By Harry Barsan

Louisville stormed out of Boston’s Conte Forum with a seismic 84-58 victory, their largest since against Indiana.

Battle of the birds

In front of a modest home crowd, the scoring started with a Chucky Hepburn assist to James Scott for an alley-oop lay-in.

A put-back slam and a goaltend gave Aboubacar Traore four straight to begin a 12-0 run to take the score to 16-4.

BC then cut the score back down to five after a barrage of outside shooting.

Unphased, the Cards unleashed a 10-0 run, started and finished by buckets from J’Vonne Hadley to give Louisville a 29-14 lead. During this streak, Hepburn launched two deep threes, cashing on both, before sharing the love to Terrence Edwards Jr. to make it three straight triples for the Cards.

Despite being down big early and not getting much flowing on offense, the Eagles took flight, scoring on six of their next seven possessions to eventually draw within six points.

The lead quickly grew back to double-digits with buckets from Traore and Edwards, the latter of whom picking up his ninth point of the half.

A couple of stalled possessions later gave the Cards control for the last shot of the half. On the Cards last possession, they tried to get it into the hands of Reyne Smith to try to him a good look. But his shot came up short, having ended the half going 1-of-4 from deep.

Louisville enter the locker rooms with a strong 41-31 lead.

No laughing matter

Louisville missed four straight field goals to open the second half while the Eagles suddenly were in the driver’s seat as they cut the lead down to seven-points.

Whenever the Cards would push their lead back up, the Eagles would come storming back. With the game see-sawing, Hepburn hit a layup, but keeled over in pain after an apparent non-contact injury. He would visit trainers on the sideline, but would not return to the game.

After the losing the leader if their team in both emotionally and in minutes played, the Cards ballooned the lead back up to 14 points thanks to sinking five of their next six shots, featuring Smith’s second three of the game.

Hadley made his presence known, going on a personal 6-0 run. He’d pick up a pair of steals to match his strong offensive performance, priming the road for a fastbreak layup from Khani Rooths to force a timeout from the Eagles.

This would be the start of a much larger 23-7 run that the Cards would use to squash any doubt. Edwards would captain this voyage, scoring 10 of the Cards 27 during this trip to victory-town.

Much to the chagrin of the traumatized fans, Pat Kelsey kept all the bench players seated right there as the final moments winded down.

The Cards would come out ahead 84-58 on a stellar night all around.

Hoping for the best

Louisville was able to match a solid first half offensive performance with yet another one in the second. Despite shooting a measly 2-of-9 (22.2%) from deep compared to their 50% rate in the first, they still made 18 of their 37 shots overall.

The Cards also shaped up their handles, only giving up three turnovers in the second and outmanning the Eagles by way of doubling them on the offensive boards.

Hadley played some imposing ball Wednesday, making all but one of his two-pointers virtually right under the basket. If up close doesn’t impress you, his perfect 2-of-2 from three just might do it, as he rode a 75.1% true shooting percentage to a team-leading 22 points for the night. This was his second game of 20-plus points this season.

Not too shabby himself, Edwards was key in putting this one away with his onslaught of shots late in the second. He racked up 19 points while leading the Cards with six assists, taking over for Hepburn at the point.

The big news, however, is Hepburn. He was listed as questionable mid-game, signaling that his injury was mild enough that he may have been able to enter the game if the score got shaky. But the non-contact aspect of the injury is cause for concern.

Louisville fans have already been scorned this season, being the most injured team in the country both in terms of gross number of injuries and production lost to injury. Speculation helps no one, though, so fans will have to wait and see his status going forward.

After another solid all-around win, the Cards advance to 17-6 on the year and 10-2 in the ACC, moving back into second place.

They will host the struggling 5-17 Miami Hurricanes at home this Saturday at 2 p.m.

Photo Courtesy // Mallory Peak, Louisville Athletics