Big East Sports Blog

Mountaineers edge Thundering Herd 66-64

Da’Sean Butler’s jumper in the lane with just under 6 seconds to play propelled West Virginia past Marshall 66-64 on Wednesday night.  Butler led the Mountaineers with 18 points and leading scorer Alex Ruoff turned in a double-double with 11 points and 11 rebounds.  Darris Nichols finished with 10 points.

Mark Dorris and Darryl Merthie each had 20 points for Marshall (10-7), the only Thundering Herd players to score in double figures. 

The Mountaineers (15-4) allowed Marshall to hang around the final seven minutes of the game by shooting just 5-of-14 from the free throw line.  The Thundering Herd cut deficits of 12 and 5 down the stretch.  Merthie was fouled on a 3-point attempt by West Virginia forward Joe Flowers with 31 seconds left; Merthie sunk all 3 free throws to tie the game at 64.  West Virginia returns to conference play Saturday night at 7 p.m. against No.9 Georgetown.

Scarlet Knights get 1st Big East win with upset over Wildcats

The guard tandem of Mike Coburn and Anthony Farmer dropped in 22 points apiece to lead Rutgers to an upset victory over No.18 Villanova 80-68 on Wednesday night.  Rutgers entered the game 0-6 in conference play in the ‘07-’08 campaign and hadn’t beat a ranked team in more than two years, their last win coming on Jan.18th, 2006 against then-No.22 Louisville 65-56.

Freshman Malcolm Grant led Villanova (13-4, 3-3) with 23 points, including a stretch of 17 straight late in the second half, as he single-handedly tried to keep the Wildcats in the game.  Scottie Reynolds was the only other Wildcat in double figures with 16, but struggled terribly from the field, shooting 5-of-19 and missing on 7-of-8 3-point attempts.

Once again, Villanova was handcuffed by a poor start, as Rutgers (9-11, 1-6) jumped all over the Wildcats 16-2 behind a frenzied home crowd at the RAC (Rutgers Athletic Center).  Villanova turned the ball over a season-high 19 times and their 36.7 percent shooting didn’t help their cause either.  Rutgers, meanwhile, shot an even 50 percent from the field.  The Scarlet Knights entered the night dead last in shooting percentage in the Big East, but you couldn’t tell on this night.  They opened the game draining eight of their first 10 shots and shot 64 percent in the first half.  Villanova began the second half down 40-32, and preceded to go scoreless from the field for almost 12 minutes.

No.18 Villanova will look to rebound Saturday afternoon back at The Pavilion against visiting Notre Dame, while Rutgers will aim for their 2nd straight conference win against No.17 Pittsburgh.

After more than two weeks since their last victory, the Cardinals finally got their head coach Rick Pitino into an exclusive club: 500 wins.

Earl Clark paced the Cardinals with 23 points and Louisville slipped past Marshall 85-75, giving Pitino his 500th coaching victory.  Louisville improves to 6-3, while Marshall drops to 5-3 on the season.

Deadlocked at 37 going into halftime, the Cardinals turned up their defensive tone coming out of the locker room.  With a stifling press , Louisville held Marshall close to seven minutes without a field goal and used a 20-3 run in that span to balloon their lead to 66-49.

The Thundering Herd refused to go away quietly, responding with a 10-0 run and solving the Cardinals’ press, cutting the lead seven.  David Caracter, who returned from a one-game suspension for violating team rules, put the Cardinals on his back and carried Louisville the rest of the way, netting six straight points.  Marshall had no answer inside for Caracter, who finished with 18 points, 8 rebounds and 4 blocks.

The defense for Louisville force the Thundering Herd to cough up the basketball 17 times, and blocked 13 shots, a season high for the Cardinals.

Markel Humphrey notched a double-double, scoring a game-high 24 points and pulling down 10 rebounds.  Mark Dorris chipped in with 21 points and Tirrell Baines added 18 points, going 10-10 from the free throw line.

The Cardinals notched their first win since Dec.1st, a 47-44 squeaker over Miami-Ohio.  Louisville will have three more out-of-conference games before they venture into Big East play on New Year’s Day against Cincinnati.

It’s hasn’t been all peaches and cream for Louisville so far on the young 2007-2008.  An impressive 20-point pasting at UNLV.  A difficult three games in four nights stretch that saw BYU spoil a potential matchup against North Carolina.  Two straight losses to Dayton and Purdue have made for a bumpy ride.  Good news is, there’s still time to get all the kinks worked out before heading into conferece play.

Pitino has had to do some juggling of his lineup early on.  David Caracter still has some growing up to do, and his maturity is a must.  He presents a dominant low post threat that Louisville will need come March.

The return of senior center David Padgett is highly unlikey, due to a broken kneecap.  He’s their best player, the straw that stirs the drink for Louisville. Collectively it’ll take a huge effort to replace him and the Cardinals call ill afford to take nights off.  Juan Palacios has battled the injury bug and he’s struggling to regain last season’s form.  In turn, Pitino has had to use Edgar Sosa off the bench, rather than in the starting lineup and Sosa has struggled to adjust coming off the bench, rather than starting, as he did a year ago.

Next up for Louisville, they’ll welcome the New Mexico St. Aggies into Freedom Hall on Saturday afternoon at 2 p.m.