The Louisville Cardinals (14-5,5-1) host the Pitt Panthers (12-7,2-4) Saturday afternoon at the KFC Yum! Center.
This is the second meeting between the two teams this season. Pitt handed Louisville its only league loss on January 9th in an 89-86 overtime victory at home. Pittsburgh led by as many as 16 in the second half of that game after leading by 10 at the break. Louisville started slow in both halves and needed a big run late in the game to force overtime. Freshman guard Trey McGowens led the way for Pitt in that game with 33 points.
Pittsburgh won that matchup on the inside. They got the ball into the paint whenever they wanted and drew fouls all night. They only shot 16-33 from the free throw line in that win. On the defensive end, they did a good job of making Louisville uncomfortable offensively. Christen Cunningham led the Cards with 23 points, but Louisville only managed 8 points from Jordan Nwora on 2-14 shooting that night.
Pittsburgh is only 2-4 in the ACC, but they have been the surprise of the conference so far. The Panthers hold wins over Florida State and Louisville, and each conference loss has come to a program picked 8th or better in the preseasonconference poll.
As the Cards learned a couple weeks ago, this is not the Pitt team that we have seen the last few seasons. This is a team who is well coached and ready to compete against whoever it plays. Louisville is still the better team, though. I expect Coach Mack will learn from the previous matchup and have his team ready to go.
The game tips at 2:00 ET and will be broadcast live on WHAS in Louisville.
Prediction:
Louisville 85 Pittsburgh 68
