LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – Louisville came close to clinching a spot in the ACC Championship game Saturday night without ever leaving the comforts of home. But a late field goal drive by North Carolina at the end of regulation and the resourceful play of quarterback Drake Maye helped the Tar Heels put away Duke 47-45 in two overtimes.
North Carolina – with the help, to be sure, of a missed penalty call on a 2-point conversion in overtime and some other questionable non-reviews in regulation – lives to fight for a championship berth itself. (It was a bad week for ACC officials, who also missed a rather clear safety that would’ve given Miami a chance to go into halftime with a lead in a 27-20 loss in Tallahassee).
For No. 11-ranked Louisville, the equation is clear. Beat Miami on Saturday at noon and nothing else matters. A win puts Louisville in the ACC Championship game against Florida State, to be played in Charlotte's Bank of America Stadium at 8 p.m. on Dec. 2.
The Cardinals should climb into the Top 10 today after weekend losses by No. 9 Ole Miss and No. 10 Penn State.
In some ways, it’s only fair. Louisville hasn’t had to face three of the ACC’s top teams. Florida State, North Carolina and Clemson aren’t on its schedule. A win on the road against a struggling Miami offense should not be too much to ask for a team aspiring to the league championship game.
Still, Louisville has earned its opportunity. it dispatched Georgia Tech in Atlanta in the season opener and beat the Duke team that extended UNC to two overtimes 23-0. It beat a Notre Dame team, then ranked No. 10 in the nation, 33-20.
Despite that, Louisville enters the final two weeks of the season with something to prove – and plenty of opportunity to prove it.
Miami and Kentucky, Louisville’s final two opponents, were ranked just two spaces apart in Jeff Sagarin’s Computer Ratings heading into the weekend, sandwiched around Duke. Those would rank among the program’s biggest wins of the season, by ranking.
After Thursday’s win over Virginia, Louisville coach Jeff Brohm continued his one-game season theme, but he can do it with great accuracy this week. Everything is on the line at Miami. Louisville still has a decent chance to reach the ACC Championship game with a loss at Miami, but that’s not its preferred scenario. A rundown of the ACC's tiebreaker process can be read here.
Brohm said Louisville has remained realistic about who it is, what it does well and what it needs to improve on. Virginia took away the running game schematically for a good while. But Louisville, in the end, found plays in the passing game and broke a big run after that. The first-year Louisville coach praised his team’s ability to adapt and find ways to win.
“I would be sitting here not in the great position that we are, but we found a way to win,” Brohm said. “Hats off to our coaches and our players because they have done enough to win the game. You go back, circle the wagons, figure out how to get better and correct things. We have done that every week. We aren't bashful about identifying the mistakes we make and how we can get better. So, we will do it again. I think our team should enjoy this and get a mental break because like I said, we finish the season with two really tough opponents that we are going to have to be more efficient and play better in order to win."
DraftKings projects Louisville will open as a 6-point favorite at Miami, which likely will be returning to Tyler Van Dyke at QB after freshman Emory Williams, who earned the start for the FSU game, was carted off late. Van Dyke threw an interception on Miami’s final possession to allow FSU to seal its victory.
Louisville is nursing injuries of its own. Leading rusher Jawhar Jordan has been dealing with a hamstring injury and leading receiver Jamari Thrash is playing with an injured hand. Both played against Virginia and should be available at Miami.
Brohm will preview the game in his weekly news conference on Monday at 11 a.m. It will be streamed live at WDRB.com. WDRB’s Rick Bozich and Eric Crawford will have preview discussion on their streaming sports program, “Overtime,” which posts to WDRB+ on Monday and Thursday afternoons.
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