UC 63, Louisville 54 – summary
10:43 pm, Feb 16, 2011 by bkoch

Player of the game: Cashmere Wright, who scored a game-high 20 points and set the tone for the Bearcats from the opening tip.

Play of the game: With about 12 minutes left in the game, Wright dove to the floor and took the ball away from Louisville guard Elisha Justice. The steal didn’t result in any points but it showed that the Bearcats meant business, that they were on the attack and intent on staying on the attack.

Turning point: After Louisville cut a 15-point deficit to five with 13:19 left, Mick Cronin called timeout and devised a play for that resulted in a Rashad Bishop layup (on a goal-tending call). Sean Kilpatrick then came up with a steal and a layup to return the momentum to UC. When Dion Dixon made a 12-foot jump shot, the lead was back to 12 with 9:49 remaining.

Quote: From Mick Cronin, on what it means to him for UC to post its first 20-win season since 2006. “Nobody’s raining on my parade. We’re having a good year. Whether anyone wants to recognize it or not, we are. I’m going to do everything I can to make sure my players enjoy it. And nobody’s going to stop me from enjoying it.”

What it means: UC now has the signature victory that it needed for its NCAA Tournament resume and the way St. John’s has been playing, that might count as one too. The Bearcats now have three wins over RPI Top 25 – Xavier, St. John’s and Louisville.

http://news.cincinnati.com/ucblog

"What it means: UC now has the signature victory that it needed for its NCAA Tournament resume and the way St. John’s has been playing, that might count as one too. The Bearcats now have three wins over RPI Top 25 – Xavier, St. John’s and Louisville."

Go get a couple more top 25 RPI wins to help your seed in the NCAA.

(02-17-2011 07:51 AM)SuperFlyBCat Wrote:  "What it means: UC now has the signature victory that it needed for its NCAA Tournament resume and the way St. John’s has been playing, that might count as one too. The Bearcats now have three wins over RPI Top 25 – Xavier, St. John’s and Louisville."

Go get a couple more top 25 RPI wins to help your seed in the NCAA.

Agreed. It was a great win. It was an incredible effort by the players which left most of us wondering where it's been and what could have been in a few other close Big East games.

But they can't rest on their heels and be content with this. If they lose the rest of the games, they go 7-11 in the Big East. Gotta win 2 more, maybe 3 of them.

If they play like they did last night, I have no doubt they will win 2 to 3 more. Seriously.

It was a different level of play, no doubt. Summarized by the heart of Cashmere Wright- diving to the floor for steals, and attacking the basket with ferocity. Excellent defensive effort.

Gates even played well. Even though he didn't score much, he passed well out of the post, drew a lot of attention, and played solid defense.

In the WVU game, I felt like the Mountaineers out hustled us and out smarted us. It was the other way around in this game.

Have to keep up that intensity level to win some of these next games. With their relative talent deficiency, is imperative that they play hard and smart all game long. That's the only way they win. Hopefully this is a sign that the Bearcats are coming to play from here on out, and not just a random occurrence.

On the flipside- what's the matter with Dion Dixon? Kid has lost his confidence. Looks like the Dion Dixon of last year and not the Dixon of the OOC schedule. Need him to get his head on straight and contribute for us to win some more.

I still feel that the St. John's win is much more valuable overall, primarily because it was a road win. The good news is they're right back in position to have a shot at making the NCAA Tournament after making up for a couple games they should have won.

Cashmere was excellent, he even got a pass inside to Gates, hopefully he can keep it up, also read where Mick didnt give them plays to run

He gave them less plays. They were still running set plays. They ran 2-3 sets repeatedly.

(02-17-2011 10:17 AM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  He gave them less plays. They were still running set plays. They ran 2-3 sets repeatedly.

Agreed. I remember seeing only a few different set plays during the game and the players executed them perfectly. It was really fun to watch even if they didn't make the basket everytime.

I was particularly impressed with how they set up the 3-point shooting with constant ball movement and switches from the guard to get someone open beyond the ark. Louisville just couldn't seem to move around fast enough to defend it and a UC player was left with a wide open look! Well played, Cats!

Not to be nitpicky, but does it seem like Yancy is always extremely slow when he gets the ball in the post? The announcers were praising his patience the entire night, which did work well most of the time, but it seems to me like sometimes he needs to make a quick move before the double team arrives instead of sitting there for 2-3 seconds thinking about it. I think he played a great game, just something small I noticed.

(02-17-2011 10:30 AM)cinbinsportsfan Wrote:  

(02-17-2011 10:17 AM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  He gave them less plays. They were still running set plays. They ran 2-3 sets repeatedly.

Agreed. I remember seeing only a few different set plays during the game and the players executed them perfectly. It was really fun to watch even if they didn't make the basket everytime.

I was particularly impressed with how they set up the 3-point shooting with constant ball movement and switches from the guard to get someone open beyond the ark. Louisville just couldn't seem to move around fast enough to defend it and a UC player was left with a wide open look! Well played, Cats!

I agree. Again you take away 2 desperation 3's late in the shot clock and UC was 5 of 12 from behind the arc. they were working the ball inside-out and they were not forcing bad threes which they have a tendency to do (st Johns they did that a lot and shot entirely too many). I was at the game, but watched it at home against after and Fran Fraschilla mentioned early in the contest that when you watch the tape on Cincinnati they take a lot of contested jump shots. To me that has been the problem for the UC offense in their losses...they don't work the ball and settle for bad to ok three point shots instead of getting good ones. That kills their shooting percentage. Just great work last night.

Can't say enough about defensive effort last night. I sure hope the team learned a big lesson last night.....play hard and good things will happen.

Bishop was really good last night. He will be key to game at providence. I'm sure he will be responsible for Brooks.

This next game will be tough. Providence plays pretty good at home.

Sk got 23 minutes last night but I wish he was a 28 minute guy. He just knows how to score. Really looking forward to watching him next 3 years. Cash also has shown he can be a big offensive player. What a difference it makes when he is on too.

I would love to see one more thing though. Is it me or when gates gets ball in low post he is usually looking to move away from basket. Would love to see him take his big ass body the other way at the basket and go up strong at the goal. But I will take what gates gave last night every night.

When Cash knocked the ball out of Justice's? hands in the first half and then went and dove across the court and took it from his hands I knew that UC wasn't going to let Louisville walk out of The Shoe with a win.

Also, Kilpatrick for the most part played pretty good defense last night, it seems to me he's getting better and better at that end of the court. No doubt he's going to be a special player for UC the next 3 years.

Going point on Killa's defense. I thought he was excellent off the ball last night and he was good on the ball.

That was the best defensive game from SK so far this year. Still has quite a few flaws in that part of his game, but it does give me hope that he has the ability to be a very good defender in the future.