Cards' Men's Basketball Team Plays its First of Two Straight on the Road at Wake Forest

Wednesday, January 13

Winston-Salem, NC

8:30 PM

University of Louisville

Wake Forest

Photo by: Tim Haag | Louisville Athletics

Cards' Men's Basketball Team Plays its First of Two Straight on the Road at Wake Forest

January 12, 2021 | Men's Basketball

Louisville notes vs Wake Forest Chris Mack Press Conference JJ Traynor Press Conference Wake Forest notes vs Louisville

Louisville is off to its best conference start in its seven years in the ACC and its first 3-0 conference start since 2012-13

By: Kenny Klein

Game Information
Site: Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum, Winston-Salem, N.C. (14,665)
Television: ACC Network - Mike Monaco, play-by-play; Dan Bonner, analyst.
Radio: WHAS, 840 AM) Paul Rogers, play-by-play; Bob Valvano, analyst (XM channel 383, Internet 973)
Series History: UofL leads 7-2 (3-0 in Louisville, 2-1 in Winston-Salem, 2-1 neutral)
Last Meeting: UofL 86, Wake Forest 76 (Feb. 5, 2020 at KFC Yum! Center)
UofL National Ranking: No. 16 Associated Press; No. 18 USA Today
Next UofL Game: Jan. 16 at Miami, Coral Gables, Fla., 8 p.m. ET (ACCN)

Tied for the ACC lead, Louisville plays its first of two straight on the road as the No. 16/18 Cardinals visit the Wake Forest Demon Deacons in Winston-Salem, N.C. on Wednesday.

Louisville won its fourth straight on Jan. 6 to open the season at 3-0 in the ACC for the first time in its seven years in the league as the Cardinals beat then No. 19/20 Virginia Tech 73-71, UofL's first home ACC game of the season. It was Louisville's 17th straight victory over the Hokies.

Louisville is off to its best conference start in its seven years in the ACC and its first 3-0 conference start since 2012-13. The Cardinals have not won their first four conference games since the 2008-09 season (8-0 Big East start).

Wednesday will be Louisville's third ACC road contest in four conference games this season due to two home postponements; and the first of three games in six days for the Cardinals.

Wake Forest (3-3, 0-3 ACC) has dropped its first three ACC games, including falling 79-68 at Duke on Jan. 9 in their last outing. Junior forward Isaiah Mucious leads WFU in scoring (11.3 ppg) and rebounding (4.8 rpg). Graduate guard Jonah Antonio is second in the ACC in three-point field goal percentage (.448. 13-of-29).

Wake Forest had five games postponed or canceled in December, and was idle between its second game of the season on Nov. 27 and its next contest against Catawba on Dec. 31. Wake Forest is No. 128 in the Sagarin Ratings, No. 134 in the NET rankings, No. 102 in ESPN's College Basketball Power Index (BPI) and No. 125 by Ken Pomeroy through Jan. 10.

Louisville leads 7-2 in its series against Wake Forest, winning the last three matchups and five of the last six. In last season's contest, Louisville prevailed 86-76 in the KFC Yum! Center as Jordan Nwora scored 21 points and grabbed seven rebounds, while Dwayne Sutton produced his 10th career double-double with 15 points, 11 rebounds and four assists in the victory.

Louisville has been successful with only one upperclassman among its currently 10 active scholarship players. Graduate transfer Carlik Jones joins nine Cardinals who are freshmen or sophomores in that group. Graduate transfer Charles Minlend, who started 82 games and scored 1,271 points in three seasons at San Francisco, is nearing a return and will double the number of Cardinal upperclassmen when he is active.

Louisville moved back into the Associated Press Top 25 rankings this week, ranking No. 16 and No. 18 in the USA Today polls. UofL's last in-season jump from unranked one week to No. 16 or higher the next week in the AP poll was Jan. 23, 1984, when Louisville re-entered the AP Top 20 at No. 14.

Notes

UofL Coach Chris Mack was an assistant coach for three seasons at Wake Forest (2001-04) under the late head coach Skip Prosser when the Demon Deacons posted a 67-29 record.
UofL assistant coach Dino Gaudio worked nine seasons at Wake Forest (2001-10), including six years as associate head coach and three as its head coach, when the Demon Deacons compiled a 187-99 record and participated in six NCAA Tournaments. In three seasons as the head coach at Wake Forest (2007-10), Gaudio guided WFU to a 61-31 overall record and a pair of NCAA Tournament appearances.
UofL's 85-76 victory over Wake Forest on Jan. 7, 2015 in Winston-Salem, N.C. was the Cardinals' first-ever ACC game. Two meetings have come in NCAA Tournament action, with the teams splitting those two.
Louisville has started with at least an 8-1 record through nine games for the 10th time in the last 13 years. UofL has won at least nine of its first 10 games on nine occasions over the past 12 years entering Wednesday's game.
Louisville's 30 ACC road wins in its seventh year in the league is the fourth-most in the ACC in that period.
Jae'Lyn Withers' 16 points and 12 rebounds against Virginia Tech marked his first career double-double. He is the first UofL freshman to have at least 12 rebounds and at least 15 points against a conference opponent in 35 years -- since Pervis Ellison had 21 points and 13 rebounds vs. Memphis in 1986.
Carlik Jones and David Johnson are the only two players in the ACC to rank among the top 20 in scoring, rebounding, and assists -- Jones (16.5 ppg/7th in the ACC, 6.1 rpg/19th, 4.9 apg/2nd), Johnson (14.7 ppg/14th in the ACC, 6.1 rpg/20th, 3.7 apg/10th). Jones has 91 career double-figure scoring efforts, including the last 31 consecutive games (all nine this year).
David Johnson has scored 17 or more points in six of the last seven games. He has made 9-of-14 threes in his last three games and has more than tripled his three-point production from a year ago, burying 16-of-35 threes this season (.457; 5-of-23 threes in 2019-20). In ACC games, Johnson is fifth in the ACC in scoring (18.0 ppg) and sixth in rebounding (8.0 rpg).
Louisville outrebounded Virginia Tech 37-30, its sixth rebounding battle won this year, including all three ACC games. Louisville produced double-digit rebounding margins in its first two ACC games vs. Pitt and Boston College. UofL's +13.0 rebounding advantage in conference games leads the ACC and its +7.2 margin on the season is 43rd nationally and fourth in the ACC.