The ACC season rolls on as the Louisville Cardinals travel north to Pittsburgh for a weeknight matchup with the Pitt Panthers. Louisville is 13-3 overall and 4-1 in ACC play after its win at Notre Dame on Saturday. Pittsburgh comes in at 11-5 and 2-3.
Louisville leads the all time series 18-6. The Cards have beaten Pittsburgh in 14 out of the past 15 meetings, including a 64-46 win at home last month. Pitt beat Louisville at home in OT last January.
Pitt has four players averaging between 10.9 and 13.2 points per game. They are not a good three-point shooting team. However, they’re an excellent rebounding team that gets second chances via offensive rebounding.
In the first game between these two, Louisville led by 14 points at the half. That lead was quickly cut to five before the second media timeout. Louisville eventually pulled away for a somewhat misleading 18 point win. Both teams played well defensively, but Louisville’s advantage from the three-point line was the difference. Pitt was held to only 3-12 from deep in by far its lowest scoring game of the season.
This is the second of three straight road games for Louisville. The win at Notre Dame was the second road win of the season after winning at Miami in the season opener. With the Duke game coming up this weekend, Louisville has an opportunity to gain some confidence with a win tonight. It’s been weeks since the Cards have put together a truly dominating, wire-to-wire performance.
Pitt is a team that Louisville has owned for the past decade now. Jeff Capel has done well with what he inherited at Pitt, but he’s still a couple years away from competing in the ACC. With a win, the Cards would be at 5-1 in the ACC ahead of a big time matchup on the road this weekend. There is no such thing as an easy road game in conference play, but this is a game that needs to be won if you are serious about competing for an ACC championship.
The game tips at 7:00 p.m. ET and will be televised live on ACC Network.
Prediction:
Louisville 74 Pittsburgh 64
