Cardinals Head North To Battle Pitt

Mark BlankenbakerJanuary 10, 2025

Louisville men’s basketball is beginning a two-game road stretch at Pitt on Saturday afternoon at 12. The game against the Panthers will be broadcast on ESPN2.

The Cardinals are currently on a five-game winning streak for the first time in four years, most recently beating Clemson 74-64 in the KFC Yum! Center on Tuesday night. Pitt was previously on a five-game winning streak before losing 76-47 at Duke on the same evening.

Despite Louisville leading the overall series between the two programs 21-11, the Cardinals have not beat the Panthers since 2022, losing the last five games in the series. UofL is 9-5 against the Panthers when playing in Pittsburgh.

Louisville’s five losses have all come to teams now ranked in the AP Top 25: No. 1 Tennessee (14-1), No. 4 Duke (13-2), No. 6 Kentucky (12-3), No. 17 Oklahoma (13-2) and No. 23 Ole Miss (13-2). As of Jan. 9, those teams are a combined 65-10.
Against Clemson on Jan. 7, J’Vonne Hadley scored 32 points, the most by any player in an ACC game thus far this season.
Against North Carolina on Jan. 1, Chucky Hepburn made 16 free throws, tying the program record for free throws made in a single game.
Louisville played five ranked opponents before the New Year. The Cardinals have the 12th best strength of schedule according to KenPom as of Jan. 9.
As of Jan.9, Louisville is 11th in the country in 3-point attempts per game (30.9), 53rd in free throw attempts per game (22.9) and 55th in free throws made per game (16.6) .
As of Jan. 9, Chucky Hepburn is 10th in the country in steals per game at 2.56 and seventh in total steals with 41. Reyne Smith is sixth in total 3-pointers made (54), third in the country total 3-point attempts (145) and 18th in 3-pointers per game at 3.38.
Sophomore forward James Scott is fifth in the country in dunks as of Jan. 9 with 34 makes on the year, according to Bart Torvik. He leads the ACC in that category.
Senior guard Reyne Smith was named ACC Player of the Week on Dec. 23 for his 27-point performance at Florida State. It was just the third time in the program’s 11 years in the ACC that Louisville has had multiple ACC Player of the Week awards as Chucky Hepburn also earned that title on Dec. 2.
Against Florida State on Dec. 21, Chucky Hepburn and Terrence Edwards Jr. both logged eight assists apiece; it was the first Louisville game to have two Cardinals log at least eight assists each in the same game since Peyton Siva and Gorgui Deng both had eight against Syracuse in the 2013 Big East Tournament championship game.
Louisville’s 89-61 victory over No. 14/15 Indiana in the quarterfinals of the Battle 4 Atlantis was Louisville’s first win over a ranked team since beating No. 19/20 Virginia Tech 73-71 on Jan. 6, 2021. It’s the highest ranked opponent the Cards have beat since beating No. 3 Duke 79-73 on Jan. 18, 2020.
In the win over Indiana, UofL’s Chucky Hepburn logged 16 points, 10 assists and seven steals. He’s the first DI player with at least those marks since Markquis Nowell of Kansas State did it against West Virginia with 23 points on Dec. 31, 2022.