Three legitimate questions for Louisville ahead of 2022 season

The Louisville Cardinals are entering their fourth season under head coach Scott Satterfield, who led the team to an 8-5 record in his first season at the helm, but finished 6-7 last season. The Satterfield era has definitely had it’s fair share of ups and downs, but ESPN’s Greg McElroy believes the tides could be turning in 2022.

“I think there’s a few things that are standing in the way between what they did last year and what they could potentially do this year, it centers around their quarterback, new offensive coordinator, there’s a lot of things right now I think to like. Especially with how they’ve recruited, goodness gracious. Have you seen how Louisville’s recruited, it’s unbelievable, I mean they have one of the top classes in the country for 2023,” McElroy said. “So it feels like there’s some momentum around the program, which is surprising because it really hasn’t been all that positive the last several months, even the last couple year’s but there’s three things that I think Louisville can do to immediately surge here this upcoming season.”

On his show Always College Football, McElroy highlighting three key questions that the Cardinals have to answer this reason in order to be successful, the first involving their ability to finish games.

“First one, can you please learn how to finish? There were so many games last year where Louisville had the ball on their racket but faltered in a crucial moment. It might be failing an opportunity against Wake Forrest, the collapse against Virginia would keep me up at night, the goal line stand against Clemson and the inability to stay competitive in the fourth quarter of the game against NC State; I mean those were four games that were very very winnable. But, for whatever reason they could not get it done,” McElroy said.

McElroy added that Satterfield and his staff have made finishing a point of emphasis all offseason for the team, and in the past when turnovers where their biggest issue, they honed in on that as well and it wonders for them. So hopefully the Cardinals self scouting can work in their favor again.

The second question relates to their depth at the wide receiver position.

“I think Malik Cunningham is one of the most under-appreciated quarterbacks in college football. I think he is so underrated, he’s got unbelievable god-given gifts, is occasionally the tiniest bit erratic, does occasionally miss wide open receivers. We know he’s great, I know the talent at running back is deep, they have really really solid pieces there. But what I don’t know is the pecking order at wide receiver, what’s that going to be? Look we know that there have been turnover at that position for the second year in a row, it’s not ideal Jordan Watkins is gone, Tyler Harrell‘s gone, Justin Marshall all those guys, three of their top four wideouts from last year based on yardage receiving are in the transfer portal and all found new homes,” McElroy said.

The Cardinals bring back receivers Ahmari Huggins-Bruce and Braden Smith, and bring in transfers Tyler Hudson and Dee Wiggins. They’ll need them to step up in a major way, which is not impossible, but still is yet to be proven.

And finally, McElroy believes that the Cardinals defense line will also need some of their more unproven talent to step up in order to be successful. McElroy believes Arizona State transfer Jermayne Lole was their biggest offseason pickup that could really help Lousville up front, and that Ashton Gillotte, and Yaya Diaby could also be key contributors this season up front.

“Right now when you look at Louisville over the last few years they are probably one of the most underwhelming groups that the Louisville roster has had. They’ve had good talent, they’ve recruited pretty well, they’ve had some nice pieces. You think about great Louisville defenses in the past, they had guys that could get after you at quarterback,” McElroy said.