-changers.

There is no doubt that Louisville football and the new staff did a sensational job of assembling the future roster.

But, alas, the offseason efforts meant nothing if Louisville football did not come out and inspire hope.

That needed to start with a convincing win over one of the perceived inferior teams on your schedule.

The exact opposite transpired.

And, while I was cautiously optimistic during my halftime liquor store run, the optimism quickly became a sinking feeling in my stomach as Louisville continued to falter.

Frankly, I expected a blowout and a feel-good win on Saturday night.

Most fans did, too. In fact, of the 150+ predictions UofL fans sent us this week, not one had Syracuse winning.

Not only did the Orange come away victorious, but they handed Louisville a beatdown of cataclysmic proportions in the grand scheme of things. One Cards fans will not soon forget. And one that I am still trying to wrap my brain around.

There was not a facet in this game that you could point to where Louisville was even remotely close to the same level as Syracuse- The same team the Cards molly whopped the last three seasons to the tune of a 127-37 score.

Not in the trenches- An area where Louisville had a serious size and experience advantage. Not at quarterback- A spot that featured Cunningham as a Davey O’Brien Award nominee vs. Garrett Shrader, one of the worst passers in power five football. And certainly not on the sidelines that featured Dino Babers- A coach that had won 5 conference games in the last 3 seasons.

I’ve sat through some embarrassing-ass Louisville football losses- Last season at home against Kentucky notwithstanding. I sat through 50-point losses to Rutgers in the Kragthorpe era. I stayed to the bitter end of some shockingly bad L’s in Bobby Petrino’s final season.

This loss, however, might be the worst among them.

We have spent the better part of two months previewing this team and this game on our site. We turned over every stone and broke down analytics. From the Pink Seats pod interviewed a dozen players, coaches, and experts.

By all accounts, 2022 was going to be an exciting, transformative season. One where Louisville football would be able to seize all of the momenta it captured over the last 9 months and turn it into something great.

Every person around our site predicted and expected an impressive blowout win from the Cards.

Save impressive performances from Tiyon Evans and Tyler Hudson, there was not a single thing we discussed that came to fruition. In fact, the exact opposite of those discussion points happened.

Louisville football didn’t just falter, it fell on its face right out the gate.

So badly, in fact, that I am not sure this team or this coaching staff can recover.

We’ve all seen those videos of track races where someone loses a shoe, skins a knee, or runs into a hurdle right out the gate and then miraculously comes back to win.

It’s going to take that sort of inspirational, heroic effort for this Louisville team to salvage the rest of this season. Which is the exact opposite of what we’d hoped for.

A dose of reality

As the clock hit zero on Saturday night, I blankly walked over to my computer, sat down, and began to try to formulate a semblance of an article.

Normally, after a loss, there are things you can point to. I can typically dip my quill into the ink that is college sports heartbreak just enough to eek out a respectable article. Clear, concise, and hopeful for the future; That’s always been tried and true.

On Saturday, I began to type, erase, rewrite, and reword. And as I burned the last of the midnight oil, I fell into a trance propped above my computer keyboard.

I was awoken from my stupor by the sound that springs any pet owner from their bed in the dead of night.

Jack was hunched over, heaving and struggling to breathe.

I bent down to rub his throat and quickly realized something was lodged and blocking his airway. I felt helpless, half panicked, half just hoping that he would cough up whatever was stuck.

After several attempts, a triumphant heave dislodged the end of a plastic bone.

Jack sauntered over and put his head on my shoulder. I scooped him up and held him like a baby, made my way through the dark, and fell backward into bed. Moments later he was quietly snoring into my ear as his chest sank into mine. I stared up at the ceiling fan thinking of anything but the game. Anything but the last few months; Much of which were spent laser focused on a laptop, a podcast, a social media post.

In that moment, I cared about what was important.

The morning came and when (Lamar) Jackson Meyer peeled himself from my chest, it was playtime once again. Life for Jack went back to normal; Finding hidden treasures in couch cushions, tearing up anything and everything deemed a “toy” in sight.

And, as so, life resumed for me. Reliving failed fourth-and-goal conversions. Unsuccessfully trying to ignore Garrett f’ing Shrader slangin it all over the yard.

The reality of life is that, at the end of the day, football is “just a game”. You quickly remember this at 3:15 am when your dog might be taking his last breaths.

However, just a game gets us from one moment in life to the next. It’s important because of what it represents: Pride for your city, for your university, revelry in victory with your fellow fan. It’s why we do life. It’s why we work jobs we might not like, save our money to spend on this silly little hobby, and let it so positively or negatively impact our moods.

For Louisville fans, there isn’t a whole lot to hang our hats on over the last few years. The end of the Pitino era bled into failed attempts at reinvigoration by Chris Mack and Petrino. NCAA scandals adorn a scarlet L on our once-proud university. Dozens of moments in between left us in a state of bewilderment.

Still, this spring and summer offered more than just glimmers of hope. The aforementioned recruiting successes. New coaching hires on both the basketball and football fronts. The NCAA investigations finally drawing to a crescendo. We became hopeful. We got excited again.

It took 3 hours and change to let all of the air out, leaving a fanbase and a city, once again, in a weird, uneasy place.

It’s been six years this week since Jack’s namesake hurdled a Syracuse player- and about two dozen names in the Vegas Heisman odds- on the same field where Louisville just took an unexpected thumping Saturday night.

It feels like since that moment, the Louisville fanbase has endured hardships for which patience has long run its course.

We are tired of spending our hard-earned money to watch a losing product. We halfheartedly flip on our TVs or meander into games, hoping for change; hoping for reasons for optimism.

It feels like, at this point, we are just exhausted, man. Another season that looks rocky or inconsistent at best. Another season of constantly getting hopes up only to be let down. Another era that feels destined to draw to a close with a sense of apathy.

Put up or shut up

Scott Satterfield and the Louisville staff have a short week to prepare for one last chance at optimism.

Before getting crushed by the Orange, a hard-fought loss on a short week at UCF would not be the end of the world. Now, it’s a must-win in a hostile, sold-out environment against a fringe top 25 squad.

Louisville football will have to pull something so far out of its ass at this point that it shocks us all.

And if it doesn’t? The apathy will begin to set in.

As our buddy Mike Rutherford put it- you made it weird, Satt.

Now, it’s time to find some source of hope and optimism or start looking for houses back in Boone.

Football isn’t life, but it comprises many of the moments that help us in between. It’s okay to be frustrated. It’s okay to be hurt.

It’s not life or death, but right now, we are all at a breaking point.