Louisville, KY – In a week all Louisville fans want to forget the No. 17 football team gave them something to cheer about. The Cardinals raced out to a 35 – 3 halftime lead. They continued their dominance in the second half with mostly backups eventually winning 55 – 10.
Bobby Petrino was asked about the difficulty preparing for a game with all that transpired with the basketball program this past week, “Well, one of the things that, as an athlete, you try to do is you find a release. Come in the building and get with your teammates. Focus on preparing for a game and going out and practicing gets you away from all of it. I thought our guys did a good job of that. We tried to communicate, talk to them every day. I was proud of the way they handled it.”
U of L dominated every phase of the game. They outgained the Racers 676 – 80 and had 38 first downs to only 5 for Murray.
Lamar Jackson was his usual self, completing 18 – 26 passes for 249 yards and three touchdowns. He ran for another 100 yards and one touchdown.
Jackson played the first half and then turned it over to redshirt freshman Puma Pass. It didn’t start well for pass as he fumbled the first snap he saw and the Racers returned it for a touchdown.
Pass settled down after the miscue and completed 14 – 19 passes for 115 yards and one touchdown. He ran for another score.
“Offensively, I really wanted to get Puma in there with the No. 1 offense”, replied Bobby Petrino. I thought he did a good job with the exception of the first snap. We didn’t get that one right. Other than that, he executed real well, threw the ball around, ran the show well.”
Dez Fitzpatrick scored two more touchdowns for U of L bringing his total on the season to six.
The Cardinals don’t have much time to relax. They head to North Carolina State for a Thursday night matchup.