Lousiville, Ky. ? In a city hooked on long shots and jump shots, college football has long been a diversion, something for fall Saturdays before the horses start running at Churchill Downs and the Louisville basketball team packs Freedom Hall.

“There were good seats available, any day, any time with any number of people you wanted to bring as a guest,” Mayor Jerry Abramson said. “Those days are over.”

Are they ever.

Two decades ago, former coach Howard Schnellenberger – who led Miami to a national title in 1983 – later took a decidedly lower-profile job with the Cardinals. He raised more than a few eyebrows when he said Louisville was “on a collision course with the national championship, the only variable is time.” Those words have proved prophetic.

With a month to go in the season, No. 3 Louisville (8-0, 3-0 Big East) controls its destiny in the chase for a berth in the Bowl Championship Series title game.

And perhaps just as remarkable, football’s popularity is making inroads in a basketball town where March Madness never really ends.

Billboards with pictures of star players like quarterback Brian Brohm and the phrase “R U Ready?” line the freeways. Jerseys with No. 12 (Brohm) or No. 19 (injured running back Michael Bush) are the clothing option of choice at sparkling Papa John’s Stadium for home games.

LOUISVILLE'S RICHARD RAGLIN CELEBRATES in the second half of the Cardinals' game against West Virginia. Louisville won last Thursday's showdown to stay unbeaten this fall, fueling a case of football fever in a city better known for its love of basketball and horse racing.

And Internet chat rooms hum with speculation and jubilation over Louisville’s lofty ranking and the futures of Brohm and coach Bobby Petrino.

The basketball team, meanwhile, began practice three weeks ago with little fanfare. Rick Pitino’s team was in the Final Four less than two years ago but is coming off a 21-13 season and was relegated to the NIT.

Sure, there was the usual sellout crowd of more than 18,000 fans at Freedom Hall for an exhibition win over Georgetown (Ky.) College on Nov. 1. Yet most of the buzz wasn’t over freshman forward Derrick Caracter, but the football team’s chances against West Virginia the next night.

After coaching under the microscope for years – first at Kentucky, now at Louisville – Pitino doesn’t mind if the scrutiny shifts a little ways down the street from Freedom Hall to the aptly named Howard Schnellenberger Football Complex.

“It’s helping us in one sense in that it takes the attention away from us and let’s us focus in on ourselves,” said Pitino, whose team was not ranked in the preseason Top 25 in any major poll. “Our players see that kind of excellence and it only helps us.”