In a week, live from Lawrence, Kansas, Louisville basketball fans will get a sense of what’s to come in the ’26-’27 campaign, without it counting as a W or L.
Maybe.
Depending on whether Jefferson Circuit Court Judge Brian Edwards issues a ruling, which will tell us — at least for a moment if not definitively — whether the Cardinals will have Seth Trimble and LJ Welles as part of the rotation?
So Wednesday next, we’ll learn some things about one version or another of the Cards.
But, we will not know
if that’s the version of the squad that will be competing, either some of the time or all the time against the most daunting slate of games Louisville will face in years.
Such is the nature of the college hoops landscape.
In constant flux, as if the New Madrid Fault Line finally decided to remind us of its presence.
Amid all the turmoil, all the destruction and restructuring of rosters, the influence of money and the guys and gals with it and willing to help the ol’ alma mammy, the transferring, shape shifting reconfiguriasma, my love for the game has not diminished.
The same with my closest Cardinal peeps.
But we’re a thinning lot.
A lot of former diehards are tuning out.
Many, lamenting the extinction of the fiction “student athlete,” because they can’t abide the reality of college kids getting paid.
Many, more reasonable, understand that, but just want to see a pick and roll, a perfectly executed 3 on 2 fastbreak which ends with a layup, not the latest opinion from an appeals panel of judges.
An old man laments the days of October 15 practice start, opening night the first Saturday in December.
Instead it’s the daze of injunctions, restraining orders and bidding wars.
Sigh.
* * * * *
One of the more interesting elements to me of the upcoming U of L season is Isaac Ellis.
Partially because he is mostly an afterthought.
Partially because he’s a reclassifier and looks like he could replace Mickey Rooney as Andy Hardy.
The kid’s got freckles.
The kid’s got the Eye of the Tiger.
He was last seen in court, Jefferson Circuit not Olsen Gym, testifying.
How Seth Trimble’s presence will diminish his playing time, but he really desires that the former Tar Heel is eligible to play.*
*Not sure why that would be legally relevant, but I retired from the Bar a score of years ago.
I’ve seen clips of incendiary Ellis from prep school.
The stories of his intensity during practices are approaching legendary.
He will be a factor, whether that only manifests itself in game prep, or if he’s thrown into action against, oh, Clemson and some guard in orange wonders, “Who is this 14 year old who just hipchecked me into the scorer’s table going after a loose ball?”
* * * * *
I know I’m just ramblin’ here.
I swear I didn’t even know what I was going to write about when I typed Hoopaholic in the title slot.
Sorry.
The last scholly guy on the bench isn’t the only Cardinal I’m wondering about.
The whole squad intrigues me.
How and whether PK has matured as a coach intrigues me.
How the staff has changed intrigues me.
I’m c d kaplan, and I am a hoopaholic.
I crave the game.
It is sustenance.
There’s just so much stuff we gotta get through before we can sit down at the table.
And we don’t even know what’s being served.
* * * * *
The first game nationwide will be November 1 in Rome.
Notre Dame vs. Villanova.
Will that ‘Nova grad currently residing in the Vatican be in the house?
Maybe the Cardinals — Louisville not College of — can get a Papal Indulgence?
— c d kaplan
