Louisville Football: 3 key takeaways from Week 4 loss to Pittsburgh
By John Vogel
2. Malik Cunningham prevents this offense from doing big things
First things first, prayers and good vibes to Malik Cunningham. On his final play of the game, a failed fourth-down conversion, Cunningham took a hit and pin-balled his head off of the turf and remained down for quite some time. I hope that he recovers and is able to return to the field soon.
Cunningham is an electric athlete but, in my opinion, he is not a very good quarterback. He isn’t very accurate while throwing the football, and tucks the football too early and starts running instead of trying to locate a playmaker down the field.
It’s true. This Cardinals offense is stacked with talent. I mean stacked. With Tutu Atwell and Dez Fitzpatrick at the receiver positions, he has both speed and size outside and can get the ball to a playmaker like Javian Hawkins. If you look at the touchdown throw on the busted coverage by Pitts back-end, his throw to Atwell was horribly underthrown and would have been broken up if the coverage was there. He’s just not very effective as a quarterback.
The Pitt defense adjusted over the course of the game and found success by forcing Cunningham to beat them with his arm. They loaded the box and focused on both stopping the run and containing Cunningham in the pocket. As a result, the offense stalled in the second half.