Louisville is set to begin spring practice for the second time under head coach Scott Satterfield. It's remarkable to compare the energy and expectations around the program just one year later. An 8-5 season with a bowl win and a large number of the key players from that team coming back have Louisville looking up for 2020. That being the case, here are three important questions the team and staff will be looking to answer in spring football.

It shows just how bad the 2018 defense was that the 2019 defense, universally acknowledged as a poor defense, was still an improvement. And it was. But Louisville simply can't get where it wants to be as a program counting on outscoring every meaningful opponent. The defense must improve in 2020 for Satterfield and company to equal or improve upon last year's record.

Spring football in 2020 must be devoted to two primary things for the Louisville defense: improving the pass rush and forcing more turnovers. In 2019, Louisville finished 66th nationally in sacks. It was a dramatic improvement from the measly 11 sacks recorded in 2018. Bryan Brown and Cort Dennison have to find a way to generate even more of a pass rush in 2020. In particular, the pass rush from the three down linemen and fourth rusher on standard defensive alignments. Louisville simply had to blitz way too often to generate pass rush. With GG Robinson gone, Louisville's three returning leaders in sacks are all linebackers. That can't be the case in 2020.

Satterfield's defenses at Appalachain State were known for forcing interceptions but outside of a few opportunistic situations, that never materialized in 2019. In 2020, it must. There's every reason to think the passing offenses in 2020 will be better and the pass defense must improve with it. Some of that will fall on the secondary itself. Louisville spent much of 2019 experimenting with different combinations at cornerback. Who will step up and hold those jobs in spring? The rest will fall on the pass rush helping the secondary out.

This time last year, nobody knew who the quarterback would be and few were sure Louisville even had the personnel to run the style of offense Satterfield liked to run. Now? Expectations are sky high. I was surprised at the Music City Bowl luncheon that offensive coordinator Dwayne Ledford said he felt like the offense was "vanilla" in 2019. That is, there are so many more wrinkles that they will feel comfortable putting into the offense this year because what Ledford called "a base of knowledge" has been laid with the players.

What will that look like and how will it capitalize on the returning players? With the skillset he possesses and his being established as the team's quarterback, what will they do to maximize what Micale Cunningham can do? Durability issues will likely keep them from emphasizing the quarterback running game too much more. But Cunningham proved to be a dangerous deep ball thrower and his overall accuracy improved dramatically from the early season to the end.

On offense, it's possible that none of the early enrollees play a lot. A year ago, the early enrollee offensive linemen still all redshirted and weren't factors in 2019. Louisville is deep and experienced at wide receiver so it's unclear how Christian Fitzpatrick will see the field outside of special teams. Tee Webb will get a lot of attention but will be firmly and comfortably third on the depth chart below Cunningham and Evan Conley (fourth behind Jawon Pass depending on what his future plans are).

Defensively, there are opportunites galore. If you consider Ja'Darien Boykin an early enrollee then there might not be a more important player for Louisville to have emerge in the spring. He's an excellent athlete and can be a force as a pass rusher at defensive end. He'll have every opportunity. Right now, Jared Goldwire is the only known quantity at nose tackle. With a defense that emphasizes movement and slanting, can Henry Bryant at 5'11 get acclimated to the college game and get strong enough in spring to push for playing time in pass rushing packages? He'll need to show it in spring.

On the outside, both Dave Lackford and I have been huge fans of Kam Wilson since he committed. He'll have a chance to not only play but perhaps even start if he makes the most of being here in the spring. He's a skilled defender with both size and speed. Louisville needs more of him on the roster. But for 2020, having him and Boykin in the front seven should provide a nice boost. When Yaya Diaby arrives in early summer the front seven should be markedly better than it was at almost any time in 2019.

In the secondary, Lovie Jenkins and Jamel Starks are versatile and athletic. I wouldn't be surprised to see them tried at more than one position to find out where they can help the most.