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Tuesday afternoon Cardinal news and notes

Crums Revengette isn't letting a subpar weekend get her down. There's still a fun month of hoops ahead.

By Mike Rutherford

I_medium I still think it's unlikely to happen, but Steve Jones makes a pretty convincing case for the committee having Louisville ranked ahead of Florida State in tonight's CFP rankings. If that were to occur (and it again I have little faith that it will), the Cards would still be in line for an Orange Bowl bid.

I_medium ESPN's Jared Shanker takes things a step further and says there's no way the committee can justify putting Florida State ahead of Louisville.

I_medium Spencer Hall gives the ACC a shout for being way more entertaining than the SEC this season.

I_medium Well this feels appropriate.

You guys deserve each other.

I_medium Western Michigan's probably not going to lose a game this season, and they're not going to have a chance to play for college football's top prize. That sort of sucks.

I_medium Andrea Adelson breaks down the Lamar Jackson vs. DeShaun Watson debate for ACC Player of the Year.

I_medium EDSBS gives its take on what a conversation between a Louiville fan and a Kentucky fan this Tuesday might sound/look like.

I_medium Eat it, West Virginia.

I_medium Somebody hacked five-star center Mitchell Robinson's Twitter and announced that he was decommitting from Western Kentucky, which isn't the case.

I_medium Tom Herman kicked off his career at Texas by taking a shot at Charlie Strong.

I_medium The ACC/Big 10 challenge is knotted at one after the first night. Night two should be a doozy. Doozie? Douzy? I'm leaving it.

I_medium Bleacher Report looks at the Louisville vs. Florida State Orange Bowl debate in its bowl projections post.

One of the spots in the Orange Bowl will come down to Florida State and Louisville.

They are each 9-3, and the Cardinals destroyed the Seminoles 63-20 in their head-to-head game. However, Louisville has lost two straight, while Florida State is riding high with four straight wins, one of which came against archrival Florida. The Seminoles will be ahead of Louisville in Tuesday's rankings and will stay there with both teams done playing until the bowl season.

Nick Bromberg of Yahoo Sports pointed to another factor when he said, "Florida State will also be a bigger draw for the Orange Bowl too. While Louisville fans would undoubtedly be happy to head south for New Year's, finding Florida State fans in Miami isn't too tall of a task."

I_medium Tickets for Saturday's 7 p.m. NCAA Tournament quarterfinal match against Stanford at Lynn Stadium are now on sale.

I_medium It didn't begin after a win over Kentucky as originally stated, but it has begun.

I_medium Gary Parrish of CBS has Louisville basketball at No. 12 in his daily rankings.

I_medium The Sporting News looks at where the top college hoops title contenders must improve.

I_medium Elvis is paying the price for the 2016 Louisville football team's rivalry sins.

I_medium Deondre Francois and Dexter Lawrence picked up the ACC's two Rookie of the Year awards.

I_medium This video of an escape from the fires in Gatliburg is thoroughly terrifying.

I_medium A player for Bryant dribbled out the clock and then celebrated last night ... as his team trailed by one to Brown.

I_medium Seth Davis breaks down what he saw from all eight teams at the Battle 4 Atlantis.

Louisville

(Def. Old Dominion, 68-€”62 in OT; Def. Wichita State, 62-€”52; Lost to Baylor, 66-€”63)

The good:

Louisville's first-round win over ODU wasn't just ugly, it was late. The game was the last one on Wednesday and concluded around midnight. Wichita State, by contrast, played in the first game early Wednesday afternoon and throttled LSU by 35. Mentally and physically, the Cardinals should have been toast by the time their game tipped off at 2:30 Thursday afternoon, yet they jumped on the Shockers right away, building a 16-point and never looking back. Louisville held the Shockers to 32% shooting and out-rebounded them by 13. Given the quick turnaround, that speaks volumes about this team's competitive spirit.

It was interesting to watch this team develop its identity over three days. Maybe the biggest thing they learned is to turn to 6' 3" sophomore guard Donovan Mitchell down the stretch. Mitchell rescued the Cards when they faced a seven-point deficit late in the second half against Old Dominion. He also had seven steals in that game. Sitting courtside, I could see the team finally acquire a sense of defensive urgency as the minutes ticked away and the specter of an upset looked very real. Yes, it would have been nice if the Cards played that hard from the start, but at least they turned up the heat before it was too late. Now they know how hard they have to play at the defensive end in order to beat good teams—or even mediocre ones. That's a valuable lesson.

The bad:

The reason Louisville needs to be so good defensively is that this is a very suspect offensive team. Rick Pitino has spent much of the preseason extolling Mitchell's dramatically improved shooting, and though he has raised his percentage to 34.3 after shooting 25.0 from behind the arc as a freshman, the jury is out on just how dependable he is in that regard. (Mitchell was 7 for 19 from three in The Bahamas.) By contrast, 6' 7" sophomore forward Deng Adel was awful, making just 6 of his 28 field goal attempts and, worse, attempting only five total free throws in the three games. I don't know who is telling Adel that he should shoot fall-away jumpers as opposed to using his length and athleticism to get to the tin, but I highly doubt it's Rick Pitino.

The Cardinals' struggles in the halfcourt led them to fritter away that huge lead against Baylor. Freshman forward V.J. King hit a couple of timely buckets in the second half, but he undermined that with some defensive lapses, which prompted Pitino to park him on the bench. Ditto for 6' 9" junior forward Jaylen Johnson, who is Louisville's best post scorer but also faces a quick hook if he takes a bad shot. Pitino said after the loss to Baylor that his inability to trust his players shortened his bench, thereby wearing down the guys who were playing heavy minutes. Hence the second-half collapse. The good news is that halfcourt offensive problems can be fixed with time and repetitions, but you have to wonder what blowing a big lead like that will do to this team's confidence.

I_medium Romeo Langford's new high school season is off to a predictably hot start.

I_medium Louisville junior defender Tim Kubel is one of 15 semifinalists for the prestigious MAC Hermann Trophy.

I_medium Even with Louisville's loss to Kentucky, the ACC is 10-2 against the SEC on rivalry weekend over the last three years.

I_medium Tonight's complete slate of college hoops:

I_medium Football Scoop has the best Twitter summary from the weekend that was in college football.

I_medium This was Ken Lolla's locker room message after his team's 3-1 win over Notre Dame on Sunday.

I_medium Caleb Swanigan, the Purdue big man Louisville has to find a way to slow down tomorrow night, is the Big 10 Player of the Week.

I_medium CBS predicts that U of L will be at No. 18 in tonight's CFP rankings.

I_medium The only UK that's OK....just OK.

I_medium ESPN's college hoops power rankings have Louisville at No. 9.

I_medium The Louisville women's basketball team is still stinging from its loss to South Carolina, but there's no time to lick its wounds with another showdown against No. 5 Maryland coming up on Thursday.

I_medium The Journal and Courier gives an early scout of Louisville-Purdue.

I_medium And finally, R&R is live from The Troll Pub today where we'll continue to try and let our wounds heal from 3-6. You can listen here.

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