Pat Kelsey took a re-invigorated Louisville basketball team to Durham for a rematch against the fourth-ranked Duke Blue Devils. Louisville was coming off of two strong victories against Virginia Tech and Pittsburgh, in which the team’s chemistry came back in spectacular fashion, fueled by the fiery return of Mikel Brown, Jr.
The Cards took their potent offensive attack to Cameron Indoor Stadium Monday night, where the team sought theirs, and their coaches, first signature victory of the season, and revenge for Duke’s domination in the second half of their last game at the Yum! Center.
Early Birds
The Cards hung with Duke for the first fifteen minutes. J’Vonne Hadley and Ryan Conwell did most of the work on offense, combining for 19 first half points. The Blue Devils were leading by a mere point, 29-28, when Isaiah Evans came alive. He scored six quick points, on his way to 17 in the first half, creating a gap between the two teams.
Duke ended the half on a 9-0 run, and took a ten point lead into the locker room.
Blue Devils red hot
Duke started the second half exactly where they left off. They got two buckets under the basket and knocked down a triple, negating the three Aly Khalifa hit out of a Cardinal timeout. Five minutes into the second half, the lead was 18, following Cam Boozer’s 3 straight paint buckets. Mikel Brown, Jr. got his first basket, a three off the dribble, but it was again negated by a Boozer three, the third shot of the following Duke possession.
Louisville started launching threes, was basically ice cold, and found themselves down by 20 with ten minutes to play.
Cardinal blues, ice cold
Brown simply couldn’t find the bottom of the basket. His attempts to drive often resulted in decent shots, but they just didn’t fall.
The Blue Devils, on the other hand, just couldn’t miss. Here’s the thing about playing Duke: they can hurt anybody from anywhere, from the paint or beyond the arc. Their defense is simply too good to allow them to get any kind of lead, which is exactly what Louisville did.
Can’t be counted on when it counts
The thing that bewilders me about Louisville basketball is their inability to make shots when they’re under the big lights. It’s one thing for a player to have shooting struggles, but this team has shown a consistent tendency to collectively go cold when they play quad one games.
Against Duke, it wasn’t just from beyond the arc: Louisville stopped hitting shots when the score was 29-28, and they never started again. There are a lot of ways to engineer a comeback, but for this team, they have to hit shots.
That’s how they win: they shoot well. When they don’t shoot well, they don’t do anything else well, either.
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Back to the drawing board
Louisville basketball comes back to Kentucky with their tails between their legs, no doubt. The effort is there, the talent is there, and I believe the will is there: to beat a team like Duke, though, Louisville has to play a complete game.
They have to rebound consistently, close out on shooters every time, and, more importantly than anything else, they have to hit shots. Rick Pitino said that the three point shot is the number one negater of talent. For a team that was assembled based on its shooting talent, this could not be more true: when Louisville is hitting threes, they look like one of the most spectacular teams in the country.
When they aren’t, they get blown out by 31 points.
Silver lining
I know that a 31 point blowout is hardly inspiring. But the fact of the matter is that Duke is arguably the best team in the country, and playing them at home is probably the tallest task in all of college basketball. The Cards have had their point guard back for two games, and I believe that Brown, and the team, will respond positively to this loss.
There’s a lot to learn from a loss like this, and I put my faith in Pat Kelsey. I truly believe that the team will be better having played this game. They’ll have a shot at Duke again in the ACC Tournament. The question will be if they can continue to grow, with a now-complete lineup, so that winning isn’t completely dependent on shooting by the time they face the Blue Devils again.
