Louisville Basketball: Cards win with defense, discipline in Bellarmine exhibition

Louisville basketball coach Chris Mack got his first win in the KFC Yum! Center on Sunday in an exhibition game against cross-town Bellarmine.

It may not count officially, but Chris Mack’s Louisville basketball team secured their first win against a talented Bellarmine Knights team on Sunday.

Bellarmine, NCAA Division II’s No.1 team in the country entering the season, was a more than worthy adversary for Louisville, and pushed the Cards until the very end.

Shooting Struggles 

The Cards began the game cold from deep. They missed their first 15 three-point attempts, and did not connect from beyond the arc until Dwayne Sutton hit a shot with a minute and a half remaining in the first half.

Louisville was able to run their offense well early on, and had excellent ball movement around the perimeter. However the Cards’s sharp shooters Ryan McMahon and Jordan Nwora took a little while to heat up from deep.

Eventually, after the urging of Chris Mack to continue shooting, Louisville warmed up and finished the game 6-26 from 3-point range, but 5-9 from outside in the second half.

Intentional Execution

If there is one noticeable difference based off of the first game of the Chris Mack era, it is that this Louisville team plays with execution in mind.

Although the Knights played Louisville close, the Cards did not look stagnant at all during the game. Often times under Rick Pitino, Louisville ran a very vanilla offense and preferred to wear other teams down before pulling away late. Against Bellarmine, the Cards’s attention to detail and intention to run offensive and defensive sets to perfection was clear.

The final score was more a result of Louisville having a lackluster shooting game rather than not being able to execute of offense. The shots were there, and guys like VJ King, Jordan Nwora, Darius Perry, and Ryan McMahon are excellent shooters who will make more shots as the season progresses.

MVP: The MVP of the game has to be Steven Enoch. 14 points on 4-4 shooting, and 2-2 from three point range, along with 5 rebounds, and a team leading +19 +/-.

Enoch was definitely the surprise of the game. He had a smaller opponent to deal with in Adam Eberhard, but Eberhard is a preseason DII All-American. He made the most of his 25 minutes of game time, and showed why Chris Mack was raving over his potential in the offseason.

If Enoch continues this dominance, Louisville will be a force to be reckoned with going forward.

The Cards have one more exhibition game against Simmons College on Saturday November 3rd before officially tipping off the season against Nichols State on November 8th.