Brohm leads Cards in Orange; will he be back in '07?

	Brian Brohm's 311 passing yards against Wake Forest were the third-best in Orange Bowl history, behind Tom Brady and Matt Leinart. Eliot J. Schechter/Getty Images
	MAILBAG Have questions or feedback? E-mail Luke Winn. Your name: Your e-mail address: Your home town: Enter your question:

MIAMI -- Brian Brohm's final throw of his junior season was made not with a football, but rather an orange, lofted overhand into the damp South Florida night. The toss -- which had an arc resembling a fade pass into a corner of the end zone -- landed a few rows into the heart of the Louisville crowd, on the same side of the field where at game's end, a fan had been holding a sign that read, "BCS: Becoming Champions Step-by-step."

The fifth-ranked Cardinals' 24-13 victory over No. 15 Wake Forest on Tuesday was only the latest step, but it was by far the most meaningful. From the GMAC Bowl in 2003, to the Liberty Bowl in '04, to the Gator Bowl in '05, to the Orange Bowl in '06, Louisville has ascended from a high-powered, offensive curiosity in Conference USA to one of the nation's elite, BCS-conference teams. Big East champs this year, national champs the next? It could happen, but much of it hinges on whether Brohm returns for his senior year.

Brohm had taken the fruit-turned-projectile out of the Orange Bowl trophy after passing for an MVP-worthy 311 yards, and leading the Cardinals back from a 13-10 fourth-quarter deficit. It was a performance that likely solidified his stock as an NFL first-rounder; just how high depends on scouts' opinions of Notre Dame's Brady Quinn and LSU's JaMarcus Russell, who square off Wednesday night in the Sugar Bowl. As Louisville fans serenaded Brohm with chants of "One More Year!" he said, "It'll be hard not to come back, but you still have to go back [home], and let everything settle down and see what the right thing to do is."

Brohm made those comments to a scrum of reporters while on the field, but a few minutes earlier, right after the gun had sounded on the Cardinals' 12-1 season, Brohm also remarked the Orange Bowl win "is a great start for next season."

If this was the season Louisville solidified its status as a national power, next year could be the one in which fourth-year coach Bobby Petrino puts the coronation on the Cardinals' meteoric rise. The program went from 1-10 in 1997, to a pair of C-USA titles under John L. Smith at the start of the decade, to the top of the Big East in 2006. Back in 1985, when the Cards were in the midst of their seventh straight losing season, ex-Louisville coach Howard Schnellenberger said, "We're on a collision course with the national championship. The only variable is time."

Then, it seemed like one hell of a joke. Who knew the red-and-black's time variable was set at 22 years?