Gillotte, Riley: The Pros of Returning to Louisville Outweighed the Cons

Over the course of his head coaching tenure up to this point, Jeff Brohm has been known for his prowess on the offensive side of the ball. However, the Louisville football program was more so anchored by a strong defense in his first season as the head man in charge.

By the time year one under his guidance came to a close, the Cardinals ranked in the top 25 in several notable defensive metrics. Louisville finished with the No. 1 red zone defense in all of the FBS, had the No. 9 rushing defense, ranked No. 10 in third down conversion percentage, and sported the No. 22 overall defense.

While there are a handful of playmakers on that side of the ball that are moving on, whether that be due to graduation, the NFL Draft or the transfer portal, Louisville's top two defenders from the 2023 season will be making a return for year two of the Brohm era.

Last month, defensive end Ashton Gillotte announced that he would bypass the NFL Draft and return to the Cardinals for the 2024 season. Earlier this month, cornerback Quincy Riley then announced that he would be doing the same.

For both players, it came down to making the best individual decisions for their situation. In the end, they both determined that the pros of returning to Louisville for one final season outweighed the cons of jumping to the NFL at this moment.

"I just talked to my family, prayed it up, obviously trying to get scout opinions and all that kind of stuff," Gillotte said. "Just like how I always have, I'm just trusting the plan that God has for me, and that's what I felt called to do. That's what led me to my decision to come back."

"My decision was based on what would be best for me and the position I'm in, then coming back with my pros and cons," Riley added. "I feel like there were more pros than cons with staying, rather than cons than pros for leaving. So I just trusted God's plan, and I just stuck with it."

Of course, a large factor when it comes to decisions such as these is gauging what your stock is in the upcoming NFL Draft. In this case, both Gillotte and Riley very well could have instead opted to make the transition to the professional ranks.

Gillotte was one of the top defensive linemen in all of college football, collecting 14.5 tackles for loss, 11.0 sacks, three forced fumbles and 45.0 tackles overall. The 6-foot-3, 270-pound edge rusher earned First-Team All-ACC honors and was the runner-up in ACC Defensive Player of the Year voting, while also earning several Second-Team All-American nods.

As for Riley, he established himself as one of the best defensive backs in the ACC this past season. The 6-foot, 185-pound corner finished the 2023 season with a team-best 11 pass breakups and second on Louisville in interceptions with three, tying for the ACC lead with 14 pass defenses. However, while also collecting 49 tackles and 1.5 for loss in the process, he was only voted as an All-ACC honorable mention.

The advanced analytics also show how dominant the duo was for Louisville, as Gillotte finished with a Pro Football Focus grade of 85.9 and Riley finished with an 85.8 grade. Not only were they the two highest-graded defenders this season for Louisville, they ranked seventh and eighth, respectively, in the ACC among defenders with 250 snaps played.

It was never a question of if Gillotte or Riley could see themselves getting drafted come April, just a matter of where they would see themselves come off the board. For both players, a desire to improve their draft stock played a big role in their final decisions.

"It wasn't a matter of if I could go or not, it's to improve my stock," Gillotte said. "Obviously, there's numerous reasons why like you would choose to come back or declare, but there's just a lot of benefits to me coming back. I think there's a lot of stuff for me to improve on in my game. There's a lot of stuff I can put on film to better improve my stock, and how I feel as a player."

That being said, improving their draft stock was not the end-all and be-all factor that drove them to come back to for their senior seasons at Louisville. The amount of fun that they had in year one under Jeff Brohm also played a role in wanting to play another year for him.

"Some of the pros with coming back were just playing again under our new coaching staff," Riley said. "This is my first year having so much fun and playing, so that was a pro."

The feeling of unfinished business also played a bit of a role in their respective decisions to come back. While Louisville did capture their first 10-win season in a decade and made the program's first ever trip to the ACC Championship Game, the 2023 season ended with a three-game losing streak. Louisville fell to Kentucky in their regular season finale, to Florida State in the ACC Championship Game, and then to USC in the Holiday Bowl.

"We got there last year, and could have won last year," Riley said. "But now that we see that we can get there, it just motivates us to get back there and just finish the business that we didn't finish."

"Now we have a standard to uphold," Gillotte added. "That's the thing with raising the bar, is now that's gonna be the expectation. Obviously, people in the city are going to expect us to do the same thing. We know what we can do, we've done it. We just got to get back to that level and execute again."