Welcome to www.Collegefootballfan.com

"Get off the couch and go to a game!"

The Goal - See 'em all!

Tales from the Tailgate: From the Fan who's seen 'em all!

by Stephen J. Koreivo

An excerpt from the proposed draft

Upset! Upset! Upset!

(44) Louisville at Army

October 15, 1994

West Point, New York - On this sunny, cool, brilliant fall Saturday on the Hudson River, Army, on a four-game losing streak, trailed the Cardinals, 29-23, after allowing Louisville to score two rushing TDs and two two-point conversions within 34 seconds. Cardinal QB Marty Lowe was hot with 19 completions for 245 yards, but for the Cadets, Kurt Heiss was also on target with a 37-yard FG and two more from 30 yards.  Army’s Ronnie McAda fired a 10-yard TD pass to FB Joe Ross to tie the score with 3:17 remaining.  Heiss booted the extra point for a 30-29 Black Knight lead. The Cardinals drove to retaliate, but Louisville’s Anthony Shelman fumbled a pitch for a nine-yard loss at Army’s 28. A second U of L possession ended with David Aker’s 46-yard FG attempt wide right with 1:35 left. The Black Knights ran out the clock for an exciting, Army upset.

     I got to enjoy it this particular Saturday with good friends Tracy and Dave Headden. St. Laurie was back at home taking care of 18 month-old Alex who had already attended her first three games the previous season. With our second kid expected in about six months, St. Laurie just wasn’t up for a short trip to West Point with a toddler.

This wasn’t the most memorable game I saw between Army and Louisville, however. That came five years later and ended with the second of “Upset! Upset! Upset!”  On a dark, chilly, overcast Thursday evening on October 7, 1999, the Army-Louisville game, to accommodate television scheduling, would be the first weekday night game ever played at West Point. With my friends Paul Zordan and Jim Baker visiting from upstate New York, we sat on the visitors’ side to watch this Conference-USA clash. With Heisman hopeful Chris Redman at QB for Louisville and Army coming in at 1-3, the game looked like a mismatch in favor of the Cardinals.

 Shockingly, Army’s offense looked unstoppable in the first half as Michael Wallace ran around, over, and through the poor-tackling Cardinal defense. In their second year of Conference-USA play, the Cadets looked like world beaters that night as they built a 45-17 lead. However, the Cardinals did not go away in the second half to make what would for one of the wildest, most exciting games ever played at Michie Stadium. Paul and Jim noted the key to Louisville’s offense in the second half was TE Ibn Green. Wherever he lined up, the Cards followed. With that strategy, Louisville rallied in the second half with 28 unanswered points on two one-yard runs by RB Frank Moreau and two TD passes from Redman, one to Green and one to WR Lavell Boyd to tie the game late in regulation, 45-45. On a night of firsts at Michie Stadium, both teams played in their first overtime periods ever. On their first possession, Louisville took a seven-point lead on a ten-yard run by Moreau, but Army QB Joe Gerena capped the extra Army possession with a nine-yard TD pass to Brandon Rooney. To start the second OT period, Gerena, who played a heady game for Army, didn’t let up as he posted a seven-yard TD run to take a 59-52 lead for the Cadets. Louisville’s next possession got to the Army eight to set up a fourth and seven. Redman stepped up into a pocket and fired to a seemingly wide-open Boyd at the back of the end zone. As Army’s Derrick Goodwin closed quickly, Boyd went high, had the ball in his hands, but he and the ball hit the turf at the same instant. The Corps roared! Howitzer volleys fired from across Lusk Reservoir.  Army won a thriller on its first weekday night game and in its first overtime game ever. In the annals of my personal game history, the one-hundred and eleven points totaled the most ever scored in one game.  It was a fantastic, exciting football game – long scoring plays, big lead, big comeback, and not one, but two overtime periods. Fans moved from one end zone to the other to be closer to the action when the teams went from the south end zone to the north in the extra periods. College football couldn’t get much more exciting than this!

Extra point: As for the third of the memorable triumvirate of Louisville upsets, there was another Thursday night game in 2006 played along a different river, the banks of the Old Raritan. The Knights that evening wore scarlet, not black. This contest was played in front of a much larger television audience because the stakes weren’t only for a possible Big East conference championship, but for even bigger BCS bowl possibilities. In the end, a 25-7 Cardinal lead turned into a 28-25 Rutgers’ victory for the second biggest win in the history of the program that started everything back in 1869. Make that the third “Upset!” for the Cardinals on the short-ends of “Upset! Upset! Upset!”