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Really nice article by Crawford.

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May 29, 2001
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NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WDRB) -- Journalism confession: I hate celebrations. Not the way you probably think. I love seeing players and coaches and fans be happy. I just have bad luck trying to capture the right image.

From a photography standpoint, it's chaos. From a writing standpoint, you just hope you can catch a glimpse of the moment, maybe a bit of the flavor. Sometimes you can piece it together later. When the Louisville football team beat Mississippi State 38-28 in the Music City Bowl on Monday night, it was a mess, and my photos reflected it. I missed the "money" shot of Louisville coach Scott Satterfield hoisting the trophy, smiling. I got others, but they weren't as good. Such is life.

Here's what I did get. I'd posted up near the barricade in front of the stage where the trophy was going to be presented, and all of a sudden there was a crowd of 80 Louisville football players behind me, pressing in. The energy in that moment is electric. It was unbridled enthusiasm.


Players behind me were mugging for TV cameras. Unusual thing No. 1: No matter who screamed out, players were pointing at teammates and saying that they loved them. Unusual thing No. 2: A chant. I heard no chants from the crowd in that moment. Maybe fans were chanting, but all other noise, including Satterfield and the announcers, was drowned out by a chant that sprang up from the players.

What were they saying? It took me a minute to get it, then I realized it.

"SCOTT-TEE! SCOTT-TEE! SCOTT-TEE!"

They were chanting the first name of their head coach, Scott Satterfield.

In the buttoned-down world of college football, it wasn't your normal thing. Players are funny, and can rally around anything, any inside joke, any motto. But this spontaneous chant apparently aimed at a coach was something different.

It reflected the feeling this team has for this head coach and staff, who came into the program at a low point, built relationships, embraced players, taught the basics not just of football but of life, in some ways, then guided a team through ups and downs to a bowl victory that few thought possible.

Whatever you remember of Scott Satterfield's first season in Louisville, remember this: He won as many games in Louisville's first season off a dumpster fire than his predecessor won with Lamar Jackson in his final season of college football.

In fact, he won more ACC games in his first season (5) than his predecessor won in Jackson's last (4).

He didn't do it with gimmicks or slight of hand. He didn't do it with a great deal of depth. He had talent on this team -- and some of us (hand raised here) are guilty of having not acknowledged that in the wake of last season. But he had to activate that talent, and more than that, had to figure out a way to deal with a lack of depth that would cripple many teams and stall many seasons.

Lose a guy like Russ Yeast, one of the team's top tacklers, and it takes a while to overcome. Have a bunch of guys miss practice with a stomach bug and it can be disastrous. The Cardinals were down two regular offensive linemen on Monday, and were in a precarious situation. But they were never hindered against a Mississippi State defense that got a good bit of defensive talent back from suspensions.

"Everybody deserves credit, coaches and players," wideout Dez Fitzpatrick said. "What this staff did, though, I don't know how many could have done. They came in and built relationships and earned trust. And once you get a group of guys to believe, anything can happen."

It wasn't just Satterfield. It was his staff, from the strength coaches up through the coordinators. It was coaches using every player for something. No wasted pieces. No wasted people. There were 22 players through the course of Petrino's flameout and Satterfield's taking over who took a walk. Transfer portal. Quit. Let go. Whatever. Think about that number -- an entire signing class, as Satterfield described it, lost.

Satterfield had to beat the bushes just to find some tight ends. He took a look at Marshon Ford, a kid from Ballard who walked on, and realized he could play. He put him on scholarship, in a surprise announcement last spring that brought the team to its feet.

Ford finished the season with seven touchdown catches, second on the team. Another to get a scholarship that day, Jack Fagot out of Lexington Catholic, contributed in the secondary and will be able to tell his kids he intercepted a pass thrown by Clemson's Trevor Lawrence.

Satterfield and his staff poured themselves into the players who stayed, and they reaped the rewards of a season that shouldn't be forgotten anytime soon, and a team moved to chant the name of the head coach after the handshakes were over.

"What these guys have had to do, the guys that stuck it out with us, it's so rewarding for them to be able to come out here and finish it off with a big-time bowl win right now," Satterfield said. "I'm so proud of these guys and particularly these seniors, but I'm excited for the young guys, the guys that will be coming back so we can build off of this."

Comebacks are not easy. Most of the time, they start off from bad places. They require enthusiasm that is not born of circumstance. They require work that can be thankless. They require the discipline to drown out negativity – from the outside and from within.

There are stories of redemption all over the Louisville football team. But it's worth acknowledging, one more time, that for Louisville, this comeback story started at the top.

"From where our team was last December and January to what they were able to accomplish this year, big credit to our staff, being consistent every single day, and we've had some days that haven't been easy," Satterfield said. "We've worked these guys really hard at times, and they're like, 'What are we doing?' But when you have a season like this, you win eight games, you overcome so much, when no one thought we were going to win any games this year, picked dead last in our conference this year, and all the things that we were able to accomplish, it just goes to show you when you have belief in one another and you focus on the team and not an individual, then great things can happen. I'm really, really excited and proud to be a part of this team, and to finish this season the way we did. And I'm really, really proud of these guys, for how they fought."

https://www.wdrb.com/sports/crawfor...cle_a424dac8-2be5-11ea-8664-f3046aea00b2.html
 
I don't believe nearly enough credit is given to the power of positivity and buy-in. Satterfield and his staff just gave a masterclass on how it's done. If they can repeat this and keep the band together (at least the core of the staff), this program will reach unprecedented heights in the coming years. Maybe not the next Clemson, but maybe damn close.
 
I don't believe nearly enough credit is given to the power of positivity and buy-in. Satterfield and his staff just gave a masterclass on how it's done. If they can repeat this and keep the band together (at least the core of the staff), this program will reach unprecedented heights in the coming years. Maybe not the next Clemson, but maybe damn close.
For our program, the buy-in is so important. Watching these guys have fun this year has been great.

And you see this exact same buy-in with the Baltimore Ravens. I adopted the Ravens as my team (along with half of Louisville), and their locker room is just like Louisville's. The love they have for each other is genuine, and the play on the field shows this.

Moving forward, Satterfield has a lot to work with, and the celebrations should continue long into the future. Thanks OP for sharing. Great read as always with Eric C.
 
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