Following a 15-2 start to the season, the No. 4 seed Louisville Cardinals had an up-and-down second half and are now scheduled to face the No. 13 seed UC Irvine Anteaters in the 2015 NCAA Tournament.
Head coach Rick Pitino and the Cardinals finished the season 24-8 with a 12-6 record in the ACC, but struggled a bit as the year went on. They suffered home losses to Duke, NC State and Notre Dame as well as a bad road loss to Syracuse. They also escaped close call against Miami and Georgia Tech before losing to North Carolina in the quarterfinal of the ACC Tournament.
But forward Montrezl Harrell (15.1 ppg, 9.1 rpg, 1.0 spg and 1.2 bpg), guard Terry Rozier (17.11 ppg, 5.3 rpg, 2.8 apg and 2.0 spg) and guard Chris Jones (13.7 ppg, 4.0 rpg, 3.6 apg and 2.0 spg) look to lead the Cardinals past the Sweet 16 in this year's tournament after they lost to No. 8 seed Kentucky at that point in the big dance last year. This is the second straight tournament that Louisville is a No. 4 seed.
Louisville has some quality wins over Ohio State, Indiana, North Carolina, and Virginia, but they'll need to stay consistent on both ends of the floor to have a chance at making a deep run.
Their opponent on Friday will be no cakewalk either. Everyone witnessed No. 14 seeds UAB and Georgia State take down Big 12 juggernauts Iowa State and Baylor, so no higher seed is safe. The UC Irvine Anteaters (21-12) are coming off of a three-game win streak that helped them to a Big West Conference Tournament championship and their first-ever NCAA Tournament berth.
Like Louisville, the Anteaters distribute the ball on the offensive side with forward Will Davis II (12.9 ppg and 7.0 rpg), guard Luke Nelson (10.5 ppg, 4.0 apg and 2.9 rpg), center Mamadou Ndiaye (10.4 ppg, 5.1 rpg and 1.7 bpg) and guard Alex Young (9.6 ppg, 3.6 apg, 3.5 rpg and 1.3 spg). They finished second in their conference behind UC Davis, who was ousted by Hawaii in the tournament semifinal.
Coach Pitino will not have his team looking beyond the Anteaters in their first tournament matchup
Here are some important statistics to keep in mind before tip-off at 4:10 p.m. ET in Seattle, WA.
Louisville | UC Irvine |
RPI - .6069 (21st overall) | RPI - .5381 (89th overall) |
SOS - 22 | SOS - 158 |
Points Per Game - 69.2 (130th overall) | Points Per Game - 69.7 (166th overall) |
FG% - .429 (211th overall) | FG% - .461 (61st overall) |
Points Allowed Per Game - 59.5 (20th overall) | Points Allowed Per Game - 62.3 (66th overall) |
Turnovers Per Game - 11.8 (102nd overall) | Turnovers Per Game - 11.6 (78th overall) |
Season Rank - 21 | Season Rank - 88 |
Check out the live stream of UC Irvine vs. Louisville here as well as the live radio broadcast here. The game will be televised on TBS.
