Louisville Football: North Carolina hanging with the Cardinals

Louisville football has found themselves in a competitive game with the North Carolina Tar Heels. A few missed opportunities by the Cardinals have the kept the game tighter than it should be.

If you were just looking at the stat sheet and not the score sheet, you would think Louisville football would be up 100. However, the Heels are right there with the 17th-ranked team in the nation. Louisville leads Carolina 20-14 at halftime.

Despite Louisville leading nearly every statistical category, it has been a back and forth game. Lousiville racked up 355 total yards to Carolina’s 148. The Cardinals have rushed for 96 yards. The Tar Heels have -20.

Lamar Jackson has gone 16-for-25 for 259 yards and two touchdowns through the air. He’s run for another 47. His counterpart true freshman Chazz Surratt made his first start and has thrown for two touchdowns of his own on 12-of-14 passing and 168 yards.

Carolina tight end Brandon Fitts has grabbed two touchdown passes.

In the oddity file, Back Judge Jacques Hooper was forced to leave the game with a pulled hamstring. He pulled up lame after the 75-yard touchdown pass to Jaylen Smith.

Highlights

Three key stats

• -20 – The first half rushing total for the Tar Heels
• 207 – Louisville’s advantage in total yards
• 1-5 – Carolina’s third down conversion numbers

Louisville adjustments

Louisville could be up much bigger than they are. They need to finish drives in the red zone. They got backed up at the goal line on one drive. On another a false start, cost them a chance to go for a short fourth down. Bobby Petrino would obviously like to clean up some of the problems in the secondary. The Cardinals obviously miss star cornerback Jaire Alexander, but tight end Brandon Fitts is the one who has been wide open in the red zone.

North Carolina adjustments

North Carolina has to limit the big play. They have given up seven passes of more than 15 or more yards and five runs of 10 or more yards. The big play killed them last week against Cal and it is doing so again today. On offense, Larry Fedora needs some balance. Running backs Jordon Brown and Michael Carter only have five carries between them.

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Outlook

Louisville has been by far the better team. They have dwarfed Carolina’s production in the first half. Louisville receivers are running wide open everywhere. It could honestly be much worse for the Heels. Logic would dictate that Louisville will not keep missing these opportunities. If Carolina is going to pull off the upset, they are going to need to keep getting a little bit of luck. This game probably still goes over the total that closed at 66.