LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Malik Cunningham left the game with an apparent ankle injury with just under five minutes to play and a 24-17 lead in the third quarter, and Louisville was unable to hold off Clemson, despite a mad-dash rally in the closing minute that wound up just 2 yards short of the goal line in a 30-24 Clemson victory.
After Cunningham went down in the third quarter, Clemson scored 13 unanswered points on a touchdown and a pair of field goals. Louisville had managed only one net yard since Cunningham's injury when he led the offense onto the field with 2:04 left. Cunningham promptly hit Tyler Harrell for a 45-yard completion, and the Cards had hope.
Two plays later, Cunningham ran for 10 more yards, then hit Justin Marshall for an acrobatic 19-yard completion that was ruled incomplete on the field but overturned after a video review, and Louisville had the ball at Clemson's 2 with 1:18 left.
From that point, the Louisville offense ran into a stone wall. Three running plays went for zero net yards, and on fourth down, Cunningham rolled to his right but found nothing, and when he tried to cut back inside, his injured ankle gave way and he fell to the turf.
“I was really proud of the way the team continued to fight and continued to play," Louisville coach Scott Satterfield said. "Even there toward the end, we're down six with two minutes to go and no timeouts and we hit Tyler Harrell, great play by Tyler down the sideline, and then another great play by Justin Marshall to get the ball on the two-yard line and it gave us an opportunity. We had a few pops to try to get in the endzone and just didn't do it. Give credit to Clemson, they still have an outstanding defense, one of the best in the country. We were able to move the football tonight, we rushed for over 200 yards against a defense that's very stingy and we scored 24 points but obviously it wasn't enough. Again, I'm proud of our guys, they continue to come back. We've had so many close games this year and have not come out on the winning side of it and these guys just keep battling. I tell them we're really close and at some point, we are going to get over the hump and when we get over the hump and we're going to start winning all these games that were so close with. Just give Clemson credit, they battled as well and came back and ended up pulling it out towards the end, but it does hurt to come that close and not finish it out.”
The ending ruined an heroic performance by Cunningham, who finished the game with 134 yards rushing and two touchdowns, as well as 174 yards on 12 of 20 passing.
The loss drops Louisville to 4-5 on the season.
"We will go back and watch this film and we'll break this film down," Satterfield said. "We'll figure out what we needed to do differently in this film. Malik (Cunningham) going out most of the fourth quarter was a huge part of this game. I think another part is that Kei'Trel Clark didn't play this game. That's a huge loss for us. He's one of our best defensive players. We lost Jack Fagot at the end of the first half, and he didn't play the whole second half (because of a targeting call). That's another starter that doesn't come off the field very much. We were playing with a lot of guys that hadn't played as much, and we still went toe-to-toe and we were still right there to win the game at the end. So again, I'm proud of our guys, I'm proud of the way they continue to fight. We're really close and we're right there. It's just such a fine line from getting the victory. If we can complete one of those balls, we win the game. It's a fine line."
Louisville returns to action on Saturday against Syracuse at Cardinal Stadium. Kickoff is at noon.
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