Breaking news:7 foot guard Flip commitment Louisville Cardinals basketball,boosting over Alabama and Tennessee…
Breaking news:7 foot guard Flip commitment Louisville Cardinals basketball,boosting over Alabama and Tennessee
When the time’s right and I feel like the revival is complete,” Kelsey told Crum’s wife, Susan, during a Sept. 17 event at the Frazier History Museum, “I’m going to call you and I’m going to ask for your permission to wear a red jacket for a game.”
Will Kelsey deliver that full-circle moment during Year 1 of his tenure? It depends on how the 49-year-old Cincinnati native defines success with the Cardinals coming off a dreadful 12-52 stretch under former coach Kenny Payne; because the bar is as low as it gets — just put a competitive product on the court and continue to galvanize a fan base desperate for a return to national prominence.
The thing is, neither Kelsey nor the members of his completely overhauled roster have shied away from the standards Crum set. Senior guard Chucky Hepburn, one of the 10 players who joined the team through the NCAA transfer portal, said they have ACC championship and national title aspirations.
“This is a one-in-a-lifetime opportunity, especially because a lot of us only have one year here,” added J’Vonne Hadley, a fifth-year guard. “The energy has been one of a kind.”
If that’s the mindset, maybe ending an NCAA Tournament drought dating back to 2019 won’t be enough for Kelsey to don a red jacket. But it’s a major hurdle to clear in making his dream a reality.
With that in mind, here’s a look at five games on U of L’s 2024-25 schedule that will be pivotal on its quest to reach March Madness while also serving as good barometers for where the program stands under Kelsey’s guidance:
vs. Tennessee (Nov. 9, KFC Yum! Center)
Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes and his team are set to visit the KFC Yum! Center on Nov. 9.
To describe the urgency with which Kelsey and his staff worked upon arriving at Louisville in the spring, assistant coach Brian Kloman compared the program to a Ferrari: “You better get in — and you better drive fast.”
Make no mistake, this first installment of a home-and-home series will lose some of its intrigue if the Cards don’t beat Morehead State in Game 1 five days earlier; and, if Payne’s tenure taught us anything, it’s that no one should be taken lightly. But Kelsey’s mission is to restore standards, so the expectation should be that his team is talented enough to take care of business against a mid-major opponent going through a regime change and roster shakeup of its own.
If U of L does that and pulls off a home upset of the Volunteers, it would make an awfully strong case for cracking the top-25 polls.
Fresh off only the second trip to the Elite Eight in program history, Tennessee enters Year 10 under Rick Barnes as a consensus top-15 team in CBS Sports, ESPN and Fox Sports’ early rankings. It’ll ring in the 2024-25 campaign by hosting Gardner-Webb five days before facing the Cards, who hold a 12-8 advantage in a series dating back to 1913.
Barnes must replace SEC Player of the Year Dalton Knecht but has no shortage of weapons at his disposal, including senior guard Zakai Zeigler and the country’s 28th-best transfer class in the eyes of analytics guru Evan Miyakawa. And if there’s anyone who can slow down Kelsey’s fast-paced offense, it’s the Volunteers’ coach, whose teams have ranked among the top five in KenPom.com’s adjusted defensive efficiency rating for the past four seasons.
In short, we’ll find out just how good Louisville is very quickly. It should enter this game feeling as if it has nothing to lose, and the atmosphere should be electric — during the aforementioned event at the Frazier, Kelsey said athletics director Josh Heird “promised” him the Yum! Center will be filled to the brim. Buckle up.
