Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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34 SEPT. 28, 2024 BLUE & GOLD ILLUSTRATED GAME PREVIEW: LOUISVILLE BY TYLER HORKA N otre Dame is effectively playing for its College Football Playoff life against Jeff Brohm's Lou- isville Cardinals. What could go wrong? Everything. It's happened before. The Fighting Irish only need to go back just under a calendar year to find the last time they were in this same situation. Several of the players on this year's team know just what it was like to go down to the Commonwealth of Kentucky and come back with a ruined season that at least had a little bit of promise preceding the short trip south. Or, a lot of promise, if you were one of the believers in the Fighting Irish who thought a last-minute victory at Duke would propel the Domers into a second half of a season to remember. As reality has it, though, nobody in- volved for the Irish really wants to re- member exactly how that Oct. 7 night in Louisville went. Terrible. Disastrous. Nightmarish. The Cardinals clubbed Notre Dame 33-20, and it really wasn't even that close. The home team ran for 185 yards. The visitors finished with 44 rushing yards. The home team turned it over once. The visitors turned it over five (5!) times. Yep. That bad. Season — if you're a CFP-or-bust kind of person — over. What was next for a team that truly be- lieved it could take a narrow loss to No. 6 Ohio State a few weeks prior, run the table and end up playing the Buckeyes, Wolverines, Crimson Tide, Longhorns or whoever else in the playoff? What was next for a program that had to come to grips with losing the ability to earn such an opportunity? "A lot of self-reflection," Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman said. "We're going to have to do a deep dive into exactly where the shortcomings happened. We got to get this thing fig- ured out." There isn't a sane, self-loving Irish fan who wants Freeman to be forced to say the same type of thing after the re- match Sept. 28. For one, obviously, it'd be a stain on the Freeman era if he had to answer to a second consecutive loss against a good Cardinals program, yes, but one that has never won the Atlan- tic Coast Conference since joining the league in 2014. Heisman Trophy win- ner Lamar Jackson couldn't even get the Cards over that hump, but journeymen quarterbacks Jack Plummer and Tyler Shough are going to beat Notre Dame in back-to-back seasons as Louisville signal-callers? Wouldn't be a great look. Secondly, Freeman has already had to make statements like the very one he made after the Louisville loss again after a defeat in this 2024 season. Freeman following Louisville, 2023: "You can point your finger at any per- son, any specific unit, but the reality is we've got to point the finger at ourselves and figure out what were the issues that led to the lack of execution." Freeman following Northern Illinois, 2024: "We've got to own this. Every person in here, every coach, has to own it first and not blame somebody else. That's the only way to fix it when, I'm sure, everybody outside of here will try to point the finger at some coach, some player, some person. It should be at the head coach. It's my job." It is just that. It's Freeman's job to have Notre Dame prepared to defend its home field, unlike against Northern Illinois in Week 2. It's Freeman's job to have his team show up against Brohm's, unlike last year. Failure to do so would result in an overall stamp of failure on the 2024 season. PLAYING THE CARDS So what is Freeman up against to make it happen? A similar test as the one he faced against Louisville a year ago, and that obviously ended up being a pretty tough one to pass. Louisville finished the 2023 season ranked 21st in the FBS in total defense. Through two games against Austin Peay and Jacksonville State in 2024, the Car- dinals were sitting at No. 7 nationally in that category. That's bound to be a number that gets worse as competi- tion gets better, but only being behind six programs in anything through two Louisville head coach Jeff Brohm had a success- ful first year back at his alma mater, posting a 10-4 record. PHOTO COURTESY LOUISVILLE ATHLETICS NOT AGAIN Notre Dame faces Louisville with its back against the wall for the second consecutive season Facts & Figures LOUISVILLE AT NOTRE DAME Date: Sept. 28, 2024 Site: Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend Kickoff: 3:30 p.m. ET Television: Streaming exclusively on Peacock Radio: Notre Dame IMG affiliates Series facts: Notre Dame and Louisville are tied 2-2, with the Cardinals winning the most recent matchup 33-20 in Louisville on Oct. 7, 2023. Head coaches: Louisville — Jeff Brohm (13-4, second season at Louisville; 78-48, 11th season overall); Notre Dame — Marcus Freeman (22-9, third season) Noting Louisville: The Cardinals followed up their win over Notre Dame last season with a disap- pointing 38-21 loss at unranked Pitt before stringing together four ACC wins in a row and qualifying for the ACC Championship Game … They lost their final three games overall in 2023; a regular-season finale rivalry bout versus Kentucky, the conference title game against Florida State and the Holiday Bowl versus USC … Brohm still posted a 10-4 season in his return to his alma mater, a program that had not won double-digit games in a season since 2013 … Louisville started this season with back-to-back offensive outings of more than 500 yards, the first such two-game stretch for the program since 2021, and the Cardinals ranked No. 4 in the FBS in yards per game through Week 3 at 590.5.