Post from a friend of mine from another site:

[Mayoman]

Some cold hard facts...

1) 7 of our Out of Conference Opponents are either in the top 50 in the RPI, or they are in 1st, 2nd, or 3rd place in their conferences.

2) Cards went 4-3 against those opponents.

3) We are tied for 4th place in the ACC.

4) Keeping things in perspective.... we lost 3 top 40 players (Snider, Spalding, and Adel) plus Lance Thomas and one of the ACC's leading shot blockers in Mahmoud.

5) We basically lost 4 starters from last year's team.

6) We replaced them with 3x 2\3-star players (Sutton, Fore, Cunningham) and one former 4-star player (Agua) who doesn't even play much at all.

7) Despite the downgrade in talent and loss of personal, our defense, according to Ken Pom is ranked 15th in the entire country... against the toughest RPI schedule we have seen since the 2016/17 season.

8) This is the highest rated defense that our guy, Chris Mack has ever coached... which proves the point that if he could get better talent, he would have better results.

9) This team, in 3 games against UNC and Duke, has looked 1000x more competitive than it ever has against similar loaded Duke teams (2017/18, 2015) despite having less talent than those Cardinal teams, and those teams being coached by a Hall of Fame coach or one of his assistants.

10) Cards have been competitive in EVERY game... this year so far.

Thoughts?

All hail U of L! Go Cards!

 

[zipp_rivals]

No question this team has played a tough schedule. I also think the talent was a little underrated. Mack's not just doing this with smoke and mirrors.

I've been encouraged by what I see of his coaching so far. And until the last couple weeks, I thought this team had the potential to make some noise in the postseason. Just the (almost) fact that we will have a postseason makes this a good season.

If we actually make that "noise", it will be a great season. A lotta basketball still to be played...

 

[davecmc]

When we complete our 31 game reg season schedule, we will have played more than 25% of our reg season games vs. 1 or 2 seeds in tourney. We will be battle tested and ready.

(2) UVA
(2) UNC
Duke
UK
Mich. St.
UT
Marquette?

 

[Tigertown_a_Rick]

Louisville isn't going anywhere but up from here IMO....As a longtime UNC fan, I was happy to see Louisville get into the ACC, and I'm still happy that they are in the ACC inspite of what transpired under RP's watch....

I really don't know if Louisville could have found a better coach than Mack, considering the circumstances that he faced when he took the job, but the fact is...Mack is a Hellava basketball coach, and he took a team that nobody thought would do a whole lot this year in the ACC, and he's kept them in the top tier of the conference which is amazing given the short time he's been in Louisville...

It's obvious as the nose on your face that Mack knows how to Coach-up players, and the evidence of that is Nwaro(sp?) who was basically a role player on last year's team, but has elevated his game to become one of the better players in the ACC this year....

With the recruits that Mack has lined-up to join the Cardinals' program next year, it would not surprise me in the least to see Louisville challenge for top honors in the ACC next year...

Good luck to the Cardinals and Coach Mack!

 

[nccardfan]

Some cold hard facts...

1) 7 of our Out of Conference Opponents are either in the top 50 in the RPI, or they are in 1st, 2nd, or 3rd place in their conferences.

2) Cards went 4-3 against those opponents.

3) We are tied for 4th place in the ACC.

4) Keeping things in perspective.... we lost 3 top 40 players (Snider, Spalding, and Adel) plus Lance Thomas and one of the ACC's leading shot blockers in Mahmoud.

5) We basically lost 4 starters from last year's team.

6) We replaced them with 3x 2\3-star players (Sutton, Fore, Cunningham) and one former 4-star player (Agua) who doesn't even play much at all.

7) Despite the downgrade in talent and loss of personal, our defense, according to Ken Pom is ranked 15th in the entire country... against the toughest RPI schedule we have seen since the 2016/17 season.

8) This is the highest rated defense that our guy, Chris Mack has ever coached... which proves the point that if he could get better talent, he would have better results.

9) This team, in 3 games against UNC and Duke, has looked 1000x more competitive than it ever has against similar loaded Duke teams (2017/18, 2015) despite having less talent than those Cardinal teams, and those teams being coached by a Hall of Fame coach or one of his assistants.

10) Cards have been competitive in EVERY game... this year so far.

Thoughts?

All hail U of L! Go Cards!

For me, this is why college basketball and especially the NCAA tournament is so exciting. You can make all the analyses and comparisons, ratings, RPI or whatever and you still can’t predict 100% what is going to happen. Loyola of Chicago? On the other side of that UVA losing in the first round? I also think player ratings are subjective as they relate to an individual’s talent, not how well they mesh with other players. If that were the case, we should have never been in the position we were against Duke.

 

[CardVille]

We are definitely playing a tough schedule and exceeding expectations. But I am still concerned that our inability to close out games could give us a quicker than expected exit from the tourney.

 

[Cardfan1937]

No question this team has played a tough schedule. I also think the talent was a little underrated. Mack's not just doing this with smoke and mirrors.

I've been encouraged by what I see of his coaching so far. And until the last couple weeks, I thought this team had the potential to make some noise in the postseason. Just the (almost) fact that we will have a postseason makes this a good season.

If we actually make that "noise", it will be a great season. A lotta basketball still to be played...

Zipp; I worry. You are getting nice. Can we survive?

 

[zipp_rivals]

Zipp; I worry. You are getting nice. Can we survive?

Too many posters here bring out my dark side.

See you at Saturday's UVA game and maybe a baseball game or two this weekend...