Cards Ready to Close Home Slate versus Pitt

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Following a heartbreaking loss to Atlantic Coast Conference opponent Stanford, the University of Louisville football team looks to get back in the win column against Pittsburgh on Saturday at 4 p.m. at L&N Federal Credit Union Stadium. The game can be viewed on ESPN2.

The Cardinals are 6-4 and 4-3 in the ACC, and will face Pittsburgh, which is coming off a 24-20 loss to No. 20 Clemson at home on Saturday.

In the loss to Stanford on Saturday. freshman running back Duke Watson was one of the bright spots in the 38-35 loss. Watson entered the game after fellow freshman running back Isaac Brown went down with an injury.

Head coach Jeff Brohm said, "Well, we like [Duke Watson], he's shown great promise, he has some speed like Isaac [Brown] that is hard to teach, he's got some elusiveness to him. Gaining strength and getting bigger and stronger is something that he's going to have to do to help him, but he goes hard. He's got some toughness as well and he likes to compete."

Watson led the run game for Louisville, rushing for 117 yards and adding three touchdowns. Watson became the first true freshman in UofL history with over 100 yards rushing and three touchdowns.

The Cardinals posted over 400 yards of offense this past weekend, but Brohm noticed little things to improve upon.

"I think we started a little slow on offense and on the second play of the game we had a batted ball get intercepted, which gave them three points. Then we got stopped once or twice and we were able to get things rolling and scored 21 points. Did some decent things in the second half, but we were not really able to get many deep shots. We tried at least a handful or more times and we hit zero."

"We were efficient in the passing game and getting the ball out and getting yards. Popped a couple of runs but the inability to connect over the top hurt us to get more points. It is a combination of a lot of things, we need to protect a little better, pick up late blitzers that were coming late, need to be able to stand in there and be open and make the plays. I think every little play had a nuance but we have had pretty decent success connecting deep up the field on plays and we were not able to do that this game," Brohm added.

Pitt handed Louisville one of their two regular season losses in 2023, and Brohm expects the Panthers' defense to bring the challenge once again.

"They're very aggressive, they don't give you the easy completions, so they're going to press you across the board. They're going to blitz you quite a bit. They're going to get after the quarterback, they're going to rush up the field. The safeties are going to play low, they're going to force you to throw the ball deep and complete it, but you don't see a whole lot of [deep completions], because they're on you tight. They don't bust many things, they're very sound at what they do. They've done this system for a long time. They've tweaked it over the years, they're much more aggressive in their blitzing approach."

This will be UofL's last home and ACC match-up of the 2024 season and the penultimate game on the calendar. Louisville will honor its graduating senior class before the game.

When asked about finishing out the season, Brohm said, "Every game matters for us. We talk about it all year long. We have two regular season games left, two really good teams and we'll see what we're made of." Brohm continued, "We get an opportunity to play a really good football team that's played really well this year. We'll measure ourselves against them and I expect our guys to work hard this week and come out with a great attitude and go to work and go out there and compete on gameday."

University of Louisville Athletics

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Isaac Brown

Duke Watson

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