Louisville Basketball: Cards continue taking care of business in ACC

How have you guys been? I know I missed the Boston College game so we will do a two for one and cover that along with Georgia Tech massacre. Let us take a stroll down memory as we find the good, the bad, and ugly of Louisville Basketball week in ACC play.

While the ACC is currently the upside down with upsets galore every game, it’s been a big week for our Louisville basketball program. The talk has been since the preseason that Louisville would need to stockpile ACC wins by “taking care” of the Boston College’s, Wake Forest’s, and Miami’s and maybe “steal” one or two from Duke, Virginia, or UNC and they have already taken care of one of those “steals” in the beatdown of UNC.

I for one was not nervous about the Boston College game at all. All day I was chalking it up to an easy win, which is why I was immediately worried when Louisville came out sluggish and Boston College came to play.

Coming into the game, BC had no wins that made you think they were going to be the scrappy team they were, in fact the loss BC suffered to IUPUI had me thinking this was going to be a blowout. Luckily Jordan Nwora is a Cardinal and when he got it going to lead the comeback,it was contagious and the team starting playing together as a whole.

The Dwayne Sutton/Jordan Nwora combo cooled a bit in the second half and the large Louisville lead dwindled to single digits in the second half before the Cards pulled away and walked away with a double digit win. The win over Boston College has to show this Cards team that most nights in the ACC will be dogfights and they can never take their foot off gas when up big on a team.

Then came the Georgia Tech game. Down 3 starters and having Josh Pastner as a head coach led to a very long Saturday afternoon for the Yellow (pea green according to Raycom Sports) Jackets. Louisville controlled everything about this game from beginning to end in frankly what was not a real fun game to watch. Pastner rolled out what may be may be the worst power 5 lineup anyone will see all season. I am glad I ended up combining these games because there would not be much to talk about in a game where Louisville so obviously overpowered their opponent.

The Good: The Nwora/Sutton combo

Jordan Nwora is exceeding the high expectations I had for him coming into the season. Following what Jordan did over the summer while playing for the Nigerian national team I fully expected him to be a huge part of Chris Mack’s offense this season. At times Jordan has been THE offense, in both the Boston College and Georgia Tech games he had such great first halves that it really spread to his teammates.

The 32 and 25 he has put up in the last two games has helped the Cards get it going on offense and his rebounding numbers have also assisted in UL winning not only the games but the rebound battles as well by double digits.

As much as I thought Nwora was going to have a real break out season, it was another Cardinal I thought would be the other half of the combo but Dwayne Sutton is the guy that has his fingerprints all over every game he plays in. Sutton was awarded ACC player of the week coming off the big UNC win and his scoring, rebounding, assists, and defense can not only keep UL in games but also keep Sutton’s name towards the top of several statistical categories in the ACC.

Also good: Controlling Tempo

In nearly every game this season outside of the loss to Kentucky, the Cards have done a great job of controlling the speed at which the game is played. Controlling tempo and staying poised in close games late can be highly attributed to fifth year grad transfer Christen Cunningham. CC keeps proving not only does he belong in the ACC he is a pivotal piece of a team that while being voted to finish 11th in the ACC is currently in a 6 way tie for the conference lead early in the year.

The Bad: Turnovers

Coming off of two ACC wins it is hard to find anything “bad” the team is doing or has done. While after the loss at Pittsburgh the defense was the biggest talking point in terms of needed growth or concern, I am starting to get more concerned with the high number of turnovers in both of the games we are talking about here.

Like everyone else I would like to see under 10 turnovers a game and with 13 turnovers against BC then 11 Georgia Tech the Cards wasted possessions that will mean a lot more against the upper echelon of the ACC.

Bottom line is Louisville took care of business as they were expected to do last week and now should do something no one really expected this season and enter the Top 25. This team is a team that loves to share the ball and they play for each other.

If Louisville does in fact enter the Top 25 this week it will set up a showdown with another Top 25 team from the ACC in NC State Thursday at the Yum.

Get out and get it rocking to cheer the Cards on to another ACC victory in what looks to be dog fight.

Until next week Go Cards! #LsUp