Stats were gathered using teamrankings.com, foxsports.com, evanmiya.com. Stats with parenthesis are the team’s national rank in this statistic. Evan Miya OBPR is a offensive efficiency statistic that predicts future outcomes. Evan Miya DBPR is a defensive efficiency statistic that predicts future outcomes. Evan Miya BPR combines OBPR and DBPR together.
| Stat | UNC | UL |
| 2pt% | 49.5% (181) | 49.6% (175) |
| 3pt% | 38.1% (17) | 32.2% (238) |
| Pts/poss | 1.11 | 1.00 |
| Pace | 70.4 | 67.7 |
| Ass/to | 1.209 (56) | 1.004 (157) |
| FT% | 75.8% (48) | 68% (270) |
| Evan Mya O | 22.9 | 5.2 |
| Rebound diff | 8.9 | 1.8 |
| Opp 2% | 48.9% (148) | 47.1% (73) |
| Opp 3% | 33.2% (162) | 32.6% (134) |
| Evan mya D | 15.1 | 12.3 |
| BPR | 38 | 17.5 |
What a whirlwind this has been. I would have never believed Chris Mack and Malik Williams would be out simultaneously if you told me that at the beginning of the year. Fans are learning what they have wanted to know for awhile and why things weren’t working out. Louisville athletics is truly the best reality television show out there. I’ll give you my thoughts on this and preview the North Carolina game below.
Williams being a determent to the team isn’t surprising from his press conference after Notre Dame, but I hate that it’s him after his loyalty to the program. Mike Pegues said during the coach talk radio show that Williams attitude has been similar to this earlier in the season says a lot. Rumor on twitter went as far to say that Williams tried to fight Pegues at practice. The patience that this coaching staff has with Williams astounds me. The worst part is that his play doesn’t back any sort of patience whatsoever. I’m sad to see Williams be a part of all of this, but am curious if Louisville will play better after this.
North Carolina will be a tough matchup for Louisville tonight. Malik Williams and Roosevelt Wheeler being out leads to lack of depth from the big men and this is strength for North Carolina is size. North Carolina has always been known for rebounding and Roy Williams presence has carried over to this team. North Carolina has a rebound differential of 8.9 and eats up boards. North Carolina ranks 10th overall in rebound differential in the nation. This will pose problems for Louisville whose differential has continued to go down since the start of ACC play and may lead to North Carolina playing a pace Louisville cannot handle.
A concern I will have for tonight’s matchup is North Carolina’s ability to hit open 3 point shots. North Carolina ranks 191th in 3 point attempts a game, but ranks 17th in the nation in 3 point percentage. Both Caleb Love and RJ Davis shoot over 40% from 3 point shots and this will demand Louisville’s guards to defend closely. Louisville guards have had trouble getting past screens and getting lost in help defense this year, which will be a key to success against North Carolina.
I won’t go into too much depth with players, but Louisville will have to slow down Armando Bacot tonight as well. Bacot is averaging 16 points and 12 rebounds a game and is a monster. This will be a good test for Sydney Curry that the fan base has a lot of faith in currently. Curry will need to stay out of foul trouble due to this being a reason why he lost minutes against Duke this past weekend.
North Carolina is an athletic team but does not cause a lot of turnovers defensively. They have kept teams to shooting high percentages from them due to this. Louisville should look completely different without Malik on the floor due to how Louisville runs the offense with him on the floor. Personally, I’m excited to see what this will look like. I have been calling for Malik Williams to play less minutes for awhile due to how he is wanting to play is simply not working. This will not be the same team without Malik that fans saw against Western Kentucky due to them playing different guys on the floor now. While saying all of that, I still think North Carolina causes too many problems. I’ll predict the score to be 76-66. I’ll be up top a bit more sober than the Duke game. Those drinks are eating a whole in my wallet.
-degenerateCARD
Stats via teamrankings.com, foxsports.com, haslemetrics.com/ratings, evanmiya.com, and kenpom.com
Degenerate Card 