TicketsBearcats Drop Heartbreaker To Cards, 69-66
Williams leads UC with 18 points
Contact: Brian Teter
1/15/2005
Nick Williams had 18 points in UC's loss to Louisville. |
CINCINNATI, Ohio---Louisville?s Larry O?Bannon dropped in a reverse lay-up with 11 seconds left, securing a 69-66 win for the 19th ranked Cardinals over No. 13 Cincinnati in front of a sellout crowd at Fifth Third Arena on Saturday afternoon. UC had one final chance to send the game to overtime, but Jihad Muhammad?s off-balance three at the buzzer went wide right.
The Bearcats led by eight with eight minutes remaining, but fell victim to a 10-0 run by Louisville that pushed the Cards into their first lead of the afternoon, 59-57 with 5:35 to play. The two teams traded the lead back and forth over the final five minutes, with Louisville going ahead to stay on a put back by Juan Palacios with just over a minute to go.
UC slips to 14-2 on the year, with a 3-1 Conference USA mark. Louisville is 14-3 overall and also 3-1 in league play.
Cincinnati got an outstanding performance off the bench by senior guard Nick Williams who scored a UC career-high 18 points, all coming on a career-best six three-pointers. James White added 15 points, while also grabbing a team-high eight rebounds and handing out a game-high seven assists. Jason Maxiell and Jihad Muhammad also reached double figures for the Bearcats with 11 and 10 points, respectively.
Louisville?s Taquan Dean exploded for 25 points to lead all scorers, as the junior made seven of 13 from behind the arc. O?Bannon tallied 18 as the only other U of L player in double figures. UC effectively shut down Louisville?s Francisco Garcia, as the preseason Conference USA Player of the Year was limited to a season-low seven points. The Bearcats also held Palacios and Ellis Myles who both averaged at least 10 points per outing, to seven and three points, respectively.
Despite holding a .442 to .375 shooting advantage, the Bearcats were beaten on the boards by a 42-30 margin. Louisville overcame a .273 shooting performance in the first half, posting a .484 effort after the half to score the victory. The Cards were able to score the victory, despite allowing the Bearcats to make a season-best 11 shots from behind the arc. UC struggled from the free throw line during the day, converting just 17 of the 30, a fact not lost on Bearcat head coach Bob Huggins.
?You can?t go 17 of 30 against a team that good, it?s demoralizing,? he stated. ?Down the stretch, we went 1-for-4 from the foul line. It de-energizes you a bit. We have to make free throws. You can?t keep coming up empty.?
The Bearcats looked like they might turn it into a run away as White and Muhammad sparked a 10-0 run to open the game. Louisville finally got on the board on a three by Dean, but found themselves down 25-8 at the 7:26 mark after White buried a triple. From there, Louisville used a 16-10 run over the last seven minutes of the first half to cut the UC advantage to 35-24 at the break. Williams got hot during the latter stages of the half, burying three?s on two straight trips down the floor. But the senior?s second triple with 4:23 to go would prove to be the Bearcats? final field goal of the half.
The start of the second half showed that Louisville head coach Rick Pitino and his staff had made the necessary adjustments, as the Cardinals scored seven of the first 10 points of the half to close to within seven points. UC quickly rebuilt the lead to 10 on back-to-back three?s by Williams, before White electrified the crowd with a fast break dunk over two Cardinal defenders.
Louisville responded to the deficit though as Dean and Brandon Jenkins dropped in back-to-back long balls to move Louisville within three at 46-43. But UC again had an answer, going on a 9-4 run to push ahead eight with nine minutes left.
Things would start to go downhill from there for the Bearcats, as they converted just two more field goals over a nine-minute span, one on a Williams three that tied the game at 63 and the final on a Maxiell jumper with 1:35 showing to tie the score at 65.
Following Maxiell?s jumper, Palacios hit his put back to give Louisville the lead for good. Maxiell had a chance to tie the game on the other end, but the senior made just one of two free throw attempts with 45 seconds left. That set the stage for O?Bannon?s lay-in and the final shot attempt by Muhammad.
The victory for Louisville was the first in Fifth Third Arena for Pitino and marks UC?s first defeat on its home court since an 86-83 loss to Charlotte on Jan. 31, 2004, a span of 13 games.
?This was a hell of a basketball game,? Pitino stated. ?We had to battle down from a major deficit on the road and you have to have tough kids to do that.?
The Bearcats will continue their big three-game home stand when they entertain Charlotte on Wednesday evening at 7 p.m. UC will wrap up the stretch when No. 3 Wake Forest comes to town next Saturday (Jan. 22).