In the first month of the season Louisville had some games against top-ranked opponents that they lost because they went flat for a quarter and couldn’t recover. Today the Cards flattened #17 Tennessee in the 4th quarter. In the first half both teams were playing evenly in a fast-paced game full of pressing and aggressive play. The Cards held a 5 points lead at halftime. As the third quarter was winding down it appeared that Tennessee was starting to fade while Louisville was gathering momentum.
In the 4th quarter the Cards boomed them.
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Imari Berry continued her upswing as an invaluable player off the bench. She scored 10 of her 15 points, got 9 of her 13 rebounds, and all of her 4 steals, and 3 assists in the second half. Tajianna Roberts led Louisville in scoring with 18 to which she added 5 rebounds, 5 assists, and 3 steals. Elif Estanbulluoglu was just shy of a double-double with 9 points and 14 rebounds.
Coach Walz said that the way his team was playing was not “high end basketball but simple.” However he added, “Our effort was elite. I thought our effort was what separated us. Rebounding, diving on the floor after loose balls… it’s plays like that which get everybody excited.”
The Cards out rebounded Tennessee 59 to 37. Coach Walz praised his team’s effort on the glass. “I thought it was fantastic. It’s something we’ve gotten better and better at throughout the year. Really making an effort to commit to rebounding and when you do that it’s going to give you a chance in a lot of basketball games.”
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He said, “Tonight we evened things out with points off turnovers. With 5 minutes to go in the third quarter they had 24 points off of our turnovers. In the last quarter and a half they got 2. The difference was I thought we were absolutely phenomenal on the offensive glass and did a great job of converting. It doesn’t matter if you get them and then you don’t make it. We did a really good job of getting them and scoring.”
Imari said, “In practice he said five to the glass every single time and if we get the rebound push it or put it back up and shoot it. I feel like we executed really well.” Elif added, “I think we did good defense on the ball. We made them make tough shots.”
Louisville takes a little break for the holidays and returns to the Yum next year on January 1st against SMU at 2PM. The game can be seen on ACC Network Extra.
