How it happened: No. 24 Louisville closes out Wake Forest in final minutes
WINSTON SALEM, NORTH CAROLINA — It wasn’t easy.
24th-ranked Louisville’s wire-to-wire 88-80 road conference win over Wake Forest was one in which the Cardinals never trailed and led by as many as 15. And despite going into the locker room up nine, a strong second half from the Demon Deacons forced Louisville to weather the storm with minutes remaining.
With the score at 80-80 and 4:44 to go, Louisville went on a defensive tear, forcing Wake Forest to miss its final 11 shots without scoring a point. The Cardinals weren’t exactly shooting the lights out in that stretch, as they failed to make a field goal, but still got to the charity stripe, connecting on 8 of 10 free throws in the final five minutes. The Deacons went 0-of-2 from the line in that same span.
Credit Louisville’s defense down the stretch, but it wasn’t pretty for most of Saturday’s contest. The Deacons finished shooting 43 percent from the field, grabbed 10 offensive rebounds, and kept
Six Cards finished in double-figures, and six recorded four or more rebounds — in all a good offensive day for a Louisville team that shot 53 percent from the field, made 10 3s on only 25 attempts, and outscored Wake 34-30 in the painted area. Senior sharpshooter Isaac McKneely made three of those triples as Louisville’s guards Ryan Conwell and Mikel Brown Jr. continue to struggle. Both finished in double-digits, but went a combined 5-of-16. Brown’s eight assists made a difference, but the freshman and his older counterpart have not been scoring the ball as effectively of late. It’s been Louisville’s frontcourt that has carried the Cardinals to their fast start in February.
One of the ACC’s most improved players, Wake Forest’s Juke Harris, led all players with 25 points on 8-of-21 shooting and recorded 11 rebounds in 39 minutes. All while German forward Sananda Fru led Louisville with 17 points and was a perfect 7-of-7 from the floor. His defense down the stretch was one of the bright spots for the Cardinals on that end of the floor. The junior did a nice job finishing through contact and the physical Demon Deacon defenders around the basket. Fru recorded two blocks and snagged six boards. By his side in the frontcourt, and just one game removed from being limited to three minutes against Notre Dame due to a back injury, J’Vonne Hadley scored the Cards’ first five points and, in just 22 minutes, was second on the team with 15 points and five rebounds. In the second half, Hadley made several heads-up plays to get ahead of the defense
Khani Rooths, coming off his first career back-to-back double-doubles against Notre Dame and SMU, gave the Cardinals 13 points, two blocks, and was +/- of +11 in just 18 minutes. It’s the first time in his college career that Rooths has back-to-back-to-back games with at least 10 points.
As mentioned, down the stretch, the Cards relied on their free throw shooting, and for the fifth time in ACC play, third consecutive, Louisville outshot its opponent at the foul line: 31-25. Louisville made 24 of those 31 attempts.
Louisville now rides a three-game win streak for the first time since November and moves to 17-6 and 7-4 in the ACC. The Cardinals are set to host an extremely tough North Carolina State team on Monday night.
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