You always want to head to your conference tournament at the top of your game. After Saturday's stinker, the UConn Huskies men's basketball team has a lot of work to do before the tournament starts on Thursday night.
After the UConn women ruined the senior day of the Louisville Cardinals on Monday, the Louisville men made sure theirs wasn't ruined with an 81-48 pasting of UConn in front of a sold-out crowd at the KFC Yum! Center on Saturday afternoon.
The UConn men finish up the regular season at 24-7 (12-6 American). Louisville finishes up at 26-5 (15-3) and picked up a share of the American Athletic Conference regular season title.
DeAndre Daniels led the Huskies with 17 points and had eight rebounds. Shabazz Napier added nine points and nine rebounds.
Montrezl Harrell led the Cardinals with a double-double of 20 points and 11 rebounds. Luke Hancock added 16 points while Wayne Blackshear had 11 and Chris Jones had 10.
Senior Russ Smith had just three points for Louisville but had 13 assists. Stephan Van Treese pulled down a game-high 13 rebounds.
The Cardinals started out the game on a 17-5 run as UConn couldn't buy a basket early on. The Huskies scored the next six points to cut the lead in half but still ended up trailing by 12 at the half at 30-18.
UConn would cut the lead to seven but they never got back into the game as Louisville put together two big runs to set up the rout.
Just when you thought their game a few weeks ago was the worst offensive performance, this one took the cake and then some. All things considered though, it was just the second loss in the last nine games for the Huskies.
Unfortunately though, they haven't played all that great in those seven wins either.
UConn will have until Thursday to get their act together as they'll take on the fifth seeded Memphis Tigers in the quarterfinals of the American Athletic Conference Tournament. Tip is scheduled for approximately 9:20 p.m. at Fed Ex Forum in Memphis.
UConn Huskies @ Louisville Cardinals 3/8/14 box score
Here are the postgame quotes from Louisville head coach Rick Pitino and UConn head coach Kevin Ollie.
Follow Ian on Twitter @soxanddawgs. And be sure to like us on Facebook as well.
photo credit: brad horrigan – hartford courant
