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Brohm, Allen shine as No. 8 Louisville tops Middle Tennessee

Sep 7, 2007 - 5:22 AM LOUISVILLE, Kentucky (Ticker) -- Both teams had their offenses on display, but quarterback Brian Brohm made the difference.

Brohm threw two of his five touchdowns in the opening three minutes as eighth-ranked Louisville posted a 58-42 victory over Middle Tennessee State on Thursday night.

The win extended Louisville's home winning streak to 20 games - second in the country behind Southern California's 34-game streak. The Cardinals (2-0) have not lost here since a 37-7 defeat by Memphis on November 15, 2003.

"It's good to get a win," Louisville coach Steve Kragthorpe said. "It's not exactly the way we wanted to play in every phase, but the bottom line is winning. There are certainly some things we need to improve upon, but when we take the field, the ultimate goal is to win the football game."

Brohm went 25-of-39 for a career-high 401 yards, including a 22-yard touchdown strike to Mario Urrutia to help Louisville create a 48-35 edge with 2:51 left in the third quarter.

"That's how it turned out to be, that's how we go into a game anticipating as an offense every game," Brohm said. "We can't really worry about what is going on, we need to score when we have the ball and take care of our business."

It was the signal-caller's fifth consecutive game with at least 300 yards through the air, dating to last season. Brohm has thrown 17 touchdowns during this stretch.

"I thought we did well on offense as a whole group," Brohm said. "We executed our game plan well. We came in and did what we thought we were going to do. We got the right checks and the line did a good job of blocking and receivers did a good job of making plays. Overall, offensively we did a good job."

Louisville's Anthony Allen ran for a school-record 275 yards and two scores on 35 carries while Urrutia caught seven passes for 142 yards.

"Of course I am tired and sore," Allen said. "In practice we have to be in good condition. In case it were to happen again, we can come in and carry the load. It (the record) hasn't sunk in yet."

Brohm completed his impressive performance with a 10-yard score to Harry Douglas at the 11:20 mark in the fourth quarter to push the lead to 58-42.

Louisville found the end zone three times in the opening quarter for a 21-7 edge, highlighted by an 81-yard pass from Brohm to Gary Barnidge just 18 seconds into the contest.

Phillip Tanner scored on a 23-yard run and Joe Craddock hooked up with Bobby Williams for a 24-yard TD in between Brohm's third touchdown pass of the quarter as Middle Tennessee State sliced the deficit to 28-21 with 3:17 left.

Allen capped a 15-play, 82-yard drive for the Cardinals with his 1-yard plunge with 4:08 remaining. But Tanner reached the end zone once again with his own 1-yard run to help the Blue Raiders (0-2) close to 38-35 at intermission.

"We just go out there and fight and play as hard as we can," Middle Tennessee State coach Rick Stockstill said. "I never though the game was away from us. They scored on their first play. It could be easy, maybe to hang our head, but we're not going to do that."

Craddock completed 14-of-26 passes for 290 yards with two touchdowns and two interceptions and Tanner finished with 144 yards on nine attempts.

"This is something we were working for throughout the whole summer," Tanner said. "When Coach first came in he said we were going to focus on speed and that's exactly what we focused on. I feel like everybody got faster. It showed a lot more so than speed, it was our conditioning."