Louisville takes down No. 9 Michigan State, 82-78 in overtime

The Louisville basketball team notched the first signature victory of the Chris Mack era Tuesday night, and it did so while exorcising some very recent demons.

In a game that, for about 43 minutes, played out in an eerily similar fashion to the one the Cards lost to Marquette just four days ago, U of L managed to pull out an 82-78 overtime victory over No. 9 Michigan State.

Ryan McMahon was the hero for Louisville, scoring a career-high 24 points and going 12-of-13 from the free-throw line. The bulk of those shots from the charity stripe came in the final minutes of regulation or during overtime. Jordan Nwora (14), Christen Cunningham (13) and Dwayne Sutton (13) also scored in double figures.

With the victory, Louisville remained unbeaten in November games played inside the KFC Yum Center. The Cards have not lost a November home game period since November 30, 1972, a streak which spans 50 games. That streak is now guaranteed to last into 2019.

U of L also improves to 3-2 all-time in the ACC-Big 10 Challenge, and 3-0 in home games in the event.

Plenty more to come in a bit, but for now allow me to say this:

This feels so good, and it’s been a long time coming.