Today Cardinal Basketball fans are dealing with something we haven’t had to deal with in 289 days. A Cardinal loss.. The team fell in the Hall of Fame Tip Off Classic Championship today to North Carolina 93-84. With this loss the Tarheels now lead the all-time series 9-3. The Cards also have their 21 game winning streak snapped and are now 5-1 on the season.

Coach Pitino after the loss: “We learned a lot from this game. They exploited some weaknesses of our team.”

Not much was going right for the Cardinals today and you could almost see this one coming by the way they played yesterday. The loss of Peyton Siva and Gorgui Dieng along with the injuries and off the court issues has really hurt the group dynamic of this team. Last year they were one heart beat and now this team has to re-focus and get that back.
The biggest issues today were the lack of transition defense and poor rotation in the half-court defense. It’s been a long time since I’ve written that about a Coach Pitino coached team. This is the first time Louisville has allowed 91 points since Western Carolina beat the Cards 91-83 in Freedom Hall on 12/12/09. Another thing missing in this Louisville defense is the lack of that big-time shot blocking presence in the low post. Hopefully we will develop one of our bigs to fill those shoes as the season progresses.
This group also needs to figure out what their identity is going to be on the offensive end of the floor. They looked really confused against the zone defense and weren’t very fundamentally sound, missing lay-ups, taking bad shots and the result was a 38.8% day from the field. That’s not going to get it done. This team must also get stronger on the boards. They were out-rebounded today 39-36. This was a better effort and I think it will continue to improve. Taking care and making better decisions with the ball also must continue to improve. 14 turnovers to 3 assist today. Not going to win many games with that stat.
Back-court scoring isn’t going to be a problem for this team and today Russ had 36, Jones had 18, and Luke had 10. Luke right now isn’t even close to being where he was last year. He just started practicing a few weeks ago so he will get it back. The real issue seems to be a lack of points coming from the front-court guys. Today Harrell had 5, Behanan 7, Van Treese 2, and Mathiang 2. And Wayne Blackshear ZERO’s across the board. Really thought he was done with his Houdini acts. This kid may never get it. But this front-court needs to do some real soul searching. They gotta be better.. This team has to and will get better…

North Carolina had a very good game plan and they are very well coached. They exposed the lack of transition defense and confused our guys with the zone. Their players stepped up big for them today. They deserved this one and got it. They had their Belmont moment and today was ours.
This one really hurts, but let’s face it Cardinal fans this basketball team has taken us on an amazing journey over the last 289 days since our last loss. They have given us memories that will last a lifetime. And now this group will refocus and find their own identity. A lot still to come for the 2013-14 Louisville Cardinals and they have a month to get some things right. December 28th is the next big one. The new streak starts Friday.. Go Cards!

(Photo courtesy @UofLSports)

I’m convinced that sluggish is the theme of the day if you are a Louisville fan. First we watched our football team win in sluggish fashion and then the Basketball team follows that theme in their semi-final game of the Hall of Fame Tip Off classic with a sluggish win over Fairfield. The Cards beat the Stags 71-57 in what was their worst performance of this young season. Regardless of how it was won the Cards are 5-0 and have now won 21 straight dating back to last season. They will now be competing in the Championship game of this tourney tomorrow against North Carolina and will be looking for their 27th title in a regular-season tournament. Louisville is now 156-37 in non-conference games under Coach Pitino.

Coach Pitino pretty much summed up this one today with his comments after the game: “Tonight we were just flat in every phase of the game,””We were flat offensively with only nine assists. Our two point guards turned it over eight times, which they haven’t been doing. We didn’t do the little things necessary to exploit the weaknesses of Fairfield. We were late to the glass a lot. A lot of things were disturbing but we’ll go ahead.” It wasn’t the crisp, business like group that we have seen through the first four games of the season. Perhaps it was nerves from the first road trip of the season or maybe just one of those off days. For as long as I can remember the Louisville basketball team always has one or two games during the season where they play down to their competition. Hopefully today was just on of those occasions.
From their 14 turnovers, 26 fouls, and the poor shooting (38%) this one just wasn’t much fun to watch.
The positives from this game was the balanced scoring with Wayne, Chris, Russ and Montrezl scoring in double figures while Chane had 8 and Luke had 9 respectively. The rebounding was a little better and it was good to see Montrezl crashing the boards with 12 rebounds. And the free-throw shooting was better as the team shot 74% from the charity stripe. It was also good to see Terry Rozier come into this game and have some production. He would finish with 3 points, 4 rebounds, and 3 assist. His confidence will continue to build off of these minutes of PT. We will need Rozier by seasons end.

Like with the football team it’s really hard to complain about a win. Ugly or not a win is still better than a loss and I think the sluggish performance today will be a great teaching moment for Coach Pitino and his staff. They can use some of the things the guys did wrong today to help them improve for tougher games down the road. The environment of this tournament will also help this group in the long run. Tomorrow they will have a very tough test against a very talented and athletic North Carolina group. Like they played down to the competition today I expect them to play up to it in the next game. I expect a battle in the Hall of Fame Tip Off Championship and It will be the best game of the year so far.