By Charlie Leffler

Going into the game against Western Carolina, Louisville head coach John L. Smith said that he wanted his team to play a smarter game. The coach was concerned with the mounting numbers of penalties that the Cards were drawing as well as their play on special teams.

Going into the locker room at halftime, it appeared that perhaps the Cardinals should be a little less cerebral. Even though they led 17-7, Louisville was not playing with the sharpness that Smith had hoped. Though they eventually pulled out a lethargic 31-7 win, up until the final three minutes of the first half the division I-AA Catamounts had the Cards locked into a 10-10 tie.

Redshirt freshman defensive end Marcus Jones finished the game with one of only two sacks of WCU quarteback Pat Cilento. Jones said the game had the feeling of a sleeper in the first half. “Then in the second half we realized that this team was sticking with us,” Jones said.

The Catamounts used a control game to try to limit the Cards’ offensive potential. WCU finished the game with nearly 12 minutes more possession time than Louisville. Even though the Catamounts gained 173 yards on the ground they ate up the clock with every posession.

“We would have liked to have done a better job of getting the ball back so we could get more snaps in,” said Smith. “We didn’t take a lot of snaps, they controlled the football on us.” Western Carolina ran 74 offensive plays compared to Louisville’s 54. “I think their game plan was to say, Ôokay are we going to die a slow death or a fast death,’ and they picked a slow death.”

“That’s a tough game to play,” said U of L quarterback Dave Ragone. “It’s just natural for a Division I team to kind of lay down for a Division I-AA team.”

“I think we pretty much played to their level,” said wide reciever Deion Branch. “We didn’t come out and play Louisville football.”

“We did some good things,” Ragone said, “but they threw some defense at us that we’ve never seen. They took a piece of each team that we played and kind of put it all together.”

Louisville appeared to be using the contest as a way of working on its own running game. The Cards ran a fairly even balance of 32 rushing plays and 25 passes. Sophomore running back T.J. Patterson led the way for the Cards with 114 yards on 15 carries, picking up where he left off last week against Kentucky. “My game last week. . . it’s the best I had in my career,” Patterson said on Wedensday, “but I look at that as the beginning. Hopefully they’ll be a lot more days like that.”

Though Smith enjoyed the yards that Patterson gained his feelings were twinged by the two fumbles that the running back had. “Yeah, he had a beautiful game,” Smith said. “And I’ll tell you, you’re not going to play running back at this school if you put the ball on the ground. And that’s what he did twice. So, he’d better learn to hang onto it or it will be his last game.” In Patterson’s defense, replays showed that the first fumble appeared to have happened when he hit the turf.

Lousiville’s other two running backs Ð Tony Stallings and Henry Miller Ð were only used sparingly, carrying the ball 15 times for a total of 60 yards. “Henry ran hard,” siad Smith, “Stallings held onto the ball.” Stallings is still suffering from a constant strain on his knee.

One of the highlights of the game came on a 61-yard punt return for a touchdown by Branch. The play came with 1:04 left in the first half. Branch returned the ball virtually untouched. He said he was surprised that the field was so open. In fact, Branch was so open that he spent the entire run looking anywhere but ahead. “I wanted to see some of the action that was going on,” Branch said. “Our guys try to get a couple of kill shots in. That’s what I wanted to see.”

Now the Cards know that their biggest challenge of the season awaits them. On Saturday they will be traveling to Champaign, Illinios to take on The Fighting Illini of Illinois.

“This is the national spotlight,” said Ragone. “I’m going to be excited. It’s bigger than Kentucky because we get to show what we’ve really got.”

“It’s a big game,” Smith said. “This is a good football team. We’ve got to step up and beat good football teams.”