Tonight felt like we finally saw the team that this Louisville team was always supposed to be.
After getting down in a 14-0 hole, with the same maddeningly soft defense and uninspiring offense, Florida State was once again driving easily to take a 21-0 lead and run away with the game. With the ball on the 2-yard line, FSU was about to deliver the kill shot when UofL’s defense finally got their first stop of the night. One play later Isaac Brown delivered the longest rush in school history for a 97-yard
blazer.
Then Louisville did something unprecedented for this team. They got a 3-and-out, scored, stop, score, 3-and-out, score, stop, stop, and score. Before you knew it, UofL went from being down 21-0 and their season having the life support plugged pull, to being up 35-14.
And it was as thorough and satisfying as a 35-0 run should look. And boy were they running.
Isaac Brown not only broke Ken Porco’s record for longest run from scrimmage (93-yards, 1958)….
But he also finished with the 3rd most scrimmage yards in school history. Whoever had the idea to let him return a kick is a genius.
And for how great the offense was on the ground, it was fantastic to see how complimentary the defense played. Especially after their atrocious start. Once the offense got going, the defense settled in and dared Daniels to throw, which is exactly what we wanted out of this game. It worked perfectly as FSU didn’t find paydirt again until under 9 minutes left in the 4th quarter. The pass rush made him uncomfortable all night, the simplified man coverage clamped down on the attack, and FSU had no way of keeping up with Chris Barclay’s stable of demons.
By the way, that guy deserves whatever raise we can give him. Even with Keyjuan out tonight, you had Isaac Brown looking as good as he ever has, Marquis Davis and Braxton Jennings looking like the future, and even Lekhy Thompkins scorching the FSU defense. Either Barclay has the easiest job in the world, or we are extremely fortunate to have a guy like him on our staff. I lean heavily toward the latter.
To continue with the them of coaching, it was great to see the defense finally find a groove and having Mark Ivey up in the box appeared to make a defense. They weren’t perfect by any means, but the busts were limited after the first 3 drives, and the rushing attack between Lubin and Thompson was relentless.
Even more surprising was the appearance of Brian Brohm calling the plays. It was noticed by more than a few that Brian had the call sheet and was getting plays in, and even Jeff admitted after the game that he had taken a back seat to playcalling, and man did it work. Lincoln only finished with 140 passing yards, but he muscled his way to 2 rushing touchdowns, and that as all that was needed from him as the running backs took care of the rest.
Not sure if this will be status quo moving forward, but Jeff shifting to mroe of a CEO role and it working tremendously is a welcome sight and could be a huge benefit/philosophy change moving forward. More to come there, but a potentially very exciting development.
And it may be a small thing that I’m reading into too much, but for a QB vet like Brian to be calling the plays and settling on a massive rushing onslaught instead of airing it out is extremely encouraging. He found a groove and stuck to it instead of forcing the issue like you’d expect many pass-happy coordinators to do.
It’s a fantastic win all around and with the exception of the first 3 drives, as close to a complete performance as we’ve seen this year. There’s still so much to build on, but this result and the positivity that comes with it is huge and could kickstart a special run that looked impossible with FSU up 14-0 and the ball on the 2.
What a massive, massive turn around and gutsy perfomance from this team when it looked like all was lost.
With all of that said. Let’s enjoy Mr. Isaac Brown:
