LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – It wasn’t just that Virginia beat Louisville.
It’s how.
The Cavaliers came in off an upset of No. 8 Florida State. They’ve worked their way into the national rankings without a great deal of buzz. And now, they capture a one-score win at Louisville, with a running back taking a direct snap and finishing the job in overtime.
If it felt familiar, that’s because it was – for the team that lost.
Virginia didn’t just leave L&N Stadium with a 30-27 overtime victory Saturday. The No. 24 Cavaliers left with something more disorienting — Louisville’s identity. They’re the team that’s going to rise in the rankings. They’re the ones who can play themselves into ACC championship game contention.
They were poised under pressure. Tough in the trenches. They took what Louisville gave them – a cornucopia of mistakes. A scoop-and-score on fourth down. A pick-six in the third quarter. A missed Louisville field goal to end the half.
Virginia was the team that didn’t beat itself. That got the last stop. It didn’t have the better offense. Didn’t have the better defense. But it made the bigger plays.
For Louisville, identity questions linger. Was this just a clunker? Or is this who Louisville is? Frankly, the big concern is that it’s the latter.
The Cardinals had the louder home crowd and better-known talent. They outgained Virginia by more than 146 yards.
But the Cavaliers made fewer mistakes. And in a game where the margins were inches — replay inches, fumble inches, field goal inches — that was enough.
In overtime, Louisville had the ball first. Moss found Isaac Brown on third down for what looked like a first-and-goal catch at the 1-yard line. The crowd thought so. The sideline thought so.
Replay didn’t. The ball grazed the turf as Brown gathered it. Incomplete. The Cardinals kicked a field goal.
Virginia didn’t waste time. After a couple of completions, quarterback Chandler Morris ran to the 2-yard line before limping off with an leg injury. On third-and-1, they turned to Jamari Taylor. Direct snap. Touchdown. Game over.
The Louisville sideline stood in place. Stunned. Not just by the result. But by the resemblance.
Louisville didn’t look like itself until the fourth quarter. Or maybe it did. The pick-six was a “what are you doing” back breaker.
“I was just trying not to take a negative play,” Moss said.
He was just about wrapped up. But falling to the turf, he flung the ball toward Nate Kurisky and Virginia’s Kam Robinson intercepted it and ran it in 47 yards for a touchdown.
If there’s a bright sport Louisville, it woke up and came back.
Louisville gained life on its first drive of the fourth quarter. The initial play was a give to Isaac Brown, who was slow to get up and left the game with an unannounced injury on the previous drive.
Or maybe the hit just woke him up. The sophomore carried 22 yards on his first run to the left side, then went right for nine yards and up the middle for five. Three plays later, Moss found Chris Bell near the front right corner of the end zone, and Bell made the catch in traffic and sneaked inside the pylon.
The sequence woke up the L&N Stadium crowd and gave Louisville some life.
The Cardinals would tie the game and force overtime.
But in the end, when you outgain a team like Louisville did, when you hold a team to just 237 yards. When you give up five sacks and nine tackles for loss.
But Louisville turned the ball over twice and could not force any.
Virginia didn’t dominate. It just didn’t blink.
This was the kind of game Jeff Brohm’s team won last year. Mistake-filled, momentum-swinging, decided by nerve and details.
Now the roles have reversed.
Virginia has won three straight and cracked the Top 25. Louisville has lost its first game of the season and lost a chance to crack the rankings heading into No. 3 Miami a week from Friday.
Saturday, Virginia didn’t so much beat Louisville as out-Louisville them.
For a program built on identity, that’s the part that will linger longest.
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