No. 9 Louisville 81, No. 19 Connecticut 48: Montrezl Harrell led the way with 20 points and 11 rebounds as the Cardinals clinched a tie for first place in the American Athletic Conference by blowing out the visiting Huskies.
Luke Hancock buried four 3-pointers en route to 16 points and Russ Smith celebrated his final regular-season home game with a career-high 13 assists and four steals for Louisville (26-5, 15-3 AAC), which finished in a tie with Cincinnati for the regular-season crown and will await the results of a coin toss to determine the top seed in the AAC tournament. Fellow senior Stephan Van Treese hauled in 13 rebounds.
DeAndre Daniels scored 17 points as Connecticut (24-7, 12-6) dropped into a tie for third place in the conference with Memphis and Southern Methodist. Shabazz Napier struggled to nine points on 2-of-13 shooting for the Huskies, who posted their lowest point total of the season.
Louisville held Connecticut to 20 percent shooting in the first half and raced out to a 17-5 advantage before settling for a 30-18 lead at the break. The Huskies scored the first five points of the second half to chop the deficit to seven points before they let it get out of hand again.
Harrell capped a 12-2 run with a thundering dunk to make it 44-27 with 15 1/2 minutes left, and his dunk after an offensive rebound pushed the lead to 51-34 with just over 11 minutes to play. Hancock’s 3-pointer with 4:07 remaining spread it out to 75-45 as the Cardinals cruised.
GAME NOTEBOOK: Connecticut ended up shooting 29.4 percent from the floor, including 3-of-22 from beyond the arc. … Huskies G Ryan Boatright went 2-for-11 and is 13-of-53 in the last five contests. … Smith, who entered Saturday as the third-leading scorer in the AAC, scored only three points and attempted a season-low two field goals while reaching double figures in assists for the third time this season.
Connecticut | Louisville | |
DeAndre Daniels 17 | Scoring | Montrezl Harrell 20 |
Ryan Boatright 3 | Assists | Russ Smith 13 |
Shabazz Napier 9 | Rebounds | Stephan Van Treese 13 |
DeAndre Daniels 4 | Free Throws Made | Montrezl Harrell 4 |
DeAndre Daniels 1 | Steals | Russ Smith 4 |
Amida Brimah 2 | Blocks | Wayne Blackshear 2 |
Team | Points | FG% | 3PM-3PA | FTM-FTA | Assists | Rebounds | Blocks | Steals | Turnovers |
Connecticut | 48 | 29.4 | 3-22 | 15-23 | 8 | 39 | 6 | 2 | 22 |
Louisville | 81 | 44.8 | 10-22 | 19-31 | 20 | 36 | 3 | 12 | 12 |