Lucas: Louisville Rapid Reactions

By Adam Lucas

1. What a performance by Carolina--while understanding Louisville was coming off a long break--in a huge 99-54 win over the Cardinals. Needless to say, that was the biggest win in the history of the UNC-Louisville series.

2. Sometimes freshmen have tough games. And sometimes they have showings like the young Tar Heels in the first half on Saturday. Freshmen scored the last 33 points of the half on the way to a 48-29 lead at the break. That first half scoring outburst was led by Kerwin Walton with 14 points and Day'Ron Sharpe with 12 points and five rebounds. The freshmen completely dominated the half, scoring 39 of Carolina's 48 points, handing out nine of the team's 13 assists, and shooting 16-for-25 from the field. By the time Caleb Love threw down a dunk at the halftime buzzer as Malik Williams gazed from below, it had been an exhilarating half.

3. The ringleader of that freshman performance was Sharpe, who finished with 21 points and 11 rebounds (eight offensive), punctuating his game with a vicious alley-oop slam with just under four minutes remaining. Louisville thought it might benefit from the return of big man Malik Williams; he was largely inconsequential in the game as he works back into game shape after a season-long absence.

4. Carolina's ball movement was significantly better. This isn't a team with a Kendall Marshall-like passer who dominates the passing. But the Tar Heels had ten different players hand out an assist, and were especially effective when passing from big man to big man. The Heels finished with 29 assists on 41 field goals, and had 16 assists on 21 field goals in the second half.

5. Remember: Kerwin Walton is having these types of shooting performances as a known quantity. Early in his Carolina career, defenses weren't keying on him. Now, every time he gets the ball, opposing benches are shouting, "Shooter!" and pregame scouting reports likely focus on his abilities. He's still able to have the type of 19-point performances he showed against the Cards.

6. That's now three straight encouraging performances by Walker Kessler, taking it from the "that was a nice one-time showing" to "the freshman appears to be getting his legs under him." Kessler did a little bit of everything on Saturday, providing some scoring to go with occasional shot-blocking and a first half hustle play on which he dove to secure a loose ball and then called a timeout. Most impressively, even Roy Williams was clapping after that last play, which shows you just how much Williams valued the hustle--even more than his precious timeouts. Kessler finished with eight points, four rebounds, three assists, two steals and two blocks.

7. Carolina did a credible job defensively on two of the best guards in the league, Louisville's Carlik Jones and David Johnson. Caleb Love got the bulk of the defensive assignment on Jones, while Leaky Black spent most of his time on Johnson. The Cardinal duo combined to shoot 9-for-28 with five turnovers.

8. It wasn't a perfect performance. Carolina needs to do a better job at the free throw line. The Tar Heels were 7-18 at the charity stripe, with 16 of those attempts coming from the big men.

9. Roy Williams now has 899 career wins. With four more victories, he will surpass Bob Knight with the third-most wins by a Division I head coach.

10. As you're enjoying that victory, remember it was partially made possible by the Tar Heels scheduling that midweek game against Northeastern. Carolina looked like a team that was in a groove, and Louisville looked like a team on a three-week pause (which they were). There are times in a normal season when a late-season week off can be beneficial. This unusual season, with all of its stops and starts, isn't the same way.

11. With all the talk about travel issues and different protocols this year, interesting to note that John Higgins, one of Saturday's officials, was doing his fourth game in four days. He officiated the Drake-Northern Iowa game in Cedar Falls on Wednesday, the Wichita State-Houston game in Wichita on Thursday, and the Dayton-Saint Louis game in Dayton last night. He was joined on the crew by Ron Groover, who was the topic of an interesting recent story about the obstacles facing officials this season.

12. Puff Johnson missed another game Saturday, as did Walker Miller, who was in street clothes. However, the Tar Heels were bolstered by the return of Anthony Harris, who missed Wednesday's game with Northeastern.

13. In case you missed the news earlier Saturday, Carolina scheduled a nonconference game with Marquette for Wednesday at 7 p.m. The Tar Heels were originally scheduled to travel to Boston College on Tuesday. But the Eagles are on pause. The ideal scenario would have been to schedule an ACC game, but the only available league opponent was Pitt. The Tar Heels have already played at Pittsburgh, and the Panthers weren't scheduled to travel to Chapel Hill this year and didn't want to make a schedule addition. Enter Marquette, where head coach Steve Wojciechowski will be very familiar with the Smith Center.

14. That was a big win for Carolina's NCAA Tournament credentials. Sure, Louisville didn't look great on Saturday. But it will look like a very strong win on paper, and the resume needed that victory.

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University of North Carolina Athletics

Players Mentioned

Leaky Black

Anthony Harris

Puff Johnson

Walker Kessler

Caleb Love

Walker Miller

Day'Ron Sharpe

Kerwin Walton

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