Louisville 91, Notre Dame 89 (2 OT)

It'd be hard to overstate how important last night's win was. A home loss to a 'Gody-less Notre Dame squad that has been awful on the road would have made the daunting task of winning four of their last five games all but a necessity for Louisville to make the NCAA Tournament. 

Even in years where defense is U of L's strong suit, Notre Dame is a tough matchup for the Cards and Louisville is extremely lucky to own the advantage in the series with the Irish over the past few seasons. Twice since making the move to the Big East U of L has gone into the Joyce Center and been absolutely humiliated. Conversely, Notre Dame - a notoriously awful road team - has been to Freedom Hall four times and lost once by five, twice in overtime and once in double overtime. 

The first two overtime victories ultimately had little effect on the fate of Louisville's season, but last night's could easily end up being the difference between the big show and the NIT. 

 It'd be irresponsible to start anywhere other than with Samardo Samuels. With Harangody out, Notre Dame running its offense to perfection and refusing to double team on the other end of the floor, this was a game Samuels had to win for his team. And he did. 

Samuels' night reminded me of when Anthony Allen set the single-game rushing record against Middle Tennessee State in Kragthorpe's first year. All of those yards were there for the taking, but Allen still had to step up and take them for Louisville to avoid the upset. Samardo got whatever he wanted in the post for most of the game, and then stroked freebie after freebie once the Irish turned to the hack-a-Sam. 

If the game had gone to another overtime or two, then Wes Unseld's Louisville scoring record would have been in serious jeopardy...on the night that Freedom Hall honored Unseld and noted the record. Samuels did, however, manage to tie the record for free-throws made that was set by Charlie Tyra in the first game ever played inside the Hall. 

A truly colossal effort from Louisville's big man on a night when they needed every point he gave them.

 The booing of Edgar Sosa was an embarrassment. This is something we've made fun of Kentucky fans for doing on multiple occasions the past few years, and something I thought the Freedom Hall faithful was above. 

Sosa has ears. He's aware of what's going on. Do you think this is going to encourage him to stop making silly decisions or make the extra pass?

At one point when Peyton Siva checked in for him in the first half, the ovation was so loud that I thought Mike Brey had been called for a technical. That was one thing. Then the boos could be heard when he was taken out of the game after an awful personal stretch near the end of regulation. That was embarrassing enough, but I was willing to stretch and chalk it up to a momentary lapse in judgment that could be blamed on the intensity of the moment and the recency of the player's transgressions. But the booing that took place when Sosa checked back into the game during the first overtime was beyond any sort of defense. 

Just in the small area around me I heard, "I'm counting down the seconds until he's gone" and "I've never been more ready to push a senior out the door." I'm confident most others in attendance could share similar stories. 

It's not that Sosa's actions didn't warrant criticism. He's a senior co-captain who displayed the same poor decision-making (pass the ball) and poor attitude (he was the only person sitting during the last possession of regulation) that has plagued his career here for four seasons. Edgar Sosa did not play well and he did not display the maturity that a senior leader should, but to boo him for it is beyond my realm of comprehension. 

Grow the f--- up. 

 To his credit, Sosa hit four clutch free-throws down the stretch and committed zero turnovers in the overtimes.

He also tweeted the following after the game:

Goodnight Twitter... Great win tonight. Samardo was an animal!!!. Good job CARDS!!!!

My disdain for the exclamation point aside, that's great to see. 

 It's easy to say that we would have lost this game had Luke Harangody been 100% or even played injured, but I do think there's something to be said for the fact that Louisville prepared for the game as if Harangody was going to play, and I imagine that a large chunk of practice time was devoted to slowing down the All-American. There's no reason to go over-the-top and say that 'Gody sitting out actually hurt us, but his absence almost certainly made a great deal of Pitino's preparation worthless. 

 As far as breaks down the stretch are concerned, we earned this one. 

Ben Hansbrough missing two free-throws in the final minute, some questionable foul calls in the post, Reggie's acting being rewarded, Jerry's man tripping over Samardo and allowing him to stare down an uncontested trey, Jerry not being called for a charge when it was borderline, Hansbrough missing a wide-open Tim Abromaitis and throwing the ball away late in the second OT, and then the Irish not being able to convert at the end of regulation or either overtime. 

We're not even with karma yet, but this was a step in the right direction. 

 I hadn't seen much of Notre Dame this year, and Tim Abromaitis is much, much better than I thought he was. 

Based on his numbers and the little bit I'd seen, I had him pegged as a bigger, less athletic Kyle McAlarney, a spot-up shooter who would average half as many points if he couldn't call Luke Harangody a teammate. But in addition to having a pure stroke, Abromaitis is shifty, smooth and savvy . He was tremendous on Wednesday night. 

 With approximately one month left in the season, I'm going to go ahead and declare this the worst defensive team of the Pitino-era, a stigma which is unlikely to fade between now and the worst day of the year. The '04 team that lost to Xavier in the first round of the tournament is a fairly close second. 

As far as U of L's defensive struggles are concerned, I still think that lack of length and foot speed is more to blame than lack of effort, although the former has certainly deserved a shout-out at times this season. At the risk of making a sweeping generalization, this year's Cardinals are too slow to play tough man-to-man and too small to keep shooters from getting good looks against their zone. 

All that said, I thought Louisville did about as well as they could in their man from the last couple of minutes of regulation on. The defense the Cardinals were playing when Notre Dame was getting buckets towards the end of the second half was actually vastly superior to the defense they were playing when the Irish were missing open look after open look from outside early in the game. If Notre Dame's shooters - with the exception of Hansbrough - had been more locked in early on then that game never gets to overtime. 

 Reggie Delk's four-point play might just have saved the season. He admitted that he may have done a little bit of acting, but given what took place in Morgantown, I think it's fair to chalk that one up to justice. 

Delk was a ghost for most of the night, but if he doesn't make that play then there's absolutely no way we win that game, and right now we're talking about needing a miracle run to get back on the right side of the bubble. 

 The only explanation for Jared Swopshire pulling the trigger on a three-pointer four seconds into the first possession of the second overtime is that his testicles are three times the size of the average man's. 

Another solid game for Swop, whose confidence (and testicles) seem to be growing by the day. 

 How badly does Jack Cooley want to be Luke Harangody? I guarantee that 'Gody-esque haircut is intentional. The resemblance is so uncanny that it took Harangody coming out in street clothes for me to be 100% sure that this was a different person.

When Cooley fouled out of the game, I honestly think about 20% of the people who were cheering thought he was Harangody. 

 Speaking of street clothes, Chris Smith...clap, clap, clap.

EDIT: Can't get the picture to post. This is what I'm referring to. 

His sartorial step-up was on par with Samardo's on-court step-up. I t was quite the night. 

 Jerry Smith played another tremendous defensive game. He appears to be getting his hands on more balls (gross) than the rest of his teammates combined.

Pitino's decision to put Delk and then Smith on Tory Jackson was the right move, as the combination of the pressure and a worn-out Jackson forced Notre Dame to waste considerable time each possession before they could get into their offense. 

 Smiling Charlie Strong.

 Preston!

 From the second he ripped off his warm-up and sprinted towards the scorer's table on, I made fun of Mike Broghammer. From encouraging his teammates to pass him the ball to laughing at his attempts to keep Samardo from scoring, I let it be known early and often that I was not afraid of Mike Broghammer's ability to play basketball.

When I saw that he was about to take an uncontested nine-footer with the game tied and the clock preparing to hit zero, there was no doubt in my mind that Mike Broghammer was going to hand Louisville a crushing loss, and it was going to be all my fault. The replay shows that the ball was only on the rim for a second (if that), but in my mind I remember it sitting on the back iron and perusing the Internet for half an hour before falling harmlessly to the ground. 

The combination of one missed Preston free-throw and a Mike Broghammer buzzer-beater was one that I'm not sure I could have handled. Your pity is appreciated, karma. 

 George Goode was back in uniform last night and has changed his number from 22 to 0, an announcement which was placed on the big screen before the game.

If you don't play all that much and they're going to give you that much exposure, I would seriously change my number before every game. I also wish they'd tell us which players were wearing undershirts or sleeves or who appears slightly cranky because they didn't have a good pregame nap. I would 100% get to the games half an hour earlier if they did that. 

 In addition to the return of Goode, Richie Phares was also dressed out for (I believe) the first time this season. He's sporting No. 32.

Pretty big shoes to fill, Richie. He and Garcia are the same height. So there's that. 

 A major CC congratulations to Kim Sinnard, who finally made it on the Thornton's Boogie Cam after "dancing my ass off all season." 

You only get out of life what you put into life, people. Keep grindin'. Dreams happen. 

 I was happy that after the game Rick Pitino addressed the fact that Terrence Jennings only played four minutes, and said that he deserves more but taking Samardo out with the result in jeopardy was just too much of a risk. To his credit, TJ never pouted and looked as happy about the victory as any of his teammates once the final horn sounded. 

 I'm not sure if it was a hangover from the Syracuse win, but the crowd was completely out of this game until about the ten-minute mark of the second half. 

Two games left in the Hall, folks. Let's be ready to go from the intros on next week.

 The people sitting next to and behind me left with 1:12 left in the second half. 

Why come at all?

 When Samardo went to the line for the first time in the second half and did the Jason Kidd thing where he holds the ball in his left arm and makes a shooting motion with his right, I wondered aloud if he'd always done that and I just hadn't noticed. Well, he hadn't and now I hope that he never stops. 

In fact, everyone who shot free-throws for Louisville on Wednesday needs to do and think exactly what they did and thought. Fourteen-for-fourteen in the overtimes and 35-for-40 overall. An unreal performance from the stripe on a night we had to have it. 

 Louisville is now 22-3 in February over the past three seasons. Given the strength of the Big East over that time, that's a remarkable achievement. 

 We said a couple of weeks ago that this team had to find a way to win a close one between then and the start of the Big East Tournament, and now they've done that in consecutive games. 

A lot of things still have to go right over the next three weeks for this team to be worry-free come Selection Sunday, but the Cards are in a much better position now (8-5 Big East, No. 30 RPI, No. 4 SOS) than many thought they'd be a month ago.