Louisville basketball aims to stay perfect as Michigan comes to town

Getting Michigan in foul trouble

Michigan has always been a physical, defense-first basketball program. That has changed a little bit in their first year under Juwan Howard, but this is still a tenacious defensive group. Louisville will put themselves in a better position to win this game if they can get some of Michigan’s stars in foul trouble, and get to the free-throw line at a solid rate throughout. In the Battle 4 Atlantis, Zavier Simpson and Isaiah Livers struggled with foul trouble. Simpson was only able to play 17 minutes against North Carolina due to foul trouble.

If Louisville can force one of the Wolverines stars to the bench for a period of time, they could take advantage of them. Franz Wagner hasn’t played in every game, but he’s committing around 3.7 fouls per game. As a team, Michigan ranks 38th in terms of committing fouls (only 13.2 per game), but it’s early and that could easily change. Louisville draws about 16.7 fouls per game, which ranks 218th in the nation. Despite this, the Cards are a top 50 unit when it comes to team free throw shooting, connecting on 75.8 percent of their attempts from the charity stripe,

Forcing Michigan to turn the ball over

While Louisville has been getting better at forcing the opponent into taking tough shots, the Cards are still not forcing as many turnovers per game as they would like. This is the perfect opportunity for the pack line defense to get into full swing. The Cards force their opponents into 10.8 turnovers per game, which ranks outside the top 300 amongst all Division I programs. They were only able to force Western Kentucky into 11 turnovers, and the Hilltoppers are one of the worst in Division I in terms of turnovers.

Michigan isn’t much better, as they rank 202nd in the nation with an average of 14.1 turnovers per game. Zavier Simpson is the Wolverines’ most-turnover prone player, giving it away 3.7 times a game. Louisville doesn’t turn it over too much, ranking just inside the top 100 in terms of avoiding turnovers.  Considering all of this, the Cards could take a huge leg up in this one by forcing turnovers and turning defense into offense.

Having an efficient night from beyond the arc

Through seven games, the Cardinals still rank amongst the top three-point shooting teams in all of college basketball. However, they’ve been struggling to connect at an efficient rate from beyond the arc in their last few games. They shot 36 percent from deep against Akron, hitting 9 of 25 three-pointers. Against Western Kentucky, the Cards only managed to hit 7 of 22 from the three-point line. Opponents are shooting just 30.4 percent from three-point range against Michigan, but the Cards are certainly capable of increasing that number.

It might be best that Louisville is coming home to play with their home rims, and hopefully, that remains true. The Cards need their shooters to knock a few three-pointers down against Michigan, but that task shouldn’t be too big for guys like Ryan McMahon, Jordan Nwora, and Dwayne Sutton. If the rest of the team can contribute a few threes to that as well, Louisville will likely be in a good position when the buzzer sounds on Tuesday night at the Yum! Center.

Predictions:

Tristan Beckmann: Louisville 81, Michigan 73.

• Jordan Nwora becomes the favorite for National Player of the Year.
• Dwayne Sutton scores 20 points.
• Michigan turns it over 15 times.

Jacob Lane: Louisville 83, Michigan 79. (Overtime)

• Malik Williams has a double-double.
• Dwayne Sutton grabs 15 rebounds.
• Cards come back from an early double-digit deficit.