Louisville humbled by Tennessee, 77-55

Not what we were looking for.

Photo by Michael Hickey/Getty Images

The first marquee moment of the Pat Kelsey era at Louisville was met with a thud.

No. 12 Tennessee overwhelmed the Cardinals from start to finish on their way to a 77-55 road win Saturday afternoon.

A KFC Yum Center jam packed with Cardinal fans wearing white and waiting to explode never really got that opportunity. Tennessee raced out to a 10-0 lead and was never truly threatened by their hosts from that point on.

A rare U of L flurry early in the second half briefly trimmed the UT lead to nine, but a shot clock-beating prayer from Zakai Zeigler served as the ultimate backbreaker.

Louisville’s woeful performance was defined by two statistics. First, the Cardinals could never get it going with any sort of consistency from behind the three-point line, finishing 10-of-39 from beyond the arc, good for 25.6 percent. Second, they were abused on the glass, getting out-rebounded by their more physical opponents by 14.

Perhaps most discouraging of all for U of L is that they were dominated by a Tennessee team that turned the ball over a whopping 20 times, including 11 by Zeigler. The senior point guard made up for it by knocking down 4-of-7 from beyond the arc and scoring 19 points to go along with seven assists. North Florida transfer Chaz Lanier also scored 19.

U of L was led on offense by Reyne Smith, who came off the bench to knock down four triples and score a team-high 18 points. Noah Waterman scored 10 to finish as the Cardinals’ only other double figure scorer.

My belief that this can be an NCAA tournament team hasn’t changed, but I’ll admit that hill that must be climbed to get there is steeper than I thought it was this morning. I believed, at the very least, that this team was close to being prepared for the challenge that Tennessee represented. It wasn’t.

The good and the bad news is that things don’t get any easier over the eight weeks that lie ahead. There are plenty more opportunities for this team to make an early splash, but clearly, Saturday’s effort isn’t going to get that done.