Blue & Gold Illustrated: America's Foremost Authority on Notre Dame Football
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BLUEGOLDONLINE.COM SEPT. 28, 2024 37 GAME PREVIEW: LOUISVILLE Date: Oct. 12, 2024 Site (capacity): Notre Dame Stadium (77,622) Kickoff: 3:30 p.m. ET TV: NBC/Peacock All-time series: Notre Dame leads 23-14 Last meeting: Notre Dame 56, Stanford 23 (Nov. 25, 2023 at Palo Alto, Calif.) 2024 Record To Date: 2-1 overall, 1-0 ACC through Sept. 20 Stanford head coach: Troy Taylor (second season, 5-10 through Sept. 20) Season Summary: It's a new era in Palo Alto, Calif., with Stanford playing its first ACC game — and winning, 26-24, on a last-second field goal — against Syracuse Sept. 20. The Cardinal became a member of the league in July, an- nouncing their intention to join in September 2023 after the demise of the Pac-12. It might not have done so without Notre Dame athletics director Jack Swarbrick, who was reportedly a major proponent of Stanford joining the ACC. Stanford opened its season with a promising sign that it can be more competitive in Power Four games than in the recent past. The Cardinal has gone 3-9 in three straight years, last finishing over .500 in a 12-game season in 2018. Stanford opened the season with a 34-27 home loss to TCU, but rebounded with wins over Cal Poly (41-7) and at Syracuse. Stanford's superstar is redshirt sophomore wide receiver Elic Ayomanor, who went for 1,013 yards as a redshirt freshman in 2023. His magnum opus that year was a 13-catch, 294-yard, 3-touchdown performance in a 46-43 overtime win over Colorado, and the craziest part was that all 13 receptions came in the second half. Ayomanor caught 7 passes for 87 yards, which included a one-handed touchdown grab, in the win over the Orange. Ayomanor and dual-threat quarterback Ashton Daniels give the Cardinal pieces to build around as it hopes to rekindle its success from the 2010s. FIVE PLAYERS TO WATCH Pos. No. Player Notable Stats* WR 13 Elic Ayomanor 17 receptions, 234 yards, 1 TD QB 14 Ashton Daniels 59-of-96 passing, 562 yards, 4 TD, 3 INT, 163 rushing yards, 0 TD WR 84 Ismael Cisse 19 catches, 145 yards, 2 TD LB 8 Tristan Sinclair 19 tackles, 1 sack CB 6 Collin Wright 13 tackles, 1 INT * Statistics through Sept. 20 On Deck Opponent: Stanford Cardinal 1. Louisville Has A True No. 1 Wide Receiver Wouldn't Notre Dame wish it could say the same? Cardinals quarterback Tyler Shough hasn't lit up the college football scene anywhere he's been, but he's been a lot of places, from Oregon to Texas Tech to Louisville, so surely he knows what it means to have a teammate who's a pass-catching option on seemingly every play. Ja'Corey Brooks is that guy. Brooks spent the first three years of his career at Alabama. He arrived in Tuscaloosa as a five-star prospect, the No. 2 wide receiver in the class of 2021 and the No. 30 player overall, per the On3 Industry Ranking. He caught 39 passes for 674 yards and 8 touchdowns for the Crimson Tide as a sophomore but was held to 3 receptions for 30 yards as a junior because of a shoulder injury. Brooks, an IMG Academy product, sought a rebirth of sorts at Louisville. He laid the early foundation for one in his first two games as a Cardinal, go- ing for 13 catches, 172 yards and a touchdown. Each of those statistics was better than those of the Notre Dame leader in the corresponding category through three Irish games. "It's great to see him be consistent," Louisville head coach Jeff Brohm said. "Every game you have to be a difference-maker. He's stood up to the challenge." 2. Playing Up To The Opponent Louisville had defeated two teams ranked in the Associated Press poll in the same season only once in the history of the program before Brohm was able to match that feat in his first season back at his alma mater in 2023. He guided the Cardinals to victories over No. 10 Notre Dame and No. 20 Duke. The irony, obviously, is that the first of those wins was over the Irish themselves and the second of them was over current Irish quarterback Riley Leonard and the Blue Devils. The 23-0 defeat at Louisville ended up being the final game Leonard played in 2023 and as a student-athlete at Duke. He was pulled from the game with an injury and did not play another college football down until this year at Notre Dame. Put simply, Brohm-coached teams have always fared well with the odds stacked against them versus tough opponents. He had a record of 8-11 against ranked teams in six seasons at Purdue, a program the Irish just evis- cerated by 59 points without him at the helm. 3. New Faces This is not the same Louisville team that beat Notre Dame a year ago. The quarterback is different, going from Jack Plummer to Tyler Shough. It's no longer the Jawhar Jordan show at tailback. Three freshmen logged at least 10 carries in the Cardinals' first two games, and junior Maurice Turner led them all with 16 carries. The freshmen, though, all led him with at least 115 yards each to Turner's 87. The Louisville running game comes at you in waves. The backs run behind four new offensive line starters, three of whom transferred in from elsewhere. Six Louisville defensive players made their first starts in a Cardinals uniform in this year's season opener, too — two defensive linemen, two linebackers and two defensive backs. Getting portal players (the Cardinals welcomed 27 of them this past off- season) to buy into a program and operate as a well-oiled machine can be difficult, but Brohm has made it work in his first two seasons at Louisville. Don't be shocked if they're all on the same page in South Bend. — Tyler Horka Louisville wide receiver Ja'Corey Brooks began his career at Alabama and is looking to break out in his first year with the Cardinals. PHOTO COURTESY LOUISVILLE ATHLETICS Three Things To Know About Louisville