The Mustangs lost the turnover battle 3-0 against the Cardinals.
The SMU Mustangs' 41-31 loss to Louisville will have fans a little concerned, as Rhett Lashlee's defense was curb-stomped on the ground at L&M Stadium.
With the Mustangs allowing a whopping 269 yards on the ground, Keyjuan Brown (163 yards, 2 TDs) and Isaac Brown (67 yards, 1 TD) were the chief destroyers.
On the offensive side of the ball, turnovers were the name of the game as Kevin Jennings again threw two interceptions, while the Mustangs were also stopped twice on fourth down, as they were outscored 27-14 in the second half and had a fumble.
Now at 2-1, the Mustangs have to pick themselves up after allowing 41 points against the Cardinals, as a familiar narrative is beginning to be spread about this year's SMU team.
And for head coach Lashlee, that narrative won't stop unless his team does something about it.
“We're disappointed to come up on the short end of this, congrats to Jeff and Louisville,” Lashlee said. “Really good football team and that's what ACC football is all about. Really good game. You look at the stat sheet, we won everything but the score and the turnover battle. And that's the story.
"If we want to be what we want to be, we got to be able to tackle on defense against the run. We can't let somebody run for 265 yards on us. We can't turn the ball over and it doesn't matter that one was late in the game and one was a great effort play at the goal line. Until we want the narrative to stop, we got to stop turning the football over.”
The Mustangs allowed 442 total yards, but kept the Cardinals to just 3/10 on third down, and ran 20 more plays, while also having the ball for three more minutes than Louisville.
But they lost the turnover battle 3-0, and when you do that, it is tough to win any game of football.
The defense is the big story to come out of the game, with the unit powerless to stop the run, as the Cardinals' offense as a whole averaged a crisp 7.4 yards per play.
It was a bad day for the Mustangs, and it is clear Lashlee knows where his team went wrong, as they dropped to 2-1, and now their chances of making the ACC title game have taken a hit.
And that narrative is only going to get louder unless the Mustangs do something about it.
