No. 6 Louisville scores 44 straight to beat Wake Forest, 44-12



By Howie Lindsey

On a big night for upsets in college football, No. 6 Louisville scored 44 straight points to come from behind to beat upset-minded Wake Forest 44-12 Saturday night at Papa John's Cardinal Stadium in Louisville, Ky.

"It was a good win for us," Louisville coach Bobby Petrino said. "Very happy with our team. A little different style than we've been winning. We've been getting ahead early and having success early in the first half, but today it took the second half to go win the game."

After an uncharacteristically poor first-half offensive performance that saw Louisville (9-1) net just a lone field goal, the Cardinals got rolling in the second half to stymie the upset bid of the Demon Deacons (6-4).

"I'm disappointed... it appears we got blown out when we had the lead going into the fourth quarter," Wake Forest coach Dave Clawson said.

After scoring just three points in the first half, Louisville's offense got rolling near the end of the third quarter. And rolling might be an understatement.

Brandon Radcliff scored three second-half touchdowns and the Cardinals scored an astounding 44 unanswered points, including 34 in the fourth quarter.

"We are so used to starting off fast and scoring on our first drives" Louisville quarterback Lamar Jackson said.

Jackson finished with 153 yards rushing and 145 yards passing with a touchdown. "We weren't really used to messing up so many times, with turnovers; I even had a turnover. Missed assignments, we weren't playing our game at first and then the second half came and we started executing and just regained focus, so it all played out."

The Cardinals finally broke into the end zone with a 55-yard run for a touchdown by Radcliff with 7:30 left in the third quarter. Radcliff's run, and the ensuing extra point by Blanton Creque, cut Wake Forest's lead to 12-10.

Creque had a chance to give Louisville a lead, but his 43-yard field goal try sailed wide left with 4:21 left in the third quarter.



Louisville took its first lead of the game on a 7-yard touchdown run by Radcliff with 10:35 left. Radcliff's run capped a nine-play, 65-yard touchdown drive that was kept alive when Jackson found Reggie Bonnafon for a 12-yard gain on fourth-and-4 from the Wake Forest 34-yard line. Louisville's two-point conversion failed, leaving the score at 16-12.



After a defensive stop, Louisville's Devante Peete blocked a Wake Forest punt, giving Louisville the ball at the Wake Forest. Radcliff scored his third touchdown of the night four plays later to put Louisville ahead 23-12 with 7:36 left.

With 4:05 left in the fourth quarter, Jackson added a 2-yard touchdown pass to tight end Cole Hikutini to put Louisville up 30-12 after the extra point.

An interception and 32-yard return by Ronald Walker added insurance to Louisville's substantial lead with 3:44 left. A 2-yard run by Malik Williams pushed Louisville's lead to 44-12 with just 50 seconds left on the clock.

As raucous as the fourth quarter was for Louisville's offense, the first half was extremely dismal. Three lost fumbles and several other miscues derailed Louisville's typically potent offensive attack in the first half.

"Well we never had our head down," Jackson said. "We were in the game at 10-3 and we knew we were down by a touchdown, 12-3 or something like that. We just stay with it, and stay together and just stay poised and try to go out there and win the game."

The Cardinals entered the game No. 1 in scoring offense (50.2 points per game) and total offense (593.4 yards), but were at minus-9 yards after their first three drives combined. The Cardinals ran only 25 plays in the first half and totaled 128 yards due in large part to four fumbles.

"I feel like everyone on the sideline was ready for someone to get a play to put the momentum on our side," Radcliff said. "That was the biggest thing for us, just changing the momentum. They were up the whole time. We were making errors on offense. We just needed to make some big plays on offense so we could change the momentum from their side to ours."

Meanwhile, Wake Forest took advantage of the short fields to kick four field goals on its five first-half drives. Mike Weaver kicked a 37-yarder after Louisville's first fumble, a 45-yarder on Wake's second drive, a 33-yarder after Louisville's second fumble and a 38-yarder with 2:49 left until halftime.

Louisville's offense didn't wake up until just before halftime, when it used a hurry-up drive to reach the Wake Forest 11 with 44 seconds left. The Cardinals avoided a scoreless first half on a 28-yard field goal by Creque with 18 seconds left.

"So really it was a game of two halves," Clawson said. "In the first half, I thought our guys came out ready to go. We were up 12-0 and then we gave up 44 consecutive points. ... And you know first half, we moved the ball up and down the field, and in second half we couldn't get anything going offensively."

NOTES: Louisville did not score in the first quarter for the second time this season (Oct. 1 versus Clemson). ... The Cardinals outscored the opposition 129-23 in the first quarter this season. ... Louisville's previous low-scoring half of the season was seven points versus Virginia on Oct. 29. ... Cardinals QB Lamar Jackson, the prohibitive favorite for the Heisman Trophy, completed 4 of 9 passes for 46 yards and rushed for 65 yards in the first half, his lowest offensive output for a half this season. ... Louisville improves to 13-0 under Bobby Petrino against teams from North Carolina. ... Lamar Jackson set an ACC record for rushing yards by a QB in a season with 1,334. The old ACC record was 1,184 yards by Boston College's Tyler Murphy in 2014.