Michigan State rips overrated U of L - like I said before, they were the fake number one overrall seed

http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20090330/COLUMNISTS02/903300338/1002/SPORTS

INDIANAPOLIS -- After climbing as high as it ever has in the national rankings and NCAA Tournament seedings, the University of Louisville men's basketball team yesterday fell perhaps as hard as it ever has.

Michigan State delivered a jarring, 64-52 defeat to the No. 1-ranked and No. 1 seeded Cardinals, ending the school's hopes for a third men's basketball title before a Lucas Oil Stadium crowd of 36,084 -- about two-thirds of whom had made the short drive up Interstate 65 hoping to see a little history.

They did, but it wasn't what they expected.

Considering what U of L coach Rick Pitino's team had accomplished coming in, the experience on the roster and the expectations surrounding it, this may rank as his worst NCAA Tournament loss.

And though U of L has experienced other tournament heartbreaks -- the overtime loss to UCLA in the Final Four in 1975, U.S. Reed's miracle shot in 1981, losing to Houston as a No. 1 seed in the 1983 Final Four -- it's hard to find a better Cardinal team that exited so quietly.

Yes, this team became just the fourth at U of L to win at least 30 games, finishing 31-6. It won the Big East regular-season and conference tournament championships. It was the first in the school's proud history to be ranked No. 1 in The Associated Press poll.

Those are significant accomplishments that should not be forgotten.

But on this day they seemed only to underscore the shock of the loss.

"There are landmarks in basketball," senior Terrence Williams said. "You make it to the tournament, and then you make it to the Final Four. It's not you make it to the Elite Eight. That's the part that really hurts us."

It ended this way for the Cardinals. With 2:19 left and a 15-point lead, Michigan State called a timeout. In the huddle, Pitino told his team it was over.

"He told us to keep playing with our heads up," senior Will Scott said. "He told us to finish it the right way, to not foul, to end the game with class, to not do anything to mar what has been a great season."

(2 of 3)


Earl Clark came out of the huddle, slammed his hands together and stared at the ceiling. When the final horn sounded, Pitino quickly moved to shake hands with Michigan State coach Tom Izzo, and was off the court before most players began shaking hands.



Williams wandered to a corner of the court by himself, remaining there for a time, before turning, circling around and trying to slip down the stairs quietly. He couldn't. An arm reached out to stop him. Izzo had gone out of his way to find him, to shake his hand, to talk to him. He did the same for Clark.

"I think it was a great tribute to our guys to win the Big East, to win the Big East tournament and finish No. 1," Pitino said. "I don't think this is the most -- No. 1 most talented team in the country. I think we're an outstanding basketball team. ... We're a real good basketball team, and we were beaten by a better team tonight."

The Cardinals also simply couldn't do the things they had done all season. Just down the road from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, U of L had turned the court into a racetrack two nights earlier, hanging a school NCAA Tournament-record 103 points on Arizona. But Michigan State turned last night's game into a tractor pull.

If U of L was a test, Izzo looked as if he'd spent all night with the teacher's manual. In fact, he had stayed up into the wee hours (Indiana coach Tom Crean, a veteran of some U of L battles, visited the team hotel Saturday night.) and came to yesterday's morning walk-through with a new game plan for attacking U of L's press.

Izzo also solved the Cardinals' 2-3 zone like an easy Sudoku. In the first half, he used 6-10 Goran Suton in the high post to shred it with mid-range jump shots. The senior from Sarajevo had a career-high three three-pointers and scored 17 points in the first half. In the second, Izzo had his team exploit U of L's press on the fast break, getting three easy baskets with a tweaked press attack.

After trailing by three at halftime, the Cards opened the second half with their usual spurt of energy. The team started forcing turnovers and pushing the pace, but it wasn't scoring points. The Cards led just 34-32 with 15:28 left. Then came the game's biggest sequence -- and a failure to adjust by the Cardinals.

(3 of 3)


Michigan State scored on 11 straight possessions against the Cards' zone, opening a 55-43 lead before Pitino went to a man-to-man defense. But the Cards got no closer than 12 the rest of the game.



In the locker room after the game, Williams sat in front of his locker, his jersey pulled up over his face, while a bank of photographers clicked away. Freshman Kyle Kuric, wearing a Sweet 16 T-shirt, stared at an NCAA Tournament participant's pin in his hand.

Everybody was thinking about the hardware that had gotten away. For a second straight year, they left the court in the Elite Eight while a trophy presentation stage was being assembled for the other team.

U of L's program still took a step forward in prestige this season. It has now been to at least the Elite Eight three times in five years. But the loss was a missed opportunity.

Getting to compete in a game this big in front of what amounted to a home crowd -- and surely the largest U of L crowd ever to pack a neutral-court basketball game, estimated at nearly 25,000 in red and black -- doesn't happen often.

"It's a shock," Scott said. "We put ourselves in position to accomplish something big. We played great all year and accomplished a lot. I think we're all walking away from here believing that we were a better team," Scott said. "But we weren't today. Michigan State was better."

In the final minute before the locker room doors were closed to visitors, Cardinal players sat quietly. Pitino had left a few minutes earlier, down the underground stadium corridor and out the door. Players now sat amid empty pizza boxes, most still in uniform.

Williams pulled a Gucci duffle bag out of his locker to start getting dressed. There were tears. Most were reading and sending text messages.

Surely, one of them had to key the words, "Ended too soon."

Reach Eric Crawford at (502) 582-4372 or ecrawford@courier-journal.com. Comment on this column, and read his blogs and previous colums, at www.courier-journal.com/crawford.