Greg McElroy predicts who is more likely to hit win total between Louisville, NC State

Over on his YouTube show, Always College Football, ESPN analyst Greg McElroy pitted NC State and Louisville against one another, trying to evaluate which of the ACC teams he likes better heading into 2024.

The Wolfpack and Cardinals enjoyed stormy Friday night drama last season, with Louisville going into Raleigh and securing a 13-10 amid some of the most challenging weather of any game throughout the whole college football season. Heading into 2024, though, McElroy has NC State getting back on top.

“At the moment I would lean slightly in favor of NC State. But it’s a tossup right now,” said McElroy, pointing to health concerns with Louisville QB Tyler Shough as a big reason why he’s more hesitant on UL.

“Part of that toss up has to do with the fact that Tyler Shough might miss time at some some point or another. If he doesn’t, you could very easily make the case for Louisville. But knowing that that’s been a question mark up to this point, I’m going to lean slightly in favor of Grayson McCall and the NC State Wolfpack.”

During this breakdown, McElroy also went over the schedules of each team and found some losable games on each schedule. When it came to the Pack:

“So, I look at, there’s really four games for me that think NC State could potentially lose: Tennessee, at Clemson, at Georgia Tech, and then at North Carolina.”

But NC State has owned that in-state rivalry lately…

“Right now, based on how things have gone the last couple years against Drake Maye, I would think they have a pretty decent advantage over the Tar Heels,” added McElroy.

When it came to Louisville’s slate, there were another four games that the ESPN analyst pegged as dangerous.

“You look at the losable games on the schedule. I the Notre game game is definitely a losable game; Miami game at home, very losable game; at Clemson, very losable game; at Kentucky very losable game. So there are about four games that are legitimately losable I think for Louisville, at least looking at their pre-season schedule at the moment.”

Where NC State owns a team like North Carolina in the latest meetings, the opposite is the case for Louisville with Kentucky. Sure, they competed until the final down last season but the ‘Cats have just had their number since 2017.

With that contrast, Greg McElroy is a little more confident in NC State hitting their win total than Louisville. But if the Cards can beat Kentucky, then that may be the difference in whether UL does wind up hitting their win total over/under number.