By Derek DeBurger
Louisville escapes Orlando with a narrow victory over the South Florida Bulls.
Jekyll & Hyde
The Cards started about as cold as a team can. While they scored first, they failed to hit a shot from the field in the first five minutes. During this time, the Bulls took a slight 2-6 lead.
South Florida’s offense then woke up and took an 11-point lead primarily off of three-point shots. Louisville, however, would deliver their first punch of the game by way of a 13-5 run to end the first quarter. During this run, Imari Berry scored 11 points.
Louisville trailed 18-21 at the end of the first.
Louisville didn’t let up in the second quarter as they started the period on a 15-3 run. The Bulls pushed back some, but the Cards continued their tear through the rest of the quarter.
Louisville led 39-29 at halftime.
Freshman mistakes
The Cards kept up their momentum out of the break, not allowing field goals and slowing growing their lead to 13 points.
From that moment on, South Florida took advantage of Louisville’s youth and chipped away at the Louisville lead. Berry was forced into a number of bad turnovers off of double teams and hedged screens, and South Florida was able to score quickly in transition off of these steals.
The play of Mackenly Randolph helped Louisville keep the Bulls at arm’s length, but the momentum had already shifted.
Louisville led by just seven going into the fourth quarter.
In the final quarter of play Louisville shot themselves in the foot on a number of occasions. They were called for four fouls in the first three minutes of play, and they couldn’t draw fouls to save their lives. Oddly enough, they played great interior defense, but the constant movement and screens off the ball caused players to get lost on defense. The result were made threes and wide open cutters for South Florida.
A four-minute scoring drought for the Cards in the final five minutes was the Bulls take the lead with under two minutes left. This was the first lead for South Florida since the second quarter.
After another scoreless minute, Louisville strung together a great defensive possession followed by a great offensive possession in which Tajianna Roberts found wide open Ja’Leah Williams for a layup to put the Cards back up by one.
After Louisville held strong again, the Cards got to inbound the ball with just 12 seconds left and South Florida not having enough fouls to get to the bonus.
Louisville ran the same look three times, but all sets unveiled themselves to be three different plays. Once the Bulls finally reached the bonus, Jayda Curry iced the game at the free throw line.
Louisville would escape 64-60.
Not over the bridge yet
The Cards showed flashes of the team they can be Sunday, but the biggest take away is the stereotypical mistakes by most of the freshman.
Berry had an incredible first quarter, but almost singlehandedly let the Bulls back in with her turnovers. The entire team, not just the freshman, got lost on defense several times with South Florida’s constant movement.
Oliva Cochran quietly led the team with 13 points and nine rebounds. And Curry showed up when she was needed most, finishing the game with 12 points.
Louisville clearly has a lot of areas of improvement, but a win is a win.
The Cards are now 4-2 on the season.
Photo Courtesy // Mallory Peak, Louisville Athletics
