It's mid-to-late December in Louisville, which means the basketball team just suffered an ugly home loss, a key player is dealing with an injury, and Rick Pitino is tinkering with the starting lineup.
It's the time for Santa. It's the time for Brad Gianiny.
Rick Pitino announced at his Friday press conference that sophomore forward Rakeem Buckles would miss Louisville's game against Gardner-Webb due to an injury he sustained during Tuesday night's loss to Drexel.
Pitino stated that Saturday's lineup will be smaller and that he hopes to utilize it for the foreseeable future. A source says that junior guard Chris Smith will definitely be one of the five players who has his name announced before the tomorrow afternoon's game. After that, I suspect you'll see Siva, Knowles, Kuric and Jennings, although I wouldn't put it past Pitino to throw Bullet out there.
Pitino also says that he will fly to Puerto Rico on Sunday to "gauge interest." He then compared basketball in Puerto Rico to basketball in Kentucky and said he was "honored to be considered" for the position. Translation: Rick Pitino is 100% going to be/is the head coach of the Puerto Rican national team.
As far as Jared Swopshire is concerned, Pitino said he remained pessimistic about the forward's return and said there are still no plans to redshirt him.