By Ed Peak
Things aren’t always as good as when everything seems to be going well. When things going bad, they are not as bad as it seems.
Louisville leads No. 2 Duke by 23 points with 9:54 to play. The Cardinal fans in the crowd of 22,046 are delirious. Then all of the sudden the bottom falls out. The roof caves in on Louisville. Duke erupts for a 71-69 win, leaving the Cardinal faithful in dismay.
“I’m stunned,” said Louisville coach Chris Mack. The Cardinals under a barrage of turnovers were outscored 35-10 the rest of the way. The Cardinals had only three field goals the rest of the way. They had only four turnovers at halftime but finished 17.
It was the second straight game Louisville lost a late lead. Saturday, Florida State edged the Cards 80-75 in overtime after leading by seven with around four minutes to play.
“As tough as it was on Saturday to swallow…..(tonight) tougher,” said Mack. “I’m really proud of my team. They competed their tails off. We played as hard as we’ve played all year.”
Louisville (17-8, 8-4) started playing a big conservatively in the last eight minutes. They were playing not to lose. They quite attacking. When Duke (22-2, 10-1) turned up the defensive pressure the Cardinals didn’t respond.
“We could sense that they got hesitant,”said Cam Reddish who scored 16 of his 22 points in the second half. “We just feed off of that. Just kept grinding, grinding through every possession.”
Duke was ready for a loss. Last Saturday the Blue Devils beat No.3 Virginia, 81-71. So it figured you might get Duke at a good time.
Freshman Zion Williamson led Duke with 27 points and 12 rebounds, but played the second half in series foul trouble. He picked up his fourth with 12:14. He returned with 9:41.
“Give Duke credit, they turned us over it seems like 1,000 times in the last four or five minutes,” said Mack. Duke had 15 points off turnovers and 11 steals in the second half. Williamson had three steals.
“I thought we outplayed the best team in the country for a long time,” said Mack. “As hard as it is to accept, we’re going to grow from it and there will be better times.”
Jordan Nwora led the Cards with 23 points and 12 rebounds. He played probably his best game of the season. Dwayne Sutton added 15 points and six rebounds. Steve Enoch came off the bench for 14 points and thee rebounds.
The Cardinals got a good performance from guard Darius Perry who had six points, but did turn the ball over three times.
Graduate transfer Christen Cunningham didn’t score but had 12 assists but did turn the ball over six times. He had difficulties seeing over the bigger Duke guards.
Did the full court press Duke employed at the 9:54 juncture do UofL in?
“That’s a great question,” said Mack. “I think that our spacing was good, we were just tentative. Every pass was like they wanted it to get to their teammate and that tentativeness becomes a negative when you have such a great anticipating teams.
“My belief in these guys is crazy strong and that’s not going away after a really tough loss. They have to grow from it and get better.”