BYU vs Louisville

BYU spoils Dick Vitale's party! Dick Vitale was pumped up - he was going to Vegas to cover the Rick Pitino vs Roy Williams matchup! Aww! Awesome with capital A babeeeee! But David Rose and his Cougars spoiled Vitale's party, just like Gardner Webb did. And this win wasn't a fluke. The Cougars earned every single dot in the W.

BYU took over the first half, having a +10 turnover advantage over PitinoVille and Derrick Caracter sitting on the bench with two fouls. But two three-pointers in the last minute of the first half brought PitinoVille back in the game.

In essence, BYU beat Pitino at his own game. The pressure was not effective, and Rose rotated players in and out so they wouldn't get worn out. And they did not. In fact the Cougars turned the press into an advantage as they were able to score uncontested buckets after they broke the press.

A seven man rotation with Will Scott coming in occasionally as the 8th man, is not exactly what fits the Pitino system. Furthermore, Derrick Caracter is not exactly the perfect compliment of a pressing team. With both Caracter and Farley being foul-prone, the rotation gets tighter. To further complicate matters, having Andre McGee and T. Farley on the court at the same time allows the defense to concentrate on the remaining players. Obviously having either Padgett or Juan Diego Tello Palacios would have given the team a lot more leeway. Given that both are injury-prone, it looks like the current rotation is all that Pitino will essentially have. Unless of course R. Delk is eligible at the semester break (which I do not know).

Plaisted and Caracter battled it out in the paint, but Tavernari was the one that had the biggest impact and broke the Cardinals back, and not just because he scored 28 points.

This creates a potentially exciting high scoring affair, assuming North Carolina is able to beat Old Dominion. The game will air tomorrow night on ESPN2 with Dick Vitale. More TV details.

The game was broadcast on BYU-TV, which is great if you dislike commercials because there are none (other than the BYU promos of course during every media timeout). BYU-TV is usually on satellite or digital cable among all the other religious/spirituality channels. One funny thing with their graphics is that they have a giant transparent overlay at the top of the screen with parts of the letters BYU. That graphic was obnoxiously annoying and distracting :)