By Will Vandervort.
Here is an inside look at the Clemson-Louisville series as the No. 25 Clemson Tigers host the Louisville Cardinals on Saturday at Death Valley. The game will be televised by ESPNU at 3:30 p.m.
About the Louisville Cardinals: Louisville has won three straight games, including the last two games in the ACC. The Cardinals are led by Eli Rogers as the top receiver for Louisville with 24 receptions for 259 yards. He has 155 career receptions for 1,654 yards. The X-factor in Saturday’s game is DeVante Parker, a senior who has not played this year due to a broken foot and is questionable for Saturday. Through his junior year he had 113 receptions for 1,920 yards and 28 touchdowns. Last year he had 12 touchdown receptions to set a school record.
The Louisville offense: Louisville has played two quarterbacks this year. Senior Will Gardner has thrown for 798 yards and eight touchdowns in four games and has completed 56 percent of his passes. True freshman Reggie Bonnafon went the distance at Syracuse and has played the last two games while Gardner recovers from a knee injury. Bonnafon has thrown for 531 yards and two scores. He has completed 57 percent of his passes. The Cardinals rank 13th in the ACC in total offense.
The Louisville defense: So far this year Louisville leads the nation in total defense, allowing just 230 yards per game. They are also first in rushing defense, allowing just 58.3 yards per game, and total interceptions with 12. They are second in yards per play allowed with a 3.75 figure and second in yards per rush allowed at 2.01.
Records: Clemson 3-2, 2-1 ACC; Louisville 5-1, 3-1 ACC
Series record: This will the first meeting.
Stat worth noting: Deshaun Watson has thrown for 702 yards and eight touchdowns in two starts. That is the most passing yards in the first two games of a Clemson quarterback’s career as a starter. Charlie Whitehurst, now with the Tennessee Titans, had the previous mark with 692 yards. Watson has tied Whitehurst’s record for touchdown passes in a quarterback’s first two starts. Whitehurst had four against Duke and North Carolina, both on the road, in his first two starts. For the year, Watson has completed 76-106 passes for 1,181 yards and 12 touchdowns with just one interception. That competes to an efficiency rating of 197.9, second best in the nation behind Oregon’s Marcus Mariota, who is at 205. Watson leads the nation in yards per pass attempt with an 11.1 figure and is fourth in touchdown/interception ratio and 10th in completion percentage (.689).
Second stat worth noting: Vic Beasley tied the Clemson career sack record in grand style last Saturday when he had a sack, forced a fumble, recovered fumble and scored a touchdown all on the same play in the win over NC State. That was Beasley’s 28th career sack, tied for the most in Clemson history with Michael Dean Perry (1984-87) and Gaines Adams (2003-06). So his next sack will break the record. Beasley has had a remarkable run to the record when you consider he has started just 18 games in his career. All 28 of his sacks have come in his last 31 games. It is amazing to think that in 2010 he was the scout team quarterback as the Tigers prepared to play Georgia Tech. And what is really remarkable is the negative yardage he accounts for when he makes those big plays. His 28 sacks at Clemson have accounted for 218 lost yards for the opponent, the most in school history. It is also the most by an active FBS player….by 84 yards. Andre Monroe of Maryland has the second most negative yards on sacks with 134. The same goes for Beasley’s tackle for loss totals. The Clemson graduate has 39 tackles for loss in his career for 257 yards. No other FBS player has more than 175 lost yards on his tackles for loss.
Third stat worth noting: The Cardinals are the first of three straight home games for Clemson where the opponent will be making their first appearance in Death Valley. Louisville is the 54th different team to come to Memorial Stadium and the Tigers are 39-13-1 against those teams when the visitor is making its first appearance. But, it has been especially difficult to beat Clemson in that first meeting since 1978. In the last 37 years Clemson is 23-2 against teams making their first appearance in Memorial Stadium. The only teams to win their first game here since 1998 are Marshall (13-10 winners over Clemson in 1999 in Tommy Bowden’s first game as Clemson coach) and Miami (FL) (36-30 wins over Clemson in 2005 in triple overtime, the longest game in Clemson history.