Tuesday afternoon Cardinal news and notes

—Spread check: Florida State by 2.5.

—The FSU depth chart for Friday night is out.

—Florida State is looking to start a season 3-0 for the first time since 2015.

—The Louisville volleyball team bounced back from last week’s loss to Ohio State with sweeps of Lipscomb and No. 9 Purdue. The Cards are No. 3 in this week’s coaches poll.

—Victory highlight videos are back, baby.

—The ACC will be dropping its full schedule for the upcoming men’s basketball season this afternoon at 2.

—The Tomahawk Nation podcast previews Friday night’s game at Cardinal Stadium.

—I didn’t know how much I needed Shohei Ohtani rocking a Lamar Jackson jersey until I saw Shohei Ohtani rocking a Lamar Jackson jersey.

—Florida State set the tone for the entire week by going with Louisville transfers Jordan Travis and Jarrett Jackson as the models for its uniform reveal.

—The Louisville women’s basketball team has drawn Gonzaga for its first game in the Battle 4 Atlantis. It’ll be a rematch of last year’s second round game in the NCAA tournament.

—While the unit was far from perfect against UCF, the Louisville offense at least took a step forward from its performance against Syracuse.

—The 5th-ranked Louisville field hockey moved to 6-0 with a 2-1 win over No. 4 Michigan on Sunday.

—Louisville-Central Florida was ESPN2’s most-viewed Friday night game in nearly a decade.

—Mark Blankenbaker over at The Crunch Zone writes about Florida State’s “Louisville envy.”

—In his latest U of L hoops newsletter, Jeff Greer says Kenny Payne and company are finally gaining a little bit of momentum on the recruiting trail.

First up: Four-star 7-footer Isaiah Miranda, who is 33rd in the Class of 2023 247Sports Composite rankings. The big fella will be in Louisville over the weekend for an official visit as he considers the Cards among his final eight schools. The rest of his list: Connecticut, Georgetown, Oregon, Rhode Island, Texas, UCLA and USC.

Then, four-star swingman Curtis Williams will be in Louisville the following weekend, with his visit ending the day before he plans to announce his commitment (Sept. 19). He is considering Alabama, Florida State, Providence and Xavier, but Louisville is thought to be the frontrunner at this point.

Regardless of how these particular visits go, the larger point is that the wheel is now turning — publicly. While a lot still has to play out — where have you gone, DJ Wagner? Our nation turns its lonely eyes to you — we were all starting to wonder when a fuller picture might emerge from underneath the surface. I wrote about this earlier in the summertime, the dangers of the high-wire “we got this” act, but as more information trickles out, there are fewer pins and needles about recruiting. That’s a good thing, right? Yes, that’s a good thing, especially with the football struggles. Hope is a powerful tool. Concrete hoops recruiting news has arrived at the perfect time.

—100 college basketball coaches were asked who the best hire of the college basketball offseason was. There was no runaway winner, but Shaheen Holloway at Seton Hall received the most votes. Kenny Payne received 4% of the vote.

—The Louisville men’s soccer team opened its ACC season with a 2-1 loss to No. 7 Duke.

—Always a good sign when you’ve got mom throwing up the L at the end of a visit.

—College basketball coaches, like all other humans, are almost universally against tweaking the NCAA tournament.

—Coaches are far more split on whether or not the sport should move from a 30-second shot clock to a 24-second one.

—Top U of L PG recruit AJ Johnson apparently had a great visit to Texas over the weekend. Chris Beard doesn’t lose many of these when he goes all in, so this development is more than a bit unnerving.

—Louisville Report’s Matt McGavic shares some final thoughts on Louisville’s win over UCF.

-Not only did the defensive coaches make the right adjustments, their players rose to the occasion and executed their assignments extremely well. This wasn’t a game where a single player was a one-man wrecking crew, this was a game where multiple defensive players had great games. The front seven in particular had several guys stand out. YaYa Diaby looked particularly disruptive, and had a huge tackle late in the third quarter on Plumlee that prevented him from scrambling for a first down. Ramon Puryear, MoMo Sanogo and Dorian Jones also did a great job at getting in the backfield and putting the pressure on Plumlee.

-Even with the success that the front seven had with generating pressure, some players in this area of the field are having slow starts to season. Monty Montgomery had a horrible game against Syracuse and looked undisciplined in the first half against UCF before having a better second half, Yasir Abdullah’s early impact hasn’t been as dominant as expected (although offenses are accounting for his presence with an abundance of double teams), and Dezmond Tell will absolutely have to step up with Jermayne Lole out for the year. The schedule only gets harder from here on out, so the D-line and linebackers will need to have a more complete performance.

—There had been reports that U of L RB commit Rueben Owens would be visiting Texas A&M this weekend, but he said on his Instagram today that this visit is no longer happening.

—The U of L women’s golf team will open its season this week at the Cougar Classic in Charleston, S.C.

—Everything you need to know about week two in the ACC in two minutes (video).

—The man is the best.

—Our guy LJ Nesbitt is back with his own U of L sports website. He writes about the win over Central Florida here.

—FSU linebacker Tatum Bethune talked with the media after practice on Monday and had Malik Cunningham on his mind.

It seemed that Cardinals quarterback Malik Cunningham was on everyone’s minds today after practice and Bethune mentioned the challenges he presents.

“Malik you know he’s a good quarterback he knows how to extend plays, he’s very athletic. We just gotta get him on the ground. When you get him on the ground he’s not going to be able to do any plays.” adding, “That’s my biggest deal just to get him on the ground and being calm when he comes at you. He know how to make guys miss a lot so he’s a very athletic dude so I know he’s going to pull the ball a lot and tuck it and run so that’s going to be the biggest thing is to get him on the ground.”

—FSU head coach Mike Norvell also addressed the media on Monday.

—You can keep tabs on the schedules for all the early season college basketball events with this link.

—Four-star U of L commit Adonijah Green talks about what he and the rest of Louisville’s 2023 class are trying to do in this video:

—Could flex scheduling be coming to college basketball?

—Cardinal Authority looks at how the members of the Louisville football recruiting class fared in their high school games last week.

—If you’re headed to Cardinal Stadium Friday night, here’s a quick guide to the changes/improvements you should expect to experience.

—The Kentucky Humane Society has taken in so many animals they’re temporarily waving adoption fees to try and make more room.

—Kenny Payne has offered class of 2024 5-star Trentyn Flowers.

—Montrezl Harrell will be No. 5 with his new team, the Philadelphia 76ers.

—I’ll never get tired of seeing these pictures.

—U of L volleyball has landed a big commitment from Ava Utterback out of Indianapolis.

—The ACC is looking for creative sources of revenue. An ESPN senior executive has ideas.

—Here’s Florida State defensive coordinator Adam Fuller on the challenges that Malik Cunningham and the Cardinal offense present:

“I think Malik has done it for a long period of time in a dynamic way in this league, I think he’s got everybody’s respect around the country. He plays every week, he’s the leading rusher, you know, he is a dynamic playmaker. He’s beat people over the top with the football he’s beat people running the football, he’s beat people making good decisions, he’s one of the better players in the country and it’s important for us to play as a team against him.”

When asked about what Louisville does schematically Fuller said it starts with Cunningham.

“I think number one, he’s that dynamic mover and athlete so I think there are a lot of offenses that fit his skillset. I think traditionally they’ve been a really good running football team, they run the stretch as well as anybody. If you run the ball that sets up other things, whether it’s him pulling the ball and going the other way, whether its routes coming back against the grain, whether its misdirection plays off of run action. When you can set up things off of your major play which they do, it creates misdirection plays. They’ve done a nice job of creating big plays over the years with that offense.”

—Spot on Florida says Friday night’s game for FSU is more about the ‘Noles than it is the Cardinals.

—U of L has received a $3.7 million grant to further viral research in hopes of combatting the next pandemic

—I’ll just never understand it.

—Wednesday night’s volleyball Battle of the Bluegrass between No. 3 Louisville and No. 13 Kentucky will start at 7 p.m. and will be carried nationally on ESPN. Here’s a preview.

—The U of L baseball team will host fall exhibitions against Miami of Ohio this Saturday and Purdue next Saturday.

—Cards would have won the 2020 College World Series.

—Louisville is No. 9 in Matt McGavic’s latest ACC power rankings.

—NoleGameday explores Friday night’s key matchups.

3. Turnover Battle

The turnover battle is always a key component in any sport. Florida State has done a good job of taking care of the football and that will need to continue this week. Jordan Travis hasn’t thrown an interception this season. However, Travis and running back Treshaun Ward did have the toss blunder at the goal line at the end of the LSU game.

Louisville quarterback Malik Cunningham threw two interceptions and lost two fumbles against Syracuse. He rebounded for a turnover-free game in the win over UCF. There may be opportunities for the ‘Noles to make a few big plays on the defensive side of the ball if they can put pressure on Cunningham.

Expect Travis and the offense to make protecting the football an emphasis during a crucial road game.

This week can be viewed as a potential trap game for Florida State. If the Seminoles can hold on and win, it’ll show the maturity the program has made under head coach Mike Norvell. FSU will play Louisville on Friday on ESPN at 7:30 pm est.

—The Cardinal Authority podcast looks ahead to Friday night’s game.

—Former U of L QB and current FSU starter Jordan Travis talks about returning to the Derby City here (video).

—This is actually kinda sad.

—This weekly college football gambling show begins its week three discussion with Louisville-Florida State.

—The FSU Rivals site has a podcast previewing the Louisville game.

—Pay this man.

—The CJ lays out the five best area high school football games of week five.

—A high majority of the College Football News staff is taking Florida State to beat Louisville. That’s fine, we’ve got Clucko the Chicken on our side.

—And finally, the Mike Rutherford Show is live from the U of L College of Business Studio from 3-6 this afternoon on 1450 The Big X. You can stream the show here.