Cards turn to Defense

[bullwark]

With an offense that could become one of the nation's best, University of Louisville football coach Bobby Petrino knows that one of the biggest obstacles between his team and a special season could be its development on defense.

Offense is Petrino's specialty. Always will be. He admits that, even embraces it, heading into his second season  which kicked off with the first practice yesterday.

But during the off-season, he reached out to embrace his defensive players even more than he did a year ago. He isn't likely to morph into a defensive guru, but neither is he willing to suffer the fate of the University of Kentucky's offense-only Hal Mumme, whose lack of interest in defense had a detrimental effect on that side of the ball.

"What you'd like to see (the players) do is take your personality as a coach and play that way," Petrino said. "We've done a good job of that here offensively. Now we've got to do a better job of it defensively."

Although he isn't drawing up defensive schemes, Petrino has worked to let his defensive players know that he's there.

"Oh yeah, we know he's watching," senior safety Kerry Rhodes said. "Coach Petrino is a great offensive coach, but he's also a great football coach. He has a certain way he wants us to play. And that's the biggest thing he wants to see from us. He wants us fast, smart, hard-nosed and aggressive."

Rhodes, like most of his defensive teammates, can rattle off an ugly string of numbers from last season.

An average of 40.4 points surrendered over the season's final five games.

Ranking last in Conference USA and 14th from the bottom nationally in passing defense at 258.3 yards per game.

Failing to stop opponents from scoring 39 times in 49 possessions inside UofL's 20-yard line.

Giving up 361 points, the fourth-highest total in school history.

"We're real tired of hearing them, to tell you the truth," Rhodes said. "But they are what they are. We gave them up, so now the only thing to do about it is go out on the field and prove we're better."

But Petrino said the numbers don't tell the whole story.

The U of L defense was a sieve in the first half of the Cards' GMAC Bowl loss to Miami of Ohio, but the Cards trailed by only a touchdown going into the fourth quarter.

The Cards gave up 45 points to a Houston team that was one of the nation's better offensive units but yielded only 14 second-half points. In a 31-28 loss at Texas Christian, the defense gave up just 10 second-half points.

"I think we're better than the numbers looked," Petrino said. "You look at it and see the strengths that we have, and we have to utilize those. We're going to be a fast defense, and we've got to run to the ball. And we have to develop an attitude that we can go three-and-out and get the offense the ball back."

Petrino said his main goal is to instill a winning attitude within each unit of his team.

"It's real important as a head coach that you develop that relationship with all the players," he said. "Our defensive players know that when we go out on the practice field, I'm going to spend the majority of my time over on the offense and working with that. That's something I don't want to take away from. And yet I know I need to be a presence over on defense to help that develop and improve."

Notes

Sophomore Michael Bush saw action at five positions during yesterday's opening practice  tailback, fullback, wide receiver, safety and outside linebacker.

Three freshman signees did not report. Bobby Buchanan, a defensive back and younger brother of former U of L star Ray Buchanan, is expected to wait until spring to enroll. Offensive lineman Josh Waller and defensive end Anthony Douglas also were absent, and their status is uncertain.

Petrino thought quarterbacks Stefan LeFors, a senior, and Brian Brohm, a freshman, were a bit out of sync but said that's not unusual for the first day.

"Our defense was playing a lot of tight press coverage, and normally on the first day you come and try to make things easy," Petrino said. "But we actually are trying to make them a little more difficult on the quarterbacks."

[bulls96go]

good

[E.T.]

I'll tell you, Loserville will be VERY tough up there ... mainly same guys that got their heart broke last year here.

Go BULLS !!!