I wasn’t expecting it, but there was something about Saturday’s game — despite the sleepy environment and the opponent being less stellar than anyone was anticipating when the game was scheduled — that felt really refreshing.
It reminded me of growing up when Crum was always playing these types of games (UCLA, Syracuse, UMass, etc.) in February in an attempt to breakup the monotony of conference play and give the team a guaranteed opportunity to make one last big statement to the committee before Selection Sunday.
Obviously, times are different now. The ACC isn’t Conference USA or the Metro, both in terms of the quality of the league and the fact that we’re only playing a pair of teams twice instead of the entire conference. Also, a win over this Baylor team didn’t provide the same type of boost that those wins (or opportunities to win) from the ‘90s did.
Still, there’s something about an unfamiliar face at this point of the season with March only a couple of weeks that just adds an extra jolt of excitement.
Would I be saying any of this if we had lost the game? Probably not, but we didn’t, so there’s no point in dwelling on that.
—There are plenty of encouraging things happening at the moment that demand attention, but let’s keep the main thing the main thing.
The biggest stars always shine the brightest in March, and the teams that play the deepest into the month always have at least one of those heavenly bodies.
Make no mistake about it, Mikel Brown Jr. is the biggest star on this team. This roster was built around him, and he was always going to be at or near the center of whatever top level success this group was able to achieve.
So to see him, in mid-February, have maybe the best back-to-back performances in the history of Cardinal basketball is … well, it’s pretty cool.
There are other guys who need to keep evolving and other improvements that need to be made, but Brown having a full-blown star turn was always the biggest necessity for this team to have a shot at doing something special on the sport’s biggest stage. If No. 0 can keep this up over the next month and-a-half or so, we’ve got a shot to be something here.
—No hoop head is better at breaking down the film of an individual player than The Athletic’s Sam Vecenie.
His full look at Mikel Brown’s performance against Baylor is worthy of your time. Here’s a snippet:
—Here’s another play from Brown that stood out on rewatch:
That’s a picture perfect hit-ahead pass that couldn’t have found Hadley any more in stride.
It seems like a little thing, but a month ago Baylor scores there, the Cards inbound the ball, they walk it up the court, and then they get into their halfcourt set hoping to break a 39 all tie. The absurd individual drives to the bucket are always going to garner more attention, but these two points count the same as the two points that come off the highlight reel plays.
Brown is so absurdly gifted and getting the opportunity to watch him playing at this level is a gift.
—I don’t want to jinx it, BUT … the necessary defensive jump that had to be made by this team at some point that I’ve been harping incessantly about since November might finally be happening.
They’re never going to be the 2011-12 Cards, but over the last three games, Louisville has jumped from 36th to 27th in the country in adjusted defensive efficiency, and has emerged as a top 15 defensive team in the country in Erik Haslam’s metric.
The communication has been better, the effort has been better, the rotations and closeouts have improved, we’ve thrown some different looks out there, the mini press has thrown teams off just enough, Mikel has defended much, much better, Ryan Conwell seems to have taken his defensive intensity to another level, Sananda Fru is protecting the rim more effectively, etc.
It isn’t perfect, and it’s never going to be, but U of L’s team defense is nearing the point where it’s going to be good enough to give this team an opportunity to beat great competition IF the offense is operating at the level it’s capable of.
—We are going to miss J’Vonne so much next year.
The tireless effort, the off-ball screening, the elite finishing, the defense, the leading by example; Every great team has a jack-of-all trades, master of none (not a dig) player on its roster.
This is an early reminder that we’re actually celebrating Senior Day on Saturday this year. I know Von got honored during the Stanford game last year, but he absolutely deserves an even bigger ovation this year.
—One of the biggest reasons why Ryan Conwell has defended so much better in recent weeks? He’s not dead from having to initiate the offense on every possession and then run down the court and try and lock up the other team’s best backcourt scorer for 35 minutes anymore.
As talented as Brown is, this team has to have Conwell playing at a high level to win two or more games in the Dance or to have a shot at winning the ACC Tournament.
—Four days after he dropped 37 on BYU, Louisville limited likely first round pick Tounde Yessoufou to 16 points on 5-of-16 from the field and 1-of-7 from three. J’Vonne Hadley doesn’t get all the credit for that, but he gets the lion’s share.
The Cards also frustrated Cameron Carr — who entered the game averaging 19.8 ppg — to just 5 points on 1-of-11 from the field (also 1-of-7 from three) and five turnovers.
Yes, Baylor is 3-9 in Big 12 play, but they also entered the weekend as a top 20 offensive team in the country, and had been averaging over 84 points per game over their last six contests.
This was a sizable step in the right direction for Louisville defensively.
—This happened when we were down seven and playing the worst basketball of the afternoon.
Guy is always going to be who he is, and I love that about him.
—This was the first really subpar game we’ve seen from Khani in about a month. I’m willing to view it as a hiccup and hope for a bounceback Tuesday night in Dallas.
—I thought this was somewhat quietly a really outstanding game from Sananda Fru. He set the tone early with a couple of buckets at the rim, including a great finish off a great pass from Mikel. He defended really well inside against a team that, admittedly, he should have had success against in the paint on both ends of the court.
I know everyone wants to see him do it against a team with one of the best frontcourts in the country, but Sananda has quietly been doing close to everything we’ve needed him to do against the teams that have comprised this five-game winning streak. He’s playing really good basketball right now.
—Aly Game or Not An Aly Game tracker update: Not an Aly game.
Still always showcasing a team-first attitude even in games where the matchup doesn’t allow for his best qualities to pop. I love the guy.
—Ok, let’s talk about these virgins:
1. Louisville had quite literally never played a game in Forth Worth before Saturday afternoon, so the “tickets are always free when the Ville comes to town” line already makes no sense and leads to believe that you did, in fact, pay money to wear your favorite team’s clothes to watch your arch-rivals play a team you have zero affiliation with.
2. This game started at 4 p.m. At 3 p.m. Kentucky tipped off arguably its biggest game of the season, on the road against Florida — the best team in the SEC and one of UK’s biggest conference rivals.
Caring enough about Louisville to wear UK gear to a Cards game against someone else is always weirdo behavior. Choosing to do that instead of actually watching a monumentally important game for Kentucky in mid-February makes me think you shouldn’t be allowed to be a member of BBN.
3. Tweeting this with pride after watching Louisville win by 11 and knowing (presumably) that Kentucky lost to Florida by 9 should result in your kid being taken away.
The two more Louisville fans who had to sit directly next to these cretins deserve a full refund.
—I like both Dave Pasch and Sean Farnham well enough individually, but were they actually watching this game. Almost every time the whistle blew on a pretty obvious call, their guess on what the call was about was completely wrong.
I also hate playing the “it feels like they’re rooting for the other team” card, because every fan base thinks the announcers are being overly complimentary of their opponent, but … I don’t know, man. It seemed like there was a lot of enthusiasm for a potential Baylor comeback and a lot of monotone commentating when Louisville was handling business.
—Struggling to handle pressure while holding a late lead continues to be something of an alarming trend. You are almost certainly going to be in that type of situation at some point next month, so that needs to get ironed out ASAP.
—Mary was keeping the kids occupied and then getting them ready to take out to my parents for most of the game. She popped in for the last minute or so and then watched the postgame handshake before firing off a “suck it, Drew Scott.”
What a woman. A+ Valentine.
—Very nice to see Adrian Wooley have some offensive success in this one. He’s the one guy who seems to have really struggled to re-adjust to his old role with Mikel back, but I stand by my belief that we’re going to need him down the stretch.
—One thing I’ll say about Baylor: Despite knowing that their only shot to salvage this season is to win four (or five) games in as many days at the Big 12 tournament, they play hard as hell.
Rob Wright leaving them high and dry for BYU pretty much tanked any shot they had of being a legitimate top 25 team, but you can still see Drew’s culture at play with this squad. Wouldn’t be surprised if they pulled an upset or two in KC next month.
—There isn’t a mid-February that goes by (outside of the two Kenny Payne years) where I don’t think about this Rick Pitino quote.
Let’s stay hot tomorrow night and let’s enjoy the hell out of these next few weeks.