All Entries Tagged With: "Football"

Bandwagon Time

...

Get Started Now

Start memorizing the University of Louisville fight song, get the words down by Saturday, Sept. 5th There will be a quiz. No excuses accepted.

This is the older fight song, of course. When you’ve got it down, get to work on my favorite, All Hail U of L!

...

Zack Stoudt Positioned For Louisville QB Role

By Paul Sykes

Hard to believe, but a month from now the Steve Kragthorpe-mentored University of Louisville football team will be in fall practice preparing for the 2009 season. Although many questions come to mind, one of the main ones revolves around the quarterback situation.

Gone is starter Hunter Cantwell. Transferring out of the program are his two backups, Matt Simms and Tyler Wolfe. Who will come out of the battle to lead the Cards onto the field against Indiana State two months from now? Let’s look at the three candidates:

Judging from spring practice and scrimmage, red shirt freshman Zach Stoudt would seem to have a slight advantage over the competition. He had the most impressive outing of the three during the scrimmage, and is a powerful passer who can also scramble when he gets into trouble.

This could be important, since the Cardinal offensive line must be reconstructed after losing George Bussey and Eric Wood to graduation. Check out the You Tube video of Stoudt throwing a football 75 yards downfield into a net. Impressive.

Sophomore Justin Burke is the only one of the three with Division 1 experience. The North Carolina State transfer has sufficient arm strength and can motor out of the backfield as well when in trouble. Displayed a few nice throws during the spring game and appears to be a “take charge” kind of guy on the field.

Adam Froman, a highly sought after junior college transfer from California, is the third candidate. Froman is an impressive physical specimen and display a very accurate throwing style during spring ball. Although his performance in the spring game wasn’t quite as good as that of Burke and Stoudt, let’s not forget he has two years of post high school experience in leading a team on the field. His scrambling skills maybe aren’t that of Burke and Froman.

We shouldn’t omit Will Stein, the fourth QB on the roster, from Louisville Trinity. Injuries play a significant role in college football these days. Let’s hope it doesn’t happen, but he could advance up the chart should any of the top three have misfortune. He’s led championship quality teams.

Although it appears that the Cardinal running game will be the most powerful offensive tool in Krag’s woodshed this fall, the old philosophy of being able to throw the ball to set up the run is still valid. A decent offensive attack needs the pass to keep the safeties and defense from “stacking the box” and clogging up a running game.

With Victor Anderson, Darius Ashley and Billal Powell returning…and the sweep abilities of Doug Beaumont, the Cards need a steady performanceat quarterback to keep defenses honest. Any winner of the QB Derby knows he must be effective from Day Oone during the schedule, because…more than I can remember for a long time, the position is far from sewn up.

...

Kragthorpe Sorry For Missing Football Camp

The apology tour has begun for Coach Steve Kragthorpe after inexcusably missing an opportunity to represent the University of Louisville program at the Kentucky Football Coaches Clinic on Thursday. About 120 high school football coaches were stood up when Kragthorpe failed to make an appearance.

The observer was reminded of his first impression of Coach K about two weeks after he took the U of L post, the coach showing up more than an hour late for his first meeting with fans at the Neutral Zone in Middletown. Said he couldn’t find the place. Bad omen, the observer was thinking at the time. New guy, new town, let this one pass.

But this latest faux pas is flat out embarrassing. Take it, Coach K:

...

Getting Corporate Fannies In The Seats

Never too early. In fact, now may be the ideal time to bring it up since the football season is just two months away.

There could well be more empty seats than normal this fall, or until University of Louisville football returns to its winning ways. But that doesn’t excuse the basis for frequent complaints from University of Louisville fans about great corporate seats sitting empty at football games.

Companies make big donations, then pay thousands more dollars for their prime season tickets. But too many tickets never get punched at Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium.

When they shell out the money, the companies say they are buying them for employees. So why do they go to waste? The reasons are as varied as the companies. The observer suspects, however, the real problem is that nobody bothers to distribute them. Either that or the tickets are entrusted to a University of Kentucky fan who can’t be bothered to pass on University of Louisville tickets.

The observer has a suggestion for Tom Jurich. Why not put the names of companies, their logos or brand names on their seats? That way the companies would get more of the public recognition they all want so much.

Even more importantly, fans would finally see which companies are following through on their commitments as “good corporate citizens involved in the community” –  or those that are merely paying lip service. Fans would recognize the companies for their support, or, in the case of the empty seats, ask them why the tickets aren’t used.

Companies pay big money for the tickets, and most don’t tolerate waste. A little exposure might motivate the people responsible for distributing the tickets, getting them off their butts, putting the tickets where they belong, in the hands of employees.

...