The teams share the same nickname, but not the same game.
That's what the University of Louisville men's basketball team proved Monday night against Lamar as the Cardinals from the Kentucky's largest city lambasted those from Beaumont, Texas 78-56 in the front of 19,058 fans at Freedom Hall in the final game of the three-day Marques Maybin Classic.
Ninth-ranked Louisville (5-1) got 15 points from freshman center Samardo Samuels and 12 points from junior guard Jerry Smith as all but one player (George Goode) scored for the second straight game. Senior forward Terrence Williams added five points, 13 rebounds and four assists.
"It was a good basketball game, not a great game for us,"
UofL coach Rick Pitino said. "We played a terrific game last night (against Ohio). (But) we still brought it defensively and did a decent job tonight and we were very pleased."
Louisville shot 46.8 percent (29 for 62) from the field and limited Lamar, which came in shooting 44.6 percent, to just 35.2 percent shooting (19 for 54).
"I think they have a really good team, they're No. 9 for a
reason," said Lamar coach Steve Roccaforte, whose team scored
had a season-low point total. "They play with a lot of
energy. They do a lot of things and they put a lot of
pressure on you. We had a hard time executing on offense with
their pressure and we couldn't pressure them very well."
Jay Brown scored 16 points and grabbed eight rebounds to lead Lamar (6-3), which went 1-3 on a six-game road trip to the Bluegrass State that included a 103-61 loss to Kentucky on Dec. 3. LU also lost to Indiana State 68-66 on a last-second shot Sunday night.
Lamar came in having lost 17 games in a row to ranked teams - LU's last win over a team ranked in the AP poll was a 72-
64 win over Louisiana Tech on Jan. 26, 1985 - but led 2-0 and 10-9. The latter scored prompted Pitino to take a 30-second timeout, UofL took control after that with a 9-0 run.
Samuels (four) and fellow freshman Jared Swopshire (five), who was subbing for a somewhat lethargic Earl Clark, accounted for all the points that spurt.
"We gave Earl some smelling salts and got him out of his
coffin and we were fine," Pitino said.
UofL stretched the lead to as many as 15, but Lamar closed to
within 34-23 at halftime despite shooting just 33.3 percent
(9 for 27), including only 8.3 percent (1 for 12) from three
-point range.
Samuels had eight points, while T-Will added five points and seven rebounds for UofL, which was just 6 for 13 (46.2 percent) from the foul line in the first half. Louisville finished 13 for 24 (54.2 percent) from the free throw line.
"It'll bite us in the ass if we don't take care of it,"
Pitino said of the foul shooting. "There arms will fall off if they don't start getting better I can guarantee you that."
Lamar got its deficit to single digits when Coy Custer scored
22 seconds into the second half, but that's as close as it
would get.
UofL responded with a 12-0 run to push its lead to 46-25.
Lamar made a couple of surges in the second half, slicing its
deficit to 13 (55-42) with just under nine minutes to play
prompting another timeout from Pitino.
Louisville scored five of the next seven points, then
Roccaforte was whistled for a technical foul after a three-
second call on Lamar.
"You know they trap and run, they are long and athletic, and I thought Kentucky was long and athletic," said Roccaforte when asked to compare UofL to UK. "I think Louisville right now has better guard play and they are a lot deeper. But they are a lot deeper than most teams. Most people don't play more than eight or nine guys and they keep running guys at you, pressing and running. It makes it very tough when they go back in the zone because they are so long."
Louisville next hosts Austin Peay at 1 p.m. Saturday.