Louisville Cardinals: The losses that define the fanbase

“And then… boom”

Jacob Lane (@JacobLane_BRL)

Seven years ago Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski went to the podium after falling to Louisville in the Elite Eight of the 2013 NCAA Tournament and uttered words that have become legend around these parts:

“…And then boom, the game changed from there. That’s what they do to teams. They ‘boom you’.”

Duke and Louisville have gone head to head many of times since the Cards knocked off Duke in the NCAA Tournament. Louisville’s had several more big performances against Coach K and the Blue Devils, including in wins in 2015, 2016 under Rick Pitino and most recently in 2019 with Coach Mack.

Those teams have had a ton of talent on both sides of the floor, but never has a team been as dominant as no. 2 Duke was in 2018 behind the freshmen trio of Zion Williamson, RJ Barrett, and Cam Reddish, when they traveled to the KFC Yum! Center.

I will never forget that night.

Instead of going and sitting in the upper level of a game that I didn’t expect Louisville to win, I decided to meet up with one of my best friends at our regular watering hole, Roosters. With the game being a 9:00 tip the place was nearly empty and it ended up with us securing the perfect booth right in front of the big screen on what just so happened to be pitcher night. With 10 boneless Donkey Garlic wings and a pitcher of beer, we were ready.

We weren’t ready for what was about to happen. First, the highs. Louisville was ready to play. There was no fear in their eyes or worries about how they’d be able to handle the superior athletes and talent of Williamson and Barrett. In fact, it was games like this that Dwayne Sutton was made for.

Through the first half, Louisville controlled the scoring of Duke making it difficult as ever for Williamson to get easy baskets around the rim while doing everything in their power to keep the ball out of Barrett’s hands. They took advantage of opportunities on the offensive side of the floor, moving the ball and making shots, got out in transition, and made smart plays. That led to them stretching the lead to nine on a crazy buzzer-beating shot by Darius Perry.

At this point, I was already over the moon just to be beating Duke in Chris Mack’s first season. But a 2-17 start to the second-half by Duke that allowed Louisville to stretch the lead to as many as 23 points nearly sent me into a place I don’t know if I could have come down from.

Every shot, every loose ball, every bounce, LITERALLY EVERYTHING was going Louisville’s way.

It was at the 9:07 mark when Cam Reddish hit a three from what felt like Southern Indiana, that I uttered the words under my breath “Duke’s gonna win.” Call it intuition, call it being a Louisville fan who’s “been there, done that,” call it understanding how the basketball gods work, but something felt awry.

Sure enough, for the next 11 minutes and 53 seconds of game action, Duke would go on the most soul-crushing 32-10 run in history of the KFC Yum! Center on way to knocking off Louisville 71-69. For the second game in a row, a full-court press befuddled and bamboozled the Cards backcourt. A 23 point lead over arguably the most popular Duke team in program history, gone in a blink of an eye.

Chris Mack’s quotes after the game hurt even worse.

"“I love my group. I feel for them,” he said. “As I said, I thought we outplayed the best team in the country for a long time and our team will grow from this. As hard as it is to accept, we’re going to grow from it and there will be better times.”"

That game can be credited as breaking the Louisville spirit in 2018-19 and leading to a 2-7 finish and brutally awful first-round exit against Minnesota.

Now I know what it’s like to be on the opposite side of this: “That’s what they do to teams. They ‘boom you’.”