U of L-UVA matchup not lacking significance

January has given way to February. The Super Bowl is over, and so is the College Football Playoff. Baseball won't start for another two months. Neither will the NBA playoffs.

This is about the time that sports fans outside of Kentucky, Indiana and North Carolina start paying attention to college basketball. It's also about the time that the mad dash toward Selection Sunday becomes increasingly serious with each passing game.

Few games the rest of the regular season could have as big of an impact on the University of Louisville basketball team's NCAA tournament standing than Saturday's 7 p.m. matchup with third-ranked Virginia.

The much-anticipated contest at UVA's John Paul Jones Arena is the last chance for Louisville to get road victory against a premier opponent. It's a high-ceiling, high-floor game: Louisville won't suffer much of a setback in seeding if it loses; if it wins, U of L enters the conversation for at least a No. 2 seed in the tournament.

Louisville-Virginia:TV info, series history, story lines

Beyond that, Saturday's game could change the Atlantic Coast Conference title race for the season's final four weeks, especially with Louisville playing five of its final conference games at home and Virginia hitting the road for four of its last eight league games.

But U of L coach Rick Pitino has a different way of looking at it.

"I don't really care if we're a No. 1 seed or a 4 seed (in the tournament) as long as you're playing good basketball, and we're playing good basketball," Pitino said. "I like our chemistry."

That chemistry has helped ninth-ranked U of L (19-3, 7-2 in the ACC) win four consecutive games and seemingly solve some of the offensive woes that troubled them earlier this season. Louisville, Pitino said, is getting more paint touches, attacking the basket more and shooting well on the road (53.2 percent).

That said, Virginia and its vaunted defense present a stout challenge that U of L's offense hasn't faced since Kentucky.

Related:Pitino admires UVA defense, teaches it to his team

The statistics have been bandied about since Louisville beat Miami on Tuesday night, and deservedly so. Virginia (20-1, 8-1 in the ACC) only allows 50.8 points per game and opponents shoot 35.5 percent. UVA's opponents also average a meager 2.2 fast-break points and 21 points in the paint per game.

Louisville, of course, is no slouch in those categories, either. The Cardinals only give up 58.8 points a game and opponents shoot 37.5 percent. Virginia is second in the nation in defensive efficiency; Louisville is sixth.

All that brings back the original point: Saturday's meeting is a clash of college basketball titans at the perfect time in the season, when the eyes of the sports world have shifted to college hoops.

And the result of this matchup, the first of two between the programs -- Virginia comes to Louisville for the season finale on March 7, will send waves through the NCAA tournament selection process and the ACC title race, even if Pitino and Virginia coach Tony Bennett don't want to acknowledge that.

Related:Louisville's small guards rebounding above their height

"This is about the moment," Bennett told reporters this week. "I think if you, again, start thinking ahead, 'Well, I wonder what my draft status is, or I wonder what seed we're going to be,' I just think that's a mistake. It doesn't work like that for me and it doesn't work like that for our guys.

"We're midway through the ACC season. We've got one of the best defensive teams I've seen coming in here. Revel in that challenge."

In other words, leave the discussion of the impact of Saturday's game to the rest of the sports world, which is happy to oblige in that conversation.

No matter how they slice it. No matter how focused they are on just playing Saturday's game. Louisville and Virginia have a lot riding on their matchup, and it should be a good one.

Reach U of L beat writer Jeff Greer at (502) 582-4044 and follow him on Twitter (@jeffgreer_cj).