By Derek DeBurger
After having the worst season in program history—going a whopping 4-28—head coach Kenny Payne and the Louisville Cardinals will kick off the 2023-2024 men’s basketball season with a matchup against the UMBC Retrievers.
A complete roster revamp
Lucky for the Cards, Payne spent the offseason completely revamping this roster. According to 247 Sports, Louisville brought in the sixth-ranked freshman recruiting class and the 29th-ranked transfer portal class.
While the transfer portal class is headlined by Illinois transfer and former five-star recruit Skyy Clark, the best new player on Louisville’s roster might actually be USC transfer Tre White. White was touted as someone who might have been able to go pro after his one season at USC, and now he’s getting similar buzz at Louisville going into his sophomore year.
Louisville’s incoming freshmen are all really exciting, too, starting with five-star recruit Dennis Evans, a center with great defensive instincts who stands at a staggering 7’1”. Come Monday, Evans will officially become the tallest player in Cardinals history. Curtis Williams is an exciting guard/forward who can shoot the absolute lights out. Ty-Laur Johnson is a point guard out of Brooklyn with a high motor and a lot of potential, and Kaleb Glenn is a local freshman with a lot of upside that reminds you of past fan favorites like Dwayne Sutton.
On top of the roster talent being vastly upgraded, the roster construction is night and day compared to last year: there are multiple points guards on the team. Last season Louisville was forced to play El Ellis at point guard despite that not being his natural position, and only sub him out when he was in foul trouble or he desperately needed a breather.
Last year, Louisville made far too many simple mistakes, including countless moments of dribbling the ball off of a foot, not boxing out a rebounder, zero communication on defense and so much more. Louisville already looks vastly improved in several areas from their two exhibitions. However, there’s still a lot of room to grow as for the second year in a row the Cards have dropped an exhibition game to a Division II opponent.
UMBC
UMBC, the Cards’ first opponent of the season, is bad. UMBC is really bad. Last year, they finished 239 in the NET rankings out of 363 schools. That’s awful, but the Cards finished 314 out of 363 schools. Historically, this matchup is a breeze, but Louisville has given no indication that they’ll win the game besides the talent.
By virtue of having the pedigree that Louisville has and playing in the ACC, the Cards will play several very talented teams this year, including five or six (depending on how the Empire Classic plays out) teams ranked in the AP Top 25 preseason poll.
The team is better, bigger, and more athletic, but none of it means anything if Payne doesn’t also improve. There’s a lot of optimism for how the Cards might fair this year, but it’s also likely that fans are in for another long season, much less if they want a chance at the tournament this spring.
Photo Courtesy // Caleb Jones, U of L Athletics
