Louisville takes care of Clemson 76-44

In all of his postgame interviews Thursday night Jeff Walz put the fear of God into me about how this game could be a potential letdown after the UConn victory. So I can only imagine the intensity with which he stressed to his players that they could not take Clemson lightly. In the first quarter it seemed they got the message and that this might be a runaway victory. The Cards went on an 18-0 run and were up 20-10 going into the second quarter. However, Louisville hit a dry spell in shooting and suddenly found themselves with a 1 point lead. Then with 2:48 to go in the first half Clemson made a basket and did not score from the field again until there was 7:30 left to go in the GAME.

Clemson only made 2 field goals in the entire second half. After the game Coach Walz said, “We defended well....The second half we start to hedge them [on ball screens] and they’re not a great perimeter shooting team. So we were going to make them score over us.”

Jazmine Jones led all scorers with 17 points including 3-3 from 3-point range. Coach Walz joked, “I told her every time she squared up to shoot a three I was saying a quick prayer. So they must’ve worked.” More seriously he said, “She’s been working on it and she’s challenging herself. I told her that if she wants to change the scouting report you need to spend hours in the gym and she starting to do that. She just can’t use her athleticism.”

Dana Evans had 15 points and 5 assists. Sam Fuehring had 10 points and 9 rebounds. Kylee Shook finished the game with a career high 15 rebounds. Coach Walz said, “Kylee Shook was fantastic today. It was one of the best ballgames she’s played and that’s a tribute to her because she didn’t get a chance to play much on Thursday night. But different games present different opportunities and matchups.” He added, ‘15 rebounds, 3 blocks shots, she altered a bunch of and those don’t show up on the stat sheet but I was really, really happy for her.”

On a technical foul called on Sam Fuehring in the 4th quarter he said, “I’ve just got to continue to work with her. She’s getting labeled now by the officials. That’s one thing she has to understand—that they all talk too. So I’m like ‘Sam, you need to learn to control your emotions. Every time you get touched it’s not a foul and then just play through it.’ Because she’s really a very, very good basketball player and she plays so hard she’s down there battling and I don’t want to see her get any technical fouls like she got tonight just because of her emotion.”

Next up the Cards take on Syracuse at the Yum Center on Thursday, February 7th. The game is at 7PM.