After an uneven (to put it politely) first 30 minutes, the Louisville men’s basketball team turned it on enough to avoid what would have been a pretty catastrophic loss to Boston College.
Instead, the final score looked more in line with the way most people thought the afternoon would go: Louisville 75, Boston College 62.
The win marked the 300th of Pat Kelsey’s head coaching career.
Playing without the backcourt duo of Ryan Conwell and Mikel Brown Jr., the Cardinals trailed by as many as 10 points
in the first half and by 4 at halftime before rallying in the second half behind the strong play of Sananda Fru. The big man from Germany played perhaps the most complete game of his college career to date, finishing with 19 points, 13 rebounds, and a pair of blocks.
Handling the point guard duties for most of the afternoon, Adrian Wooley also turned in a strong performance, finishing with 16 points, 6 rebounds and 4 assists. Isaac McKneely (13) and J’Vonne Hadley (11) also scored in double figures, while Khani Rooths came off the bench to pull down a career-best 11 rebounds.
Defensively, Louisville held a Boston College team that tracks as the worst team in power conference basketball to just 9-of-28 shooting from three and 23-of-63 (37%) from the field.
I’m glad they turned it on when they needed to, because this would have been an absolutely devastating defeat, but it should go without saying that this type of overall effort isn’t going to get it done three nights from now against Virginia.
Let’s get healthy, sure, but from this point forward, let’s also have more than three guys playing like they recognize the gravity of the moment from the opening tip on.
