No. 11 Louisville Hosts Syracuse on Wednesday Night

GAME 27
Date: Feb. 19, 2020
Time: 7:00 p.m.
Site: KFC Yum! Center/Crum Court, Louisville, Ky. (22,090) (159-26 in 10th year)
Television: ESPN - Dan Shulman, play-by-play; Dick Vitale, analyst.
Radio: WKRD (790 AM; joined in progress on WHAS, 840 AM) Paul Rogers, play-by-play; Bob Valvano, analyst (Sirius channel 81, XM 81, Internet 81) Also: Westwood One Sports - Bill Roth,
play-by-play; Jon Crispin, analyst.
Series History: UofL leads 18-10 (9-4 in Louisville, 4-6 in Syracuse, 5-0 neutral)
Last Meeting: Syracuse 69, UofL 49 (Feb. , 2019 in Syracuse, N.Y.)
UL National Ranking: No. 11 USA Today, No. 11 Associated Press
Officials: Roger Ayers, Brent Hampton, Ron Groover
Next UofL Game: Feb. 22 vs. North Carolina, KFC Yum! Center, 4:00 p.m. ET (ESPN)

LOUISVILLE, Ky.-- With just five games remaining in the regular season including three at home, Louisville returns home for the first of two straight in the KFC Yum! Center as the Cardinals face the Syracuse Orange on Wednesday.

Louisville dropped its second straight after winning 10 in a row in falling 77-62 at Clemson on Feb. 15. The Cardinals suffered through a sub-par first half when they shot just 15.6 percent from the field and fell behind 31-14 at the half. Dwayne Sutton led UofL with 18 points and added seven rebounds.

Louisville has four players averaging eight or more points a game. Junior Jordan Nwora leads the team in scoring with 18.2 points per game, while pulling down 7.3 rebounds a game. Steven Enoch is second on the team in scoring and rebounding with 9.9 points and 5.8 rebounds per game. Dwayne Sutton averages 9.2 points while leading the team in rebounding with 8.4 per game. Fresh Kimble leads the team with 74 assists.

The Orange (14-11, 7-7 ACC) have won six of their last 10 games, but fell 80-77 at Florida State on Feb. 15 in their last game. Elijah Hughes led Syracuse with 25 points in the game while Joseph Girard III added 25 points and seven rebounds.

Hughes leads the ACC in scoring, averaging 18.9 points and 3.7 assists per game. Buddy Boeheim leads the ACC in three-pointers per game (3.5, 84-of-215, .391) and Girard III leads the ACC in free throw percentage (.923). Syracuse is No. 58 in the Sagarin Ratings, No. 65 in the NET rankings, No. 55 in ESPN's College Basketball Power Index (BPI) and No. 55 by Ken Pomeroy through Feb. 16.

Louisville leads 18-10 in its series against Syracuse, winning five of the last eight but dropping the last two. In last year's matchup, Syracuse won 69-49 in Syracuse, N.Y. as the Cardinals had their poorest shooting performance from the field for the season (.259) and scored their lowest point total of the year. Jordan Nwora scored 11 points to lead the Cardinals. UofL twice beat Syracuse in the championship game of the Big East Tournament (2009, 2013).

CARD FILES

Louisville's 12-3 ACC start is its best in its six years in the conference and its best in any league since the Cardinals won the 2014 American Athletic Conference title with a 15-3 record. UofL has started with at least a 21-5 overall record through 26 games for the first time since 2013-14. UofL has 18 straight 20-win seasons on the court.
Louisville has a 54-16 record in its conference home games over the last eight years (.771). UofL has the fourth-most conference home wins in its six years in the ACC with a 39-13 ACC home record.
Louisville is 12th in the nation in three-point field goal percentage (.383), but has made just 9-of-51 threes in their last two games. UofL has made as many as nine three-pointers in a game on 15 occasions this season (10 of the last 16), including 9-of-22 threes vs. Virginia on Feb. 8.
Dwayne Sutton needs five rebounds for 600 at UofL. He has grabbed double-digit rebounds in seven of the last 15 games (11 this year).
UofL is 17th in the nation in field goal percentage defense (.385), 23rd in rebound margin (+6.5), 25th in scoring margin (+10.9) and 41st in scoring defense (63.9). UofL is 11^th in offensive efficiency and 44th in defensive efficiency in KenPom statistical rankings.
Louisville's bench has delivered an average of 32.3 points over the last nine games. Six of the Cardinals' top seven bench scoring efforts of the season have come in the last nine games, with a different bench scoring leader in four of those.
Jordan Nwora's 474 points this year is the fourth-most by a UofL player through 26 games

over the last 20 seasons. The preseason ACC Player of the Year is second in the ACC in scoring (18.2 ppg), 10th in rebounding (7.4).

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Players Mentioned

Steven Enoch

Jordan Nwora

Dwayne Sutton

University of Louisville Athletics