Friday afternoon Cardinal news and notes

—Spread check: Louisville by 7.

—The latest episode of the CC Podcast is here.

—Louisville is Pittsburgh’s Homecoming game, and Panthers will be wearing all blue tomorrow night to celebrate.

—The Athletic’s ACC power rankings have Louisville at No. 3.

—We’ve got some new Cardinal player billboards poppin’ up across the city.

—Jamari Thrash makes On3’s midseason all-transfer portal offensive team. Devin Neal is on the defensive team.

—Louisville Report’s Matt McGavic looks at the key storylines ahead of Saturday’s Louisville-Pitt game.

—Making Louisville one dimensional is a tall task for this Pitt defense.

Yes, Jordan has been excellent in bouncing runs outside (25 carries for 214 yards and two touchdowns on runs around either end), but he’s been pretty darn effective in just about every phase — running up the middle, off the guards, off the tackles, out in space, whatever. He’s averaging nearly eight yards a carry. And that’s no coincidence.

And to the other point, Cards’ quarterback Jack Plummer has not had many designed rush attempts this season. In fact, most — just about all — of his rush attempts come in the form of scrambles. He’s not a statue, but he’s also not Malik Cunningham either. But he is throwing the ball very well.

“It’s a balance,” Narduzzi said Monday at his weekly news conference. “You’ve got to play both. They’re having success in the run game and the passing game. So, it is a lot more balanced. However, you look at Virginia Tech, and they averaged almost 12 yards per pass and 3.4 yards per run. It looked like it was the opposite, but it wasn’t.”

—The fifth-ranked Louisville field hockey team gets a major opportunity this afternoon at No. 2 Duke.

—Eric Crawford and Rick Bozich discuss Louisville-Pitt.

—It’s a monster night for Louisville volleyball, which will play host to rival Pitt in a matchup of top 10 foes who met in last year’s Final Four.

Tickets are still available here, but if you can’t make it out to the Yum Center, the match will be carried live on ESPNU.

—Big Red Louie has three keys for the Cardinal offense against Pitt.

—The U of L women’s soccer team is headed to Boston College.

—It’s game day even and we’ve got (presumably) Pat Narduzzi out here DM’ing the Bring Brohm Home guy.

What a world.

—Ashton Gillotte sits at No. 2 in the country in QB hurries.

—The Louisville women’s swim and dive team is No. 3 in this week’s coaches poll. The men’s team is No. 12.

—AVCA.org is keeping tabs on where to watch this weekend’s top volleyball matches, including Louisville vs. Pitt.

—Interesting move by U of L here to drum up an increase in hoops ticket sales.

—The last three times a Jeff Brohm coached team has beaten a top 10 opponent, Brohm’s squad has lost the next weekend. It’s an understandable storyline going into this weekend, but it’s also worth mentioning that Brohm’s team was an underdog in all three of those “letdown” performances.

—Louisville may have totally derailed Notre Dame’s 2023 season.

—The CJ staff makes some picks for tonight’s area high school football games.

—Do not care much for this thread.

—Despite all of that, Athlon is predicting a 36-16 Louisville victory.

—Tim Sullivan shares his thoughts on the Louisville football team’s upset of Notre Dame.

—This is a good read from The Athletic on the job that Mike Elko has been able to do at Duke.

—Our guy CardinalStrong has been feeling it this week.

—The U of L men’s tennis team logged nine total wins on the first day of the ITA Regional Ohio Valley Championships on Thursday.

—The latest episode of the Starting 502 podcast is here.

—Churchill Bounds makes Trilly Donovan’s All-Name team for the upcoming college basketball season. Should’ve been a Cardinal.

—Spencer Hall has a way with words.

—If the expanded playoff existed this season, Andy Staples projects a first round matchup between Louisville and Ohio State in Columbus.

—The latest From the Pink Seats podcast is here.

—Devin Neal is the Prairie Farms Dairy student athlete of the week.

—The State of Louisville says that style points now matter for U of L football.

—The next task for Brohm and company is to have this hot start carry over into the recruiting world.

—Updated bowl projections for the Cards are here.

—Cardinal Authority is keeping up with where U of L’s football commitments are playing this weekend.

—Louisville’s recent history on Oct. 14 is ... a little scary.

You’ve got the Brett Favre Hail Mary game, a road loss to Wyoming(?), the Kerry Rhodes interception drop game against Miami, and the Boston College game that had me send the original “Whatever, I was already dead inside” tweet.

Let’s fix these vibes in about 24 hours.

—Sports Illustrated’s Richard Johnson breaks down the best college football games of the weekend.

—The LEO has five things to do around Louisville this weekend.

—Greg McElroy dives into the “chaos scenario” of Louisville, North Carolina and Florida State all potentially finishing the year 8-0 in ACC play.

—And finally, beat Pitt.