Wednesday afternoon Cardinal news and notes

—Spread check: Louisville by 12.5.

—Joe Lunardi’s latest Bracketology features Louisville as an 11-seed, but only because the Cardinals are currently leading the ACC and thus are the league’s automatic qualifier in Lunardi’s bracket.

—Jay Bilas has Louisville at No. 53 in his countdown of the 68 best teams in men’s college basketball.

53. Louisville Cardinals

U of L endured Chris Mack’s suspension to start the season and has since shown some grit in outlasting NC State, Wake Forest and Georgia Tech to open the ACC portion of the campaign. Fifth-year senior Malik Williams has played like a guy who has been through the ACC wars, posting double-doubles against the Wolfpack and Yellow Jackets.

—Louisville has offered Central Michigan S transfer Devonni Reed.

—The Athletic counts down the 25 best college football players currently available in the transfer portal.

—The tv ratings for the two College Football Playoff semifinal games were bad.

—Full bowl game ratings:

—Fox will be the new home of the Belmont Stakes through at least 2030. Get Gus Johnson on the call immediately.

—Coach K got into it with Georgia Tech star Michael Devoe last night and hit him with a “you don’t know who you’re talking to.”

Nice to see him checking off the “lecture opposing player” box of his farewell tour checklist this early into conference play.

—The real fun started after the game when Josh Pastner, who was basically on the court for stretches of the game, started his postgame press conference by stating his desire to live to be 120.

Rick Pitino has thoughts.

Tune into The Big X at 3 this afternoon for discussion about this and only this for three consecutive hours.

—Beloved Louisville restaurant Vietnam Kitchen is back from the almost dead.

—The Louisville baseball program continues to put up impressive numbers in the classroom.

—Your 2021 Forecastle lineup:

—U of L volleyball star Anna Stevenson is headed to Turkey to begin her pro career.

—ACC hoops from last night:

No. 2 Duke 69, Georgia Tech 57
Wake Forest 76, Florida State 54
NC State 68, Virginia Tech 63
Virginia 75, Clemson 65

—SI’s Kevin Sweeney looks at the best and worst from college basketball’s season thus far.

—AB knows.

—Ron Cooper has been hired as the new head football coach at Long Island University. It’ll be the first head coaching gig for Cooper — outside of an interim run at FIU in 2016 — in 21 years.

—Even though the last few weeks have been rough, college basketball is still in a much better spot right now than it was a year ago.

—Tori Dilfer shares her love letter to volleyball.

—Three years into expansion talks, it’s now seeming more likely than not that the CFP executive board won’t come to an agreement in time to make the first expanded playoff happen in 2026. Because nothing that nearly everyone wants can ever just happen easily in college sports.

—The Southland Conference is starting league play with an 8-team “tip-off tournament.” What a cool idea.

—It’s all “ass this,” “ass that” with this guy.

—U of L true freshman WR Demetrius Cannon has entered the transfer portal.

—Eli Hershkovich of The Lines has Louisville at No. 39 in his top 68 college hoops power rankings.

—The CJ’s Brett Dawson has an insightful read about why, regardless of the fan base’s wishes, Louisville should NOT employ ore full-court pressure.

—And finally, beat Pitt.