The University of Louisville men’s basketball (19-5, 10-2) team got back to their winning ways today, as they blew out a struggling Depaul team 99-54. The Cards shot 59% for the game and connected on a season high 18 three point baskets on 36 attempts.

After jumping out to a 13 point lead to start the game, U of L never relinquished control of the game to the Blue Demons (8-18, 0-13) through the entire 40 minutes of play. Louisville led Depaul by as many as 47 in the second half.

Preston Knowles scored 19 off the bench to lead the Cards. The sophomore guard connected on five of his seven three point attempts and grabbed four rebounds.

Regineld Delk made his first career start as a Cardinal and chipped in 10 points. Delk replaced forward Terrence Williams, who played a season low 15 minutes while nursing a bruised shooting wrist and dished out five assists, but did not attempt a shot.

Depaul finished with three players in double figure scoring, led by Dar Tucker’s 17. But the Blue Demons were just clearly overmatched by a much more experienced and talented group of Cards and shot just 34% from the field for the game. Center Max Koshwal and guard Will Walker finished with 12 and 10 points respectively.

Earl Clark came within two assists of recording a triple-double and finished with 12 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists.

Though it’s a tough to take too much from this blow-out win, the Cards should feel good about the 25 assists on 36 made field goals the team finished the game with. Louisville is now tied with Pittsburgh and Marquette in the Big East standings at 10-2.

The Cards will be back in action on Wednesday when they will take on Providence at home in Freedom Hall.

No. 5 Louisville seems to have responded well in the first half against Depaul since that 33 point beat down they received in South Bend, courtesy of Notre Dame.

After scoring just 19 points in the first halves of their last two games, the Cards have put up 51 points in the first 20 minutes of play while holding the Blue Demons to just 21. Though it’s difficult to give too much credit to the Cards’ offensive production against a team that hasn’t one a game in conference play, the overall energy and unselfishness displayed by U of L has been noteworthy.

Of Louisville’s 20 field goals made, 13 have come on assists which is why they’ve shot 57% from the field and 9-19 from the three.

U of L jumped out of the gates onto a 13-0 run and haven’t looked back. Starting in place of Cardinals’ do-it-all forward Terrence Williams, Regineld Delk scored 8 points. Williams, who is nursing an injured right wrist, was used sparingly in the first half and dished out two assists without scoring a basket.

Forward Earl Clark and guard Preston Knowles lead the Cards with 11 points. Clark also dished out 6 assists and grabbed four rebounds.

So here’s what we learned today…Kristof Ongenaet getting ejected is a good thing?  The Orange forward was ejected for a “flagrant” elbow thrown in the direction of Georgetown’s DaJuan (DaJaun is you read SI) Summers.  Once KO was out, SU ripped off a 22-5 run and never looked back…well, until the end of the game, but then it sped off again.

But seriously, we saw how strapped SU is without Ongenaet and how important his recent remergence is for SU (9 rebounds against UConn).  Without Kristof Jim Boeheim did not go to freshman Kris Joseph off the bench – a guy who has seemingly withered away as the year has gone on.  Instead, SU plays with only six guys – the five starters and Andy Rautins off the bench (who fouled out today).  It just emphasizes how short SU’s bench is without the injured Mookie Jones and without more improvement from Joseph (he played only four minutes).

On another note, it’s great to see Arinze Onuaku back to some sort of dominance today, especially without Kristoff for 3/4 of the game.  AO had 15pts and 13 rebounds after spending the last several weeks struggling with tendinitis in his knee.  Granted, Greg Monroe is not Hasheem Thabeet, Blake Griffen etc, but he’s still a solid big man who has NBA aspirations and AO showed up against him.

What concerns me is this teams ability to close the game out – especially with the ball in Eric Devendorf’s hands.  Devo had a great scoring game, but for some reason the last few weeks has had fumble-fingers.  He only turned it over once today (after 9 at PC and 7 at ‘Nova), but there was one particular play in the last few seconds were SU inbounded and Eric almost lost his dribble.  A TO would have given Georgetown a chance to tie (which it eventually did).  As good a game as Jonny Flynn played as well, his TO almost cost SU in the last four seconds of the game.  Flynn coughed it up to Summers.  The senior got a good three point look from straight away as time expired, but missed.

Here are some post game comments from Jim Boeheim…

On Kristof Ongenaet’s foul:

“They didn’t catch [Connecticut’s Hasheem] Thabeet hitting us with an elbow so now all the refs are ejecting for elbows. It’s supposed to be a flagrant, I think he came over the guy and elbowed him, but not on purpose, it was part of the basketball play. They don’t have a feed, but we have the feed showing [DaJuan] Summers elbow him just before that. I haven’t seen it, he said he went for the rebound and came over him to get the ball and elbowed him unintentionally. I thought elbows had to be intentional to be a flagrant foul ejection. I’m at a loss for that one.”

On Arinze Onuaku’s play:

“I think he hadn’t practiced. He had soreness from two or three games. The last game he was a little better, but still not jumping. When you can’t jump and you’re not practicing, your timing isn’t there. Today he made those shots he’s been missing. Today he had his timing back and he was much, much better.”

On Jonny Flynn’s play:

“He’s going to do what we need to do to win. In the first half, I don’t think we were ever in sync. Andy [Rautins] kind of saved us in the first half, making some real good plays on offense for us. We were not in sync until Jonny got started. Ricky [Jackson] had a few buckets for us but we weren’t very good in the first half, both teams weren’t. In the second half, both teams were pretty good.”

On Eric Devendorf’s improvement with turnovers:

“Nobody tries to make turnovers. He’s trying to make plays and when you try to make plays, sometimes turnovers happen, they’re part of the game. I think the turnovers were relatively good today.”

An interesting note – SU did not miss a shot in OT (4-4 and 2-2 from deep).  It was only 5-6 from the FT line, only.

The new lineup: Head coach Fred Hill Jr. sent out a starting lineup of guards Mike Coburn and Anthony Farmer, forwards Earl Pettis and Jaron Griffin and center Gregory Echenique to combat the Friars, but the lineup proves ineffective as Providence beats RU 78-68.

Bench woes: No one seemed to be able to get anything going off of the bench for Rutgers. Guard Mike Rosario stuggled in his first game off the bench, scoring just five points on one-of-six shooting. Center Hamady N’Diaye played just 13 minutes off the bench  scoring four and pulling in four boards.

Foul trouble: With N’Diaye’s minutes limited, both Pettis and Griffin fouled out at the forward position. Griffin had eight points and five boards on three-of-13 shooting and Pettis remained hot with 13 points and two steals.

Guards step up: The struggles of Rosario in the loss seemed to help some of the other guards as Coburn ended up leading all Rutgers scoreres with 14 points and three assists. Freshman guard Pat Jackson also got in for five minutes of Big East action and had an assist.

The Hoyas averted a Valentine’s Day massacre, but there was no miracle occurring in the Carrier Dome as they fell 98-94 in overtime.

Down by 16 with just eight minutes to play, Georgetown looked like it was throwing away a game that had been evenly played in the first half. But then the Hoyas found the tenacity that they have been missing in most of their recent games. After some excellent shotmaking (and a few lucky breaks), the comeback was capped off by a long, contested three by Chris Wright to tie the game at 83. With only a few seconds remaining, Syracuse guard Johnny Flynn made one of his few mistakes of the day, allowing DaJuan Summers to intercept a pass, sending the game into overtime.

Chris Wright was the Hoyas’ leader today, scoring a career high 25 points to go along with six assists and five rebounds. He hit clutch shots all game, nailing threes or penetrating inside when Georgetown needed a score the most. But in overtime Wright ultimately had to head to the bench when he picked up his fifth foul with 50 seconds remaining. No other Hoya was able to repeat Wright’s heroics as time ran down.

At the end of the game it was the Orange guards who made the difference. Eric Devendorf finished with 23 points, including eight in overtime. Jonny Flynn was the hero for Syracuse, scoring 20 of his 25 points after halftime and shooting 15-of-16 from the free throw line. His 4-of-4 performance from the line in the extra period kept Georgetown from having a chance to win. Flynn also had 13 assists for the double-double.

Two other players had double-doubles: Syracuse’s Arinze Onuaku had 15 points and 13 rebounds, and Georgetown freshman Greg Monroe had 16 points and 11 boards.

Now 13-10, 4-8 in the Big East, the loss today made Georgetown’s already dire situation even worse. USF on Tuesday is unquestionably a must-win for the Hoyas, but the real moment of truth comes next weekend, when they play two games in three days against Marquette and Louisville. If Georgetown does not show it can still beat a quality opponent, it can give up any hope of dancing come March.

Rutgers running backs coach Gary Brown resigned from his post today to take the same position with the Cleveland Browns Accordig to a story on Scarlet Scuttlebutt.

Brown spent just one year as the running backs coach of the Scarlet Knights as he led a comittee led by sophomores Kordell Young and Mason Robinson and freshmen Jourdan Brooks and Joe Martinek to a total of 1,664 rushing yards.

Brown will now join Browns’ new head coach and former Jets’ head coach Eric Mangini in Cleveland.

With both Georgetown and Syracuse potentially playing to keep their tournament hopes alive, it should come as no surprise that the two rivals go into the break separated by just one point.

Plenty of storylines in this one. The first for Georgetown was obviously the shift in the starting lineup, with John Thompson III replacing Nikita Mescheriakov replacing Jessie Sapp. Mescheriakov wasn’t particularly effective, but he continued to contribute the energy and the hustle plays that have earned him his playing time.

It wouldn’t be Georgetown-Syracuse without some confrontation and controversy, and we got  both at the eight minute mark. After a Syracuse miss, Hoya junior DaJuan Summers was in position for the rebound when he took a hard elbow to the back of the head from the Orange’s Kristof Ongenaet. After about three minutes of review the officials called it a flagrant technical and Ongenaet was ejected.

Both teams got themselves going on the strength of outside sharpshooting. Syracuse’s Andy Rautins leads all scorers with 11 points, including 3-of-6 from three. Georgetown also jumped out to a quick lead on consecutive threes from Austin Freeman and Summers.

Chris Wright has probably been the Hoyas most important player so far. He’s 4-of-6 with nine points, including a couple of difficult drives when Georgetown really needed a basket. He also has three assists.

The second half just got underway, and fans should be in for a treat if both teams keep up their quality of play.

The Mountaineers put an end to #13 Villanova’s 6 game win streak with a 93-72 upset victory over the Wildcats last night.

Da’Sean Butler followed up his season-low 4 point performance against Pitt on Monday with a career-high 43 points against Villanova.

It was the highest scoring performance by a Big East player since Gerry McNamara dropped 43 on BYU in the 2004 NCAA tournament. Butler’s performance was also the first time in 31 years that a WVU player has scored over 40 points.

Behind Butler, the Mountaineers held the lead for over 36 minutes and never trailed the Wildcats.

Freshmen Devin Ebanks recorded the fourth double-double of his young career with 16 points and 10 boards.

Corey Fisher led Villanova in scoring with 17 points, followed by 15 from Corey Stokes and 12 from Scottie Reynolds.

Villanova will be happy to get out of Morgantown where they have not won a game in over a decade, and will take on Rutgers on Thursday.

Both the Wildcats and the Mountaineers have favorable schedules remaining. With 6 games left to go, 5 of WVU’s upcoming opponents are in the bottom half of the conference. Villanova has a game against #23 Syracuse next Sunday and will finish the season against a tough Providence team that gave them trouble earlier in the season.

Both teams will also have to play a Notre Dame squad that followed up a 7 game losing streak with a 90-57 beat down of #5 Louisville this past Thursday.

The No. 7 Cards ( 18-5, 9-2) will host the DePaul Blue Demons (8-18, 0-12) Sunday at Freedom Hall.

Louisville should be able to bounce back from a loss at Notre Dame in which they were outplayed on both ends of the floor.

Terrence Williams will be the player I expect the most out of. Williams, the team leader in rebounds and assists, played like an All American during a five game stretch beginning with Villanova and ending with Syracuse, but with the exception of his performance against UConn, has been underachieving lately.

Williams will most likely defend DePaul’s leading scorer, Dar Tucker. Tucker is 6th in the Big East in scoring at 18.5 points per game. Williams’ athleticism and length should enable him to contain Tucker when the Cards play man-to-man defense.

The Blue Demons in general are going to have a very difficult time against the Cardinal defense. The Cards are one of the best teams in the country at wearing down opponents with their full court press. DePaul, unlike teams that have been successful against the Louisville pressure, doesn’t have the type of guards that can prevail against the press.

In the half court game, Pitino will likely play zone the vast majority of the game. DePaul is the worst three point shooting team in the Big East at 27%, making the 2-3 zone very effective.

Offensively, this game should give the Cards a chance to get back into a rhythm. Their execution has been subpar lately, a trend that will need to end. Earl Clark and Samarado Samuels both need to take care of the ball and control the paint, while the Louisville guards must end their poor shooting streak from mid to three point range.

The Wildcats (20-4, 8-2) will travel to Morgantown tonight to take on the Mountaineers (16-8, 5-6).

Villanova is on a six game winning streak that includes wins over #3 Pitt, #20 Syracuse and #10 Marquette. The Wildcats are averaging 99.3 points per game in their previous three contests and are are shooting an average of 53 percent from the field in that time.

Dante Cunningham is leading Villanova with 17 points and 7.3 rebounds per game this season.  Scottie Reynolds has put up 68 points in his last three games.

WVU is coming off a a 70-59 loss to Pitt in which De’Sean Butler (WVU’s leading scorer) was held to a season-low 4 points off a 2-for-12 performance. This marked only the third time that Butler has failed to score at least 10 points this season so look for Butler to bounce back tonight.

Although Villanova has topped 90 points in their last three games, those wins came against teams that are more offensively minded. WVU ranks third in the Big East by limiting opponents to an average of 61 points this season.

The Wildcats are as hot as a team can get right now and WVU has dropped four of their last six games. The only thing working in the Mountaineers favor is history as Villanova has not won in Morgantown since Jan. 23 1999.

Click here to see how these teams match up.