Louisville Report's Matthew McGavic Previews Virginia-Louisville

Louisville Report's Matthew McGavic answers five questions about Saturday's matchup between the Cardinals and the Cavaliers

The Virginia Cavaliers (2-3, 0-2 ACC) host the Louisville Cardinals (2-3, 0-3 ACC) at noon on Saturday at Scott Stadium in a pivotal ACC matchup for both teams. Ahead of UVA's game against Louisville, we asked Matthew McGavic of Sports Illustrated's Louisville Report to answer five questions about this Saturday's matchup between the Cavaliers and the Cardinals. 

1. What's the latest on Malik Cunningham? What are the chances that he plays on Saturday at this point? 

Satterfield announced on Tuesday that Cunningham is “day by day” after taking a couple shots to the head against Boston College. He took one in the third quarter, but was cleared by doctors pretty quickly during a TV timeout and only missed one play. The second one came in the fourth quarter, and that’s when he started experiencing “concussion-like symptoms”. Cunningham has typically been pretty resilient when it comes to injuries in his career, but considering the national spotlight on concussions right now after what happened to Tua Tagovailoa, if I had to guess, he won’t play. It’s very much a day-of call, though. 

2. If Cunningham doesn't play, what should we expect from the Louisville offense? How does it change if he is not on the field?

Well, to be quite honest, don’t expect much. Cunningham has been the heart and soul of the offense for a couple years now, and sometimes that hasn’t been a good thing. This season, the offensive line has been good but hasn’t been dominant like expected, and the wide receivers have not been great at getting separation. Then, three of Louisville’s five scholarships running backs are also “day to day” or questionable. Adding to that, Louisville’s quarterback situation behind Cunningham is not very good. If Cunningham isn’t a full go, unless the running backs who are healthy absolutely run wild, this might be over before it begins. 

3. What's the mood surrounding the team and the program coming off of the one-point loss at Boston College last week? How do you think the Cardinals will respond in another road matchup? 

As you can probably guess from my previous answer, it hasn’t been great at all. This was a team many expected to be at least 4-1 by now, and they are 2-3 and winless in ACC play. Quite honestly, many (including myself) view the Boston College loss as probably the beginning of the end of the Satterfield era. But as far as if they will respond, I think they will answer the call if they can. Louisville has been in a vicious cycle where, from an energy and effort standpoint, they’ll get too high then they’ll get too low. Since they’re coming off of a loss, I could see them playing inspired ball, but we’ll see. 

4. Defensively, Louisville boasts one of the top pass-rushing units in the conference, as the Cardinals are tied for 1st in the ACC with 16 sacks so far this season. How do you think that defensive front will fare against UVA's re-tooled and inexperienced offensive line?

Well, on paper, they should dominate. YaYa Diaby is having a career year, Ashton Gillotte (when healthy) is a force, Dorian Jones has stepped up his game, Monty Montgomery is coming off of the best game of his career and Yasir Abdullah is still very much an All-ACC caliber linebacker even if his stat-line this year doesn’t show it. Then again, I thought they would obliterate Boston College’s O-Line, one that was one of the worst in all of FBS football, but BC was the one who seemed to get more push. Not to mention that Louisville’s front seven is pretty boom or bust. They either blow up the play in the backfield, or the running back snaps off a solid run that moves the chains. There’s no in between. It really depends on how much energy they come out with. 

5. Excluding Malik Cunningham's condition for the game, what is the No. 1 factor that will determine who wins Saturday's game between Virginia and Louisville? 

Louisville’s ability to contain big plays against a UVA offense that, seemingly, has struggled to recreate some of the big plays from last year. So far this year, the inability to contain big plays has absolutely killed Louisville. For example: Boston College ran 57 total plays and put up 449 total yards of offense. BC gained 200 yards on their five biggest plays in that game, whereas the remaining 52 plays produced only 200 yards. Just when you think Louisville is generating defensive momentum, either a schematic failure or lapse in effort results in a massive, momentum-shifting play. If Louisville can limit these, it will greatly increase their odds of winning.

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