BIG EAST GAME PREVIEW: Louisville @ Notre Dame

January 3, 2006



One of the more interestinggames of the first week pits the Louisville Cardinals and the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Heading into conference play, the resume of each team almost sounds reversed as the Cards are fighting injuries and inconsistent play while the Irish have come together and over-whelmed the majority of their opponents with a barrage of offense. Here are the pregame articles from newspapers around the internet:

Are Cards ready for Big East Play? (News-Sentinel)
Cards Brace for Irish 'O' (south Bend Tribune)
U of L Opens Big East Play at Notre Dame (Kentucky.com)
Jenkins, Cards Hope to Have Shot Tonight (Louisville Courier-Journal)

This game has added additional intrigue with Kyle McAlarney being out after being charged with marijuana possession after a routine traffic stop early Saturday morning and with Juan Palacios being listed as 'doubtful' for Louisville due to back/wrist ailments. Both are key players to their team's hope for success this season, we will soon see how big of a loss each player is.

It has been nothing short of a special run by Notre Dame through their pre-conference schedule. The Irish have drubbed opponents that have given them trouble in the past and found the strength to close out Maryland and Alabama when the games got tight down the stretch. When it seemed like everything was going right, the news on McAlarney hit them right in the face. In his place, it is expected that freshman Tory Jackson will have to take the majority of minutes on the ball for Notre Dame. Jackson enters tonight's contest averaging 16.6 minutes a game with 4.8 PPG and an assist to turnover ratio of slightly better than 1:1. His 17% 3-pt shooting percentage and 52% free throw percentage are both big drop-offs compared to McAlarney (46% and 82%) and areas to watch as the Notre Dame offense has been built around the effeciency that McAlarney provided with the ball (2.5:1 assist to turnover ratio). Notre Dame does have the personnell to pick up the slack with seniors Russell Carter (17.8 PPG) and Colin Falls (14 PPG) on the wings and an inside duo of Rob Kurz (16 PPG and 9 rebounds) and freshman Luke Harangody (12 PPG and 6 rebounds in just 18 minutes a game). The Irish play well together and know their roles, key points in games this early.

Louisville looks to be the polar opposite thus far. Suffering through a series of injuries once again and off-season defections, the Louisville line-up has been in a state of flux and looks to be changing again with the injuries to Palacios. The Cards have had 12 different players start as David padgett, Brandon Jenkins and Adnre McGee have battled injuries and Derrick Caracter has battled maturity issues. The Cards have gone young of late with Edgar Sosa, Jerry Smith and Earl Clark getting more and more time. Terrence Williams is their leading scorer at 12 PPG, but he has been brick-city (and continues to let them fly) from beyond the arc shooting a woeful 17% on 69 attempts. Williams also leads the team in rebounds (7.6/game) and assists (4/game), so the offense seems to be going through him. The only other players averaging in double-digits are Sosa (11 PPG) and Palacios (10 PPG). If palacios is unable to go, Caracter could be pressed into action and his vulnerability to fouls could be exploited quickly by Kurz. The inconsistent Cards will have their hands full against the effecient Irish.

The current vegas line shows Notre Dame as 9-pt favorites and Pomeroy has the Irish as 14-pt winners. We are not sold on Louisville, especially on the road, until they can get healthy and playing together much better.

NBE Blogger Prediction: Notre Dame 75 Louisville 65

What do you think?