Monday Evening Cardinal News and Notes

Spread Check: Auburn by 10.5.

I don't care if we're double digit underdogs, it feels so good to be able to type that again.

It's so beautiful when you see a dream become reality.

@CardChronicle My new Auburn gameday attire courtesy of @OhSoSarahh pic.twitter.com/iD8xq9wdxY

— Ben Ballard (@GD_Superman388) August 30, 2015

It appears as though this jersey is going to be relevant for the weekend.

The official Auburn game notes for week one have arrived, but no depth chart until tomorrow.

There's an entire website dedicated to Auburn uniforms and the uniforms of Auburn opponents, and unsurprisingly, they didn't have a whole lot of nice things to say about the "Uncaged" look U of L will be sporting Saturday afternoon.

As for Louisville, you already know what they're wearing. It was all over the place. Regardless, I'm still posting it here. The first uniforms revealed in a series of unfortunate designs by adidas, Louisville's "Uncaged" uniforms got a lot of attention for sure. The uniforms feature chrome "duct tape" silver numbers and shoulder details, what looks like a bird wing or something. The pants feature some rather large Old English "L" logos on the hips, something adidas and Louisville have been using for their baseball uniforms. Arguably the most shocking element of these uniforms are the helmets. The lids feature the Old English "L" on the right side in the typical adidas chrome finish. The left side is where things get a little nuts. Louisville has always been given a tough time because their cardinal head logo has teeth. Well, they decided to forgo their traditional logo (for some reason) for this game and replaced it with a realistic illustration of a cardinal. The yellow eyes are what turn me off to the design. Ever since the reveal, I've referred to this design as "Laser Chicken," and I will certainly continue to do so.

Here's the most important line in that whole spiel: "As for Louisville, you already know what they're wearing. It was all over the place."

That's kinda what adidas and U of L are going for here, and it's working.

Will Muschamp confirms that Louisville not naming a starting quarterback has forced his defense to prepare for multiple guys, but he doesn't think it's that big of deal.

"I think they probably have a pretty good idea who their quarterback is," Muschamp said. "We'll prepare for what we need to be able to do to win the game".

The four-man competition among Will Gardner, Reggie Bonnafon, Kyle Bolin andLamar Jackson continues in Kentucky, where coach Bobby Petrino previously said he would like to name a starter two weeks before the season opener.

Bonnafon, a dual-threat quarterback, was the favorite entering preseason camp. Bonnafon threw for 864 yards and five touchdowns with four interceptions, and rushed for 164 yards and five scores last season. Garner is a prototypical quarterback who threw for 1,669 yards and 12 touchdowns in 2014.

It doesn't appear Auburn is using multiple scout team quarterbacks in its hush-hush, behind-closed-doors practices this week.

"Schematically, there's not a whole lot of difference in the things that they do in the throwing game, especially, but certainly the quarterback's legs are always a concern," Muschamp said. "You've got to get ready for the quarterback run game."

Even so, Muschamp is getting his guys ready for a bunch of Louisville "unknowns."

Teddy Bridgewater finished his preseason 29 of 35 (82.9 percent) for 295 yards with 1 touchdown and no interceptions. That's, uh, that's pretty good. Imagine when he gets Adrian Peterson in the backfield two weeks from now.

The Corey Ray hype is too real.

Right now I'd say Corey Ray of Louisville https://t.co/iSUqZn53YU

— keithlaw (@keithlaw) August 30, 2015

Athlon has four Cardinals on its list of the best players in the ACC for 2015. They all play defense.

If you're just about to burst with Louisville excitement and don't think you can hold it all in until this weekend, go to the men's soccer game tonight and get a free poster.

Check out our new schedule posters featuring @ben_strong5! They're free to the first 1,000 fans at tonight's game. pic.twitter.com/gwvD9IhfCJ

— UofL Men's Soccer (@UofLmenssoccer) August 31, 2015

The Cards will host nationally ranked Stanford at 7:30 p.m.

DeVante Parker is back at practice for the Miami Dolphins today, and still hopes to play in the team's season-opener in a couple of Sundays.

Paul Finebaum is not buying the SEC Network's Kentucky hype.

Here is ur laugh 4 the day. This just happened on ESPNHD-- Kentucky Football. #L1C4 #CardNation pic.twitter.com/wU5LkyLuXQ

— caribbeanchic (@caribbeanchic) August 30, 2015

Matt Elam, on the other hand...

Forget Those 8-4 Predictions We Going 12-0 !! It's Game Week #BBN We Ready !!!

— Matt Elam™6⃣9⃣ (@FballIsLife69) August 31, 2015

Awesome.

In the last week I've had dreams that Louisville started the season 0-3 and that they blew a 24-3 lead in the season-opener .... against Notre Dame. My college basketball dreams wound up being eerily accurate last March, so if someone proposes subbing Auburn out for Notre Dame at some point this week, let's push extra hard to keep that from happening.

Also dreamed I was trying to trim our shrubs but couldn't hold onto the hedge trimmer. That's not nearly as relevant though.

Just when you're thinking, "man, it's finally the first day of Auburn game week. How could this possibly get any better?" Earl Clark announces on Instagram that he's running for President in 2020.

Top Of The Morning Look Out 20-20-20 #teamgrindharder

A video posted by 6_eazy (@6_eazy) on Aug 31, 2015 at 5:33am PDT

Fox Sports' Stewart Mandel talks to the C-J about why he's so high on Louisville this year, and for the future.

Why in general do you think Louisville is going to have a really good year?

First of all, it starts with the fact that I think FSU and Clemson might have a bit of a down year, relatively speaking. A down year for FSU might be 10-2. I just think both those teams are going through a lot of transition at key positions. Louisville obviously lost a lot of guys to the NFL as well, but I have a lot of faith in (coach) Bobby Petrino in the second year of a program to really get things ratcheted up on offense. And the strength of that team is clearly going to be that front seven and on the defense. I think it's a good opportunity for them. The schedule sets up very nicely for them. I certainly don't think they're head and shoulders above FSU or Clemson. I think it'll be a very tight race. But I think this particular season is kind of a window of opportunity for them.

...

You answered a reader's email asking you which programs you think could win their first national championship sometime in the next 20 years, and you mentioned Louisville as one. Why did you think Louisville has the potential to be in that elite group in the future?

All the facilities and resources you could ever want are there. They've done it in basketball. And they've had a couple seasons in football where they were among the top five or top 10 in the country, so it's not that farfetched. But if somebody asked me that question five years ago, they would not have been in there. But getting into a Power Five conference was really the game-changer going forward. I don't know what college football will look like 20 years from now - or five years from now much less - but certainly after solidifying their future and being in a power conference is why I would feel confident putting them in a list like that.

Louisville's not naming starting offensive linemen, and Auburn's not naming its starting linebackers .

Where should the Johnny U statue go? Eric Crawford examines.

A quick reminder that if you're getting into Atlanta early enough, we'll be at Buckhead Tavern doing the radio show from 3-6.

@CardChronicle How drunk is too drunk to be at the broadcast at Buckhead Tavern Friday?

— Dennis Lynch (@dennisRlynch) August 31, 2015

Shaping up to be a memorable afternoon.

U of L checks in at No. 4 in the ACC Digital Network's first power poll of 2015.

It's not too late for U of L students to snag tickets to this Saturday's big game. Stop by the Student Involvement Office to purchase $20 tickets from U of L Student Government Association. Tickets will be on sale until Tuesday, September 1st. Tickets include admission to the game and bus ride to and from Atlanta the day of the game.

The WarBlogle.com folks give their season predictions, and do not think Louisville has much of a shot on Saturday.

Sept. 5 - Louisville - Any semblance of a Petrino-lover in the Auburn fanbase will be gone by the end of the 3rd quarter as Auburn opens it up and answers any questions about the defense early.

Worry level: 7. 

Score: Auburn 45, Louisville 20.

Both Louisville and Auburn are expected to play a number of newcomers on Saturday. Here are the nine Tigers that U of L fans should acclimate themselves with.

Love seeing this every late summer.

Louisville-Auburn is one of the top games of week one, but you already knew that.

DeShaun Watson compares himself to LeBron James, and Adam Kramer of Bleacher Report says he could be the star college football needs.

Bobby Petrino has been preparing for Auburn for a while, and the only man who has coached with both him and Gus Malzahn knows what that means.

"There are some (coaches) that are just as good but there's nobody better," Auburn running backs coach Tim Horton said.

Horton had a front row seat to the Petrino Show for four years at Arkansas, where the head coach led the Razorbacks to their first BCS game in school history before he crashed his motorcycle -- and his SEC career -- into a ditch in April 2012. The two will meet again when Auburn and Louisville open the season inside the Georgia Dome on Sept. 5.

"He's just a terrific coach and that's going to challenge our team because the one thing he always did when I coached with him for four years at Arkansas was he put a lot of emphasis and a lot of preparation time into that first game," Horton said. "Now we're the first game, so we know we're going to get their very best shot."

And finally, there have been a lot of questions here about all the Louisville events taking place in Atlanta this weekend. I'll have a full list of all the official and unofficial list of all the things going down once I get all that information, but for now, here's what U of L has planned.