Monday afternoon Cardinal news and notes

—Despite some reports to the contrary over the weekend, Mackenzie Mgbako IS set to visit Louisville this Friday-Sunday.

With RJ Luis headed to St. John’s and Churchill Abass to DePaul, it’s all eyes on Mgbako for Louisville’s final 2023-24 scholarship.

—DraftKings has set the over/under win total for Louisville football this season at 7.5.

—David Cobb of CBS shares one overreaction for every ACC football team after spring practice.

Louisville

The Cardinals will match or exceed Scott Satterfield’s best win total: Louisville’s defense won the spring game 51-30, and that should be encouraging since you know first-year coach Jeff Brohm is going to produce a solid offensive product. Satterfield moved on to Cincinnati after four seasons, and Brohm, a beloved native son, has entered. Louisville maxed out at eight wins (twice) under Satterfield, but it looks like the Cardinals should be able to match or exceed that total in Year 1 under Brohm. One of the most obvious reasons is the addition of former Purdue and Cal quarterback Jack Plummer, who threw for 3,095 yards, 21 touchdowns and nine interceptions with the Bears last season after spending four years in Brohm’s system at Purdue. If he could post those types of numbers in Cal’s woeful scheme, he should rack up monster stats at Louisville in a system he already knows.

—On3 has dropped Mackenzie Mgbako from a 5-star to a 4-star prospect, which means he’s definitely coming to Louisville.

—Former Trinity High School baseball star Brandon Pfaadt made his Major League debut with the Diamondbacks last Wednesday.

—Love this tweet from Jeff Walz (and the comments from Dana).

—BetOnline has dropped the U of L men’s basketball team’s odds of winning the 2024 national title from 200/1 to 150/1.

—Bronny James has committed to USC. What does that mean (Athletic link) for Andy Enfield and the Trojans?

—Speaking of USC, The Athletic has a scouting report of new Cardinal transfer commit Tre White.

A former top-50, four-star recruit who was seen as a sneaky potential one-and-done player entering the year if things really broke right, White was the upside swing that had potential to elevate the Trojans to different heights. A 6-foot-7 wing with real athleticism and scoring ability, White had a good year. He was an All-Freshman pick in the Pac-12 who averaged nine points, five rebounds and shot 47 percent from the field.

He’s physical as a driver and versatile in how you can use him across the two through four positions. Defensively, White was really good for a freshman and gave the team real size and athleticism on the wing to place next to another stout defender in Kobe Johnson, a solid scoring wing in Reese Dixon-Waters, and older 6-foot-8 scoring wing Drew Peterson. White was the one that could tie it all together at times, though. A two-way player with legitimate NBA upside whom scouts believe has a real shot to elevate into being a real prospect as soon as next season.

It’s kind of hard to overestimate how important this loss is for the Trojans. He’s the kind of versatile player whom teams hunt across the country to try to find, and one that I don’t think gets to his fourth year in college before turning pro.

—The Louisville baseball team currently has a strong RPI of 26, but if the season ended today, the Cardinals wouldn’t even make the ACC tournament. They’ll need a special final two weeks to lock up spots in both postseason tournaments.

—Congrats to the Cardinal freshman.

—CBS hands out some coaching hire grades for this college hoops offseason.

—Louisville Report looks back at the U of L football recruiting class of 2018.

—The Tennesseean looks at key moments from the Louisville-Vanderbilt “Battle of the Barrel” rivalry. The Cardinals and Commodores will square off in their annual regular season meeting Tuesday night.

—Josh Pate likes Louisville to win at least eight games in year one under Jeff Brohm.

—Louisville appears in the “just missed the cut” section in Stewart Mandel’s post-spring college football top 25.

—Mike James appears to be very excited about the addition of Tre White.

—College basketball teams have become increasingly reliant on the transfer portal, but a slew will still be relying heavily on freshmen for success. The upcoming college hoops season is setting up to be a referendum on roster-building philosophies.

—Some nice love for Bryan Hudson here.

—Louisville Report takes a look back at Jeff Walz’s recruiting class of 2018.

—There is a proposed change to the block/charge rule in men’s college basketball that could go into effect next season.

—All five participants in this Field of 68 podcast gave Kenny Payne less than a 50 percent chance of earning a third season at Louisville.

—I love that Brady takes the top step here. Power move.

—Jeff Walz recent voiced this message in support of NIL funding for the U of L women’s basketball program.

—There was officially a tornado in Louisville on Sunday.

—Louisville TE commit Dylan Mesman will take a visit to U of L in June.

—The Athletic’s Chantel Jennings says the verdict is still out on whether Jeff Walz and U of L were a winner or a loser in this offseason’s transfer portal madness.

Verdict is still out

Louisville

Key additions: Kiki Jefferson (JMU), Jayda Curry (Cal), Nina Rickards (Florida)

Key losses: Van Lith (LSU), Payton Verhulst (Oklahoma), Zyanna Walker (Kansas State), Jalyn Brown (Arizona State)

It’s hard to know where to place Louisville just yet. Verhulst was a midseason transfer, and Van Lith’s departure shocked many as it seemed she basically had the keys to the car at Louisville. In addition to those two, the Cardinals lost freshmen Walker and Brown, two former top-100 recruits who would’ve been able to grow within the program. But coach Jeff Walz has shown he can be an uber-effective portal recruiter, and he did it again. Jefferson was the Sun Belt player of the year after averaging 18.3 points, 7.9 rebounds and 2.9 assists. Curry is a former Pac-12 freshman of the year (2022) who averaged 15.5 points, 3.5 rebounds and 3.5 assists. Rickards comes to Louisville with four years of starting experience at Florida. Without Van Lith, the Cardinals will look and operate differently than the last three seasons. Whether that’s a plus or minus for the Cardinals remains to be seen.

—Louisville women’s hoops transfer Imani Lester is headed to Kansas State.

—Rick Bozich once again speaks glowingly of Kenny Payne’s offseason roster reconstruction.

—Both Andrea Adelson and David Hale think Louisville was the ACC’s biggest winner during the spring transfer portal window.

—Racing Lou took a frustrating 1-0 loss to Orlando over the weekend.

—The Louisville softball team will be the No. 4 seed for this week’s ACC tournament. The Cards will face No. 5 Virginia Tech on Thursday at 1:30 p.m. in quarterfinal play.

—And finally, the Mike Rutherford Show returns this afternoon form 3-6 on 1450 The Big X. We’ll react to the big news of the weekend, and at 3:30 will be joined by Louisville native Damon Stinson, one of the owners of Kentucky Derby winner Mage. You can stream the show here.