Analysis | NC State tops sluggish U of L

Just about everything that could go wrong went wrong on Saturday for the ninth-ranked University of Louisville basketball team.

Terry Rozier scored single-digit points for just the second time all season and fouled out with five minutes left. Montrezl Harrell scored his first points with 17 minutes left in the contest. And NC State only committed eight turnovers.

All that added up to a trying afternoon for U of L -- and a surprising 74-65 loss to a scrappy NC State team that needed a signature win to boost its waning NCAA tournament chances.

"In past years, when we shot poorly like this, our defense would carry us through, but we didn't tonight," U of L coach Rick Pitino said. "We got dominated ... You can't complain because they were the better basketball team. They were better -- better at almost every position."

The game always had the feel of an upset in the making, at least after Louisville (20-5, 8-4 in the ACC) cooled off from a 5-of-6 shooting stretch early on. The Cards went nine minutes and 58 seconds in the first half without making a field goal, and every time they scratched close in a second-half flurry of a comeback, NC State got a crucial basket or went to the foul line.

READ MORE |Game Rewind: U of L falls to NC State

Rozier finished 3 of 10 from the field with seven points. Harrell grabbed 13 rebounds but only scored seven. Wayne Blackshear's hot start -- 14 first-half points -- didn't continue in the second half, and he finished with 19.

This looks like how Louisville could potentially lose in March. A poor shooting day -- U of L shot 32.8 percent and 29 percent in the second half -- paired with an opponent, like NC State on Saturday, that limits its turnovers and finds ways to score in the paint.

NC State (15-11, 6-7 in the ACC) outscored Louisville 32-16 in the paint and built an 11-point lead that turned out to be insurmountable.

"Our guys are not like my other teams," Pitino said, repeating a theory he's maintained most of the season. "They let points dictate. If they're not scoring, they don't play great defense. We've always had the mindset that we're always going to play great defense regardless of whether we score or not. Our guys get deflated when they don't score, and they paid the price tonight. They deserved to lose."

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Blackshear's OK. Wayne Blackshear (hip pointer) played all of one minute in Wednesday's win over Pittsburgh and missed practice on Thursday, but the 6-foot-5 senior forward on Saturday showed no sign of the painful hip injury that had bothered him during the week. He scored the game's first basket -- a 3-pointer -- and had several assertive plays that led to 14 first-half points. He looked healthy and engaged, playing with padding on his abdomen to protect from contact. He made 7 of 10 shots and grabbed four rebounds in 36 minutes.

"I just went out there and played," Blackshear said. "I was in the heat of the game and didn't really feel anything."

WATCH |Terry Rozier reflects on Louisville's NC State loss

Low turnovers -- again. It's been a bit of problem in ACC play, and Louisville's turnover creation didn't improve much against NC State. In Louisville's 11 previous ACC games, opponents had only turned the ball over on 16.7 percent of their possessions, about 6 percentage points lower than Louisville's season average. NC State did its part on Saturday, limiting its turnovers to 12 percent of its possessions by running a patient press offense and quickly passing out of Louisville's traps.

"Defense is not important to this team as it was to the other teams," Pitino said. "Those statistics are not good."

UP NEXT

NO. 9 LOUISVILLE AT SYRACUSE

7 p.m. Wednesday, Syracuse, N.Y.

TV: ESPN Radio: WKRD-790 and WHAS-840