It’s been a tough start to the new year for Louisville, and coach Pat Kelsey vows that will change. The No. 20 Cardinals will get a chance to prove that when they visit Pitt for an Atlantic Coast Conference game Saturday night.
Louisville (12-5, 2-3 ACC) is coming off a 79-70 loss at home to No. 16 Virginia, the team’s third defeat in its last four games. Kelsey’s team never led in the game, one in which the Cardinals shot a season-worst 35.8% (24 of 67) from the field and connected on just 10 of 38 (26.3%) 3-point attempts.
More worrisome to Kelsey, though, was the season-high 14 treys the Cardinals allowed Virginia to hit, including 7-for-13 shooting from beyond the arc (53.8%) in the second half. He blamed undisciplined play, which he said is caused by undisciplined coaching.
The Cardinals were once again without Mikel Brown Jr., a five-star freshman averaging 16.6 points and 5.1 assists per game and whose back injury kept him out for a seventh straight game. On Tuesday, they were also without Khani Rooths, an important sub, who missed the game due to illness. Other key players have missed time, too.
That has shortened Kelsey’s bench. Rather than taking out an unproductive player, he told reporters after the loss, he has to urge them to play better.
“We got guys who are playing too many minutes right now,” Kelsey said. “Some of the guys that aren’t playing as many minutes need to step up and need to play better.”
The Louisville offense has taken a turn for the worse without Brown, who is considered one of the top freshmen in the country. After averaging 94.3 points per game in their first 10, the Cardinals have scored just 77.1 per game without their point guard. Assists have dropped from 19.7 to 14.4 a game, and 3-point shooting has gone from 37.5% to 29.3%.
Ryan Conwell, whose team-best 19.5 scoring average ranks seventh in the conference, scored just 14 points on 5-of-21 shooting in the loss to Virginia. He missed last weekend’s game against Boston College due to a knee issue.
The Panthers (8-9, 1-3), meanwhile, are coming off an 89-66 win at Georgia Tech on Wednesday to break a three-game skid this season and a seven-game ACC road losing streak. Pitt shot 53.1% (34 of 64) in the victory, the team’s second-best shooting performance of the season.
Coach Jeff Capel’s team also got 39 points off the bench, tying a season high, in the win down in Atlanta. Brandin Cummings has shown potential in becoming a scorer off the bench. He led the Panthers with 23 points in the win against Georgia Tech, and he’s also put up 34 and 29 as a sub.
“We want to get him the ball, try to get him in space and allow him to make plays,” Capel said of his 6-foot-3 backcourt player who leads the team at 13.6 ppg.
Nojus Indrusaitis, the team’s other key reserve, matched his season best with 16 points in the win. That included a season-high four treys.
–Field Level Media
