Louisville beat Wake Forest 44-12 this past Saturday, though it was a classic “closer than the score appears” game. Wake was winning 12-0 at one point, and went into the fourth quarter up 12-10 before Louisville blithely stepped on the gas. Nonetheless, it would have been a mere footnote of a game if not for what happened afterward.
According to various reports, Wake Forest coaches discovered after the game that Louisville had left documents around their home stadium that showed they were aware of plays that Wake Forest had never previously run in a game. Per Dan Wolken of USA Today:
Wake Forest football staff members discovered materials left behind by Louisville last Saturday that showed the Cardinals were prepared for plays the Demon Deacons had not run before, raising suspicions of a security breach, a person with knowledge of the situation told USA TODAY Sports.
Wake Forest confirmed that they’re investigating the situation, but have not publicly stated how they believe Louisville may have gotten the information. One possibility is that Wake Forest has an aspiring Edward Snowden somewhere in its coaching staff. A more fun and entirely plausible scenario, given that we’re dealing with Bobby Petrino, is that Louisville somehow spied on Wake Forest’s practices.
Petrino released a statement essentially saying that he runs a program of integrity, which I don’t think anyone is going to buy.
Though one might point out that the No. 5 ranked Cardinals would not need any extra help to beat frickin’ Wake Forest, using subterfuge against a lowly opponent is exactly the sort of thing done by serial cheaters. Remember that the entire Spygate controversy stemmed from a game in which the Patriots illegally videotaped signals sent by a Jets team that would end up finishing the season 4-12.
In any event, Louisville has been a complete wrecking machine this season, but it doesn’t exactly speak highly of their coaching staff that they were losing to Wake in the fourth quarter despite potentially knowing about plays that had never even shown up on tape. Free Lamar Jackson.