First win for Charlie Strong in his first season as head coach of the University of Louisville football team.

Not that impressive. Eastern Kentucky is not very good.

Still it was his first win. Considered significant by some players. They reward him with his first Gatorade bath in the closing seconds. Reserve defensive end Malcolm Tatum doing the heavy lifting.

Strong wasn’t celebrating, however. He knows the road ahead will be difficult and challenging. This was confirmed by an inability to score or shut down EKU in the second half after taking 23-0 lead in the first 20 minutes.

“Guys just have to finish the game,” he said afterward. “Guys get relaxed, thinking the game is over and their focus and concentration misses. We will have to talk about at halftime is that we still have 30 minutes to play. So let’s not sit back and relax. Let’s keep playing and keep playing hard. That is what we didn’t do.”

Hard to believe, a Louisville team thinking a game was over at half time. Many hard lessons yet to be learned.

A few encouraging signs:

  • The most impressive pass Adam Froman has thrown this season or last resulted in the first touchdown reception for Doug Beaumont in his four seasons at Louisville. A textbook 42-yard pass that Beaumont floated under in the end zone in the second quarter, ending a string of 106 catches without a touchdown. “I was just trying to concentrate on the ball,” said Beaumont. “When I caught the ball and I was across the line, I was relieved, I raised my hand.”
  • Defensive end Rodney Gnat had four sacks in the game, after having recording only three during his first three seasons. “It’s just knowing your opponent, technique and relentless effort,” he said. “One of the quotes on the board in the team room is play with relentless effort. Coach tells us it doesn’t take talent to play with effort, if you play with effort good things can happen and I think that was part of it today.”
  • An interception for Darius Ashley, his first since being moved from offensive back to cornerback on defense. That helped to make up for a roughing the kicker penalty earlier in the game.

Josh Chichester (11) pulled in a 20-yard pass from Adam Froman only to fumble on the two-yard line in the first quarter. Fortunately for Chichester, the ball rolled out of bounds.

Victor Anderson (20) breaks loose for a 59-yard kickoff return in the third quarter in Louisville’s 23-13 win over Eastern Kentucky University.

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By Charlie Springer

Charlie Springer is a former Louisville editor and sportswriter, a public affairs consultant, a UofL grad and longtime fan.

7 thoughts on “Louisville outlasts Eastern Kentucky, gives Charlie Strong first win”
  1. Sound system seemed better from what I could hear in the Crunch Zone. Note to Adam Froman…it’s OK to turn loose of the ball when handing off to Anderson.

  2. What a contrast in games. Against UK we play our best in the second half while being behind. Against EKU we play our worst in the second half while being ahead. Let’s see if we can put together a solid 1st AND 2nd half against Oregon State. It will take nothing less to be even competitive with them.

    Can you tell we have a lot of Newbies (true and red-shirt Freshmen, and lots of untested Sophomores)? Coach has his work cut out for him. But I believe he is up to the task and has, thankfully, surrounded himself with a lot of top quality assistants.

  3. Sound System. Hopefully they will continue to work on this issue. It was so loud that I could not have a conversation with the person next to me before the game so we went inside. I have been to concerts that are less noisy. Somewhere between the UK game level and the EKU level would be nice. If not, I will bring my Bose headphones next time.

  4. Zagnut’s right — a win is a win. But Coach Strong also has a well-taken point: this team cannot mail in the second half against ANYONE. They got away with coasting against Eastern because the defense made enough plays to shut the door in the end, but the Cards need to play hard all 60 from now on.

    That said, congrats to Coach Charlie on the first W – E pluribus unum!

  5. Strange to say but I actually felt more upbeat after the second half of the UK game than I did after the second half of the EKU game. Talk about being conflicted.

  6. Got to win the boring ones before you can win the big ones. Judging by this one, it’s going to be a slow process.

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