Mikel Brown Jr. knocked down a pair of free throws to give Louisville basketball its fourth one-point lead over Notre Dame of the first half with 3:19 to play in the period Wednesday.
Then, Pat Kelsey dialed up the pressure. And the No. 23 Cardinals (16-6, 6-4 ACC) never trailed the Fighting Irish (11-12, 2-8) again en route to a 76-65 victory at the KFC Yum! Center.
Kelsey, admittedly, isn’t a big press guy. But he knows a guy: assistant coach/press coordinator Peyton Siva, the tip of the spear that was Hall of Famer Rick Pitino‘s championship-winning defense in 2013.
“I told him at the beginning — and I said it to our players, ‘I don’t know anything about pressing,’” Kelsey said. “But I know effort.”
The effort Khani Rooths and Sananda Fru had trapping Notre Dame guard Jalen Haralson in the right corner on the ensuing inbounds pass? Suffocating. They forced a held ball — possession arrow UofL.
A few moments later, after Rooths misfired from 3-point range, Adrian Wooley snagged Louisville’s ninth offensive rebound of the half with one hand. The sophomore guard tried a layup and missed but came down with the ball again. Then, Rooths darted toward the basket. Wooley hit him in stride, and he finished the play with a two-handed flush.
That sequence was part of a 14-7 swing — and a 31-16 extended run — that put the Cards in the driver’s seat.
“These big plays give us a huge energy boost,” Fru said.
Kelsey called it “winning in the margins.” It wasn’t pretty, but that’s what it took on a night when UofL shot 22.6% (7 for 31) from beyond the arc and had its top two scorers combine to go 5 for 21 from the field.
The most-glaring margin: Kasean Pryor coming off the bench for the first time since a Jan. 17 win at Pittsburgh and scoring a team-high 10 points during the second half. He added five rebounds, an assist and a steal to boot across 15 minutes, 29 seconds — his longest shift since going 15:56 during a Nov. 6 victory over Jackson State.
His layup with 7:23 remaining in regulation was the first basket of a 14-0 run that turned a five-point Louisville lead into a 19-point advantage.
Notre Dame’s Micah Shrewsberry heard what Kelsey said Monday, during a Zoom call with ACC coaches, when he was asked about Pryor’s shrinking role: “Playing time, your role, is developed over time — and it’s earned. It’s up to everybody. … Everybody needs to be ready when their name’s called.”
“It looked like he stayed ready tonight,” Shrewsberry said.
“He always makes plays that are super loud — whether it’s a dunk or a big steal,” McKneely said. “He’s willing to do whatever it takes to win.”
In a way, Kelsey’s hand was forced when J’Vonne Hadley couldn’t return to Wednesday’s game after checking out at the 17:14 mark of the first half —the sixth-year Swiss Army knife is dealing with a back injury stemming from a “hard fall” he had during practice Monday, the coach said. But Pryor totaled only nine minutes off the bench during Rooth’s four-game absence due to an illness last month. What changed?
“He’s practiced angry,” Kelsey said. “He’s practiced desperate.”
“Dealing with a very serious injury, there’s always going to be complications — even after healing,” Pryor told Cardinal Sports Network play-by-play announcer Paul Rogers after the win. “The last few weeks, my knee has felt the best it’s felt since the injury. … Everything’s coming back to me now. It was only a matter of time that I got back to playing at this level.”
Rooths, meanwhile, continued his torrid pace since being cleared to return to the court. The sophomore forward posted his second consecutive double-double, 12 points and a game-high 12 rebounds in 25:58, to help UofL outscore Notre Dame 33-14 off the bench. Wooley chipped in six points and tied Rooths with a game-high four offensive rebounds (six total).
Isaac McKneely led Louisville with 13 points —10 during the first half — on 4-for-8 shooting from beyond the arc. Fru and Ryan Conwell joined Rooths with 12 apiece. Conwell, who with Brown combined for the aforementioned 5-for-12 clip, accounted for half of the Cards’ 14-0 knockout punch of a run late in the second half.
To get there, UofL had to weather rocky starts out of the gate — falling behind 16-7 in the opening six minutes and allowing the Irish to make 6 for their first 10 shots — and out of the locker room. Before that big run, Kelsey’s team missed 10 consecutive shots from the 11:58 and 7:38 marks.
“The effort, the grit, the tenacity, the energy went (up),” the coach said. “Usually, it goes when you’re rolling on offense, but they really upped the rebounding, I think, especially. We missed so many 3s; but gosh darn, there were some scrums for balls. I don’t even want to name all of the names, but we played really, really hard.”
It showed in the margins: +11 on the boards (46-35) and +18 in the paint (40-22).
“From top to bottom,” McKneely said, “everybody contributed tonight.”
Up next for Louisville: a noon tipoff Saturday at Wake Forest’s Joel Coliseum. The Demon Deacons have the week off after falling to 11-11 overall and 2-7 in the ACC with a loss to N.C. State on Jan. 31 — their eighth in the past 10 games.
Reach Louisville men’s basketball reporter Brooks Holton at bholton@gannett.com and follow him on X at @brooksHolton.
This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Louisville basketball beats Notre Dame, UofL overcomes slow start