Louisville under Charlie Strong

At the end of the 2013 NCAA FBS season, Charlie Strong left the Louisville Cardinals as head football coach to take the head football coach at the University of Texas.  Here is my analysis of the Louisville Cardinals during coach Strong's tenure at Louisville using the using the Complex Invasion College Football Production Model starting with his first season as head football coach.  Below is a chart with the Cardinals ranking over the last four seasons as well as the worst team in the Football Bowl Subdivision during that time as well.

2010
In Strong's first season as head football coach, the Cardinals finished the regular season at 6-6 making them bowl eligible and they defeated #44 ranked Southern Mississippi to finish overall at 7-6.  Louisville played against an "average" strength of schedule (SOS) as compared to the "league" average, meaning that their actual SOS was within one standard deviation of the "league" average.  Louisville's best game was their bowl victory over #44 ranked Southern Mississippi and their worst game was a loss to #86 ranked Oregon State.  Overall, the Cardinals had the #35 ranked team with the #48 ranked offense and the #23 ranked defense.

2011
This was the worst of the four seasons under Strong even though the Cardinals finished  the regular season better in the win/loss column at 7-5.  In the bowl that season Louisville lost to #42 ranked North Carolina State to finish overall at 7-6.  Louisville played against an "average" strength of schedule (SOS) as compared to the "league" average.  Louisville's best game was their bowl victory over #24 ranked West Virginia and their worst game was a loss to #90 ranked Marshall.  Overall, the Cardinals had the #66 ranked team with the #90 ranked offense and the #43 ranked defense.

2012
This was the season that turned Louisville around, with the Cardinals finishing the regular season at 10-2.  They also defeated #13 ranked Florida to finish overall at 11-2.  Louisville again played against an "average" strength of schedule (SOS) as compared to the "league" average.  Louisville's best game was their victory over #8 ranked Cincinnati and their worst game was a loss to #70 ranked Connecticut.  Overall, the Cardinals had the #27 ranked team with the #31 ranked offense and the #27 ranked defense.

2013
In what ended up as Strong's last season as Louisville head football coach, the Cardinals finished the regular season at 11-1 and they defeated #46 ranked Miami (FL) to finish overall at 12-1.  Louisville played against an "average" strength of schedule (SOS) as compared to the "league" average.  Louisville's best game was their victory over #22 ranked Houston and their second best victory was over #25 Cincinnati.  All of their other victories were against teams in the bottom half of the Complex Invasion College Football Production Model Rankings.  Their only loss was to #20 ranked Central Florida.  Overall, the Cardinals had the #2 ranked team with the #11 ranked offense and the #1 ranked defense.   Yes, Louisville had the best defense in the nation!

Analysis of 2013 NCAA FBS Head Coach Changes
UAB and Garrick McGee
Western Kentucky and Bobby Petrino
Arkansas State and Bryan Harsin
Army and Rich Ellerson
Vanderbilt and James Franklin
Penn State and Bill O'Brien
UMass and Charley Molnar
Boise State and Chris Petersen
Texas and Mack Brown
Washington and Steve Sarkisian
Wake Forest and Jim Grobe
Wyoming and Dave Christensen
Eastern Michigan and Ron English
Florida Atlantic and Carl Pelini
Miami of Ohio and Don Treadwell
UConn and Paul Pasqualoni
USC and Lane Kiffen