Bird on bird violence went down at the KFC Yum! Center on Monday and the Louisville basketball program walked out with a blow out victory.
Following an extremely slow offensive start to their road victory against Cincinnati, Pat Kelsey was hoping his Louisville basketball program would hit the court hard from the tipoff of Monday’s game against the Eastern Michigan Eagles.
While points again eluded the Cards for much of the first five minutes, it would be their defensive intensity throughout the game that kept the visiting Eagles out of the contest, almost from its inception.
Slow… And then, go!
Both the Cards and the Eagles only managed to muster four points apiece until Louisville finally found its shooting stroke in the sixth minute. UofL put up four unanswered threes, which expanded the score to 17-4 following a Sananda Fru free throw.
Eagle woes
Eastern Michigan wouldn’t hit a field goal again until the nine minute mark, making the score 19-6. Isaac McKneely, who struggled from the field against Cincinnati, answered with back-to-back threes, expanding the Louisville lead to 29-9. EMU finally managed to hit a pair of threes late in the first half, but the Cards took a comfortable 33-17 lead into the break.
The Cairo magic show
Coming out of the locker room, McKneely and J’Vonne Hadley threes inflated the lead, again, to twenty points. It was then that the Egyptian Magician began his showcase. Aly Khalifa hit a three at the 14:31 mark, got the next defensive rebound, and laid one up following a rebounded tip from Ryan Conwell. Khalifa then knocked down another one from long distance, giving the Cards a 57-25 lead with 12:46 remaining.
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Relentless warriors
Though Ryan Conwell was, by far, the most dependable offensive presence for the Cards against Cincinnati, he had shooting struggles for most of Monday’s matchup. He finally got his first field goal, though, at the 12:12 mark of the second half. Though luck eluded him for most of the evening, he followed his first make with a double bounced, off-the-backboard three, which Khalifa complimented with a triple of his own at the four minute mark, making the score 77-40. For his final trick, the magician stuffed the next attempted Eagle shot.
The real icing on the magical evening, though, was J’Vonne Hadley finally breaking a stretch of extremely poor free throw shooting dating back to the Kentucky game, in which he missed four straight free throws in the final fifty seconds. Hadley managed to finally hit a pair on Monday night, making the score 81-44. McKneely and walk on Cole Sherman closed the evening out with another pair of Cardinal threes, sealing an 87-46 Louisville win.
Getting better and better
While it was nice to see the Cards’ offensive potency return, and for Aly Khalifa to light up the entire stat sheet, the most encouraging thing about Monday was the defensive intensity Louisville imposed throughout the contest. EMU had only four points in the first five minutes and none for six that followed.
The Eagles were constantly worked deep into their own shot clock, rarely had on offensive rebound, and coughed up 13 turnovers. Ryan Conwell showed incredible patience and maturity, playing through a poor shooting performance in the first half by continuing to positively affect the game for his teammates. The ball finally fell through the hoop with twelve minutes remaining.
It bodes well for the team that even when their most reliable offensive weapon can’t hit a shot, there are still more than enough great gunners on this roster to compensate. The offensive diversity and patience is becoming increasingly complimented by defensive tenacity: the Cards are dangerous on both sides of the ball.
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