LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Here is what’s at stake when No. 9 Clemson takes on Louisville tonight (7:30) at Papa John’s Stadium in Louisville, Ky.

It is the first real test for the Tigers, who were predicted back in July as the favorite to win the ACC this year. Clemson comes into tonight’s game with a 2-0 record after outscoring Wofford and App State 90-20 in the first two games.

But just how good are these Tigers? Are they ready to make a run at their first ACC title in four years, and are they truly a team that should be considered as a contender for one of college football’s four playoff spots?

Louisville comes in just looking for a win after dropping two heartbreakers to open the season against Auburn and Houston. No one expected the Cardinals to be 0-2 coming into its ACC opener, but here they are playing for their season in just the third week.

“A wounded animal is a dangerous animal,” Clemson co-offensive coordinator and running backs coach Tony Elliott said. “Their back is in the corner. Obviously, they are going to be playing at home. They should be 2-0 and they believe they should be 2-0, and they are going to be ready to prove it.”

Clemson is going to be looking to prove it is worthy of all the preseason hype and its current No. 9 ranking. Many of the so-called experts believe the Tigers are too young and have too many question marks on offense and defense to be a true contender in the ACC race.

Though the defense has looked dominant in the first two games, there are doubters this year’s group cannot possibly be as good as last year’s No. 1 ranked defense, which lost nine starters, many of which are on current NFL rosters.

“Our first group has been dominant. I mean, they’ve really played as I expected them to play, with very little drop-off from what we had last year,” Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney said. “They’ve really played well. But we are a very different makeup on that side of the ball from where we were last year. I mean, we had, what, 10 guys go to the NFL from that defense, get shots at the NFL, six D-linemen.

“We lost a lot of good players, and these guys that are starting were here last year, too, so we had a lot of great experienced, talented depth. And this year we have the talent and the depth, we just are so inexperienced with our backups.”

That inexperienced showed in the second half in both of its first two games. Wofford and App State got most of their yards against the Tigers backups. Both were held under 100 yards of total offense against Clemson’s first-team defense in the opening half when the games were all but put away by halftime. However, once the starters went out, Wofford and App State finished the games with 213 and 298 total yards respectively.

The second team defense was also responsible for giving up all 20 points.

“We’re very fortunate that we’ve got the front-line guys that we have, and hopefully we can stay healthy over there and allow us to have some time to just continue to get some of these young guys some experience,” Swinney said. “I think after the first two games, that’s been one of the big, big positives for us is a lot of the D-linemen that we’ve played, a lot of the guys in the secondary, a couple of the young linebackers, they’ve all been able to get their feet wet a little bit, and that’s certainly going to accelerate their development.”

The Cardinals just want to get their running game going, which could be hard to do against Clemson’s interior line. With all that has been made about the quarterback situation, the running game, or the lack thereof, is really want is hurting the Louisville offense.

Take away quarterbacks Lamar Jackson’s and Reggie Bonnafon’s 136 rushing yards, and the Cardinals running backs have rushed for just 172 yards in two games and are averaging just 3.5 yards per carry. Of course part of that can be blamed on a young offensive line that is starting one true freshman and has three playing on its two-deep depth chart. The Cardinals also have a sophomore who is starting.

“We’ve been working hard on the running game, on our assignments and our technique, our pad level,” Louisville head coach Bobby Petrino said. “Our running back is hitting the hole on time, and blocking downfield, which I think our receivers have been doing a good job of. But it’s still a work in progress.”

So too has been the Cardinals’ defense. They have struggled at times in both games, though more against Houston where there were missed assignments up front, linebackers not staying within their gaps and the secondary blowing coverages and allowing wide receivers to run wide open.

Louisville has allowed 32.5 points and 394.5 total yards in its first two games this season.

“It’s been a number of things,” Petrino said. “One is being sound in our gap control and playing our responsibility and not trying to do too much and relying on our teammate. The other one is to tackle better and do a better job of wrapping up and not letting people get yards after contact.”

But Clemson has some questions on offense too, despite averaging 45 points and 462.5 yards per game. First off starting center Ryan Norton will not play tonight after suffering an MCL sprain in his right knee in Monday’s practice. That means junior Jay Guillermo will get the start at center as he will try to help an offensive line that struggled to run the ball with any consistency against App State.

The Tigers had just 140 rushing yards against the Mountaineers and for a while struggled to get out of their own way. App. State, who plays fronts similar to Louisville on the defensive line, shifted and moved around a lot, which confused Clemson’s young offensive line, especially in the first quarter.

“Our offensive line is a group that we’re really excited about, but you know, we think we’ve got more depth there than we’ve had in a long time, but we do have a lot of young guys,” Swinney said. “We’ve got a true freshman at left tackle, got a sophomore at right guard, so I’m anxious to see those guys continue to get better as they get more and more challenged going through this season.”

And that first challenge begins tonight.