Seedy K’s GameCap: Arkansas

In my pregame prep, I refreshed my memory about some truly important mileposts, battles of note against Arkansas in decades past.

The Good: Scooter or Charles one or the other or both following a shot to beat the Razorbacks in Knoxville in the Dream Game Chaser game.

The Bad: The season ending loss to Arkansas in ’79, a game when Denny Crum was so displeased with Grif’s play, he sat him most of the second half.

The Ugly: US Reed from midcourt to end the ’81 campaign after the defending champs had won 15 in a row and 19 of 20 to offset a truly dismal start to the campaign.

What my research didn’t reveal: That freshman Jimmy Dykes was on the Arkansas bench when Reed launched the heartbreaker. I knew he played there, but didn’t know exactly when.

And there he was doing color for the game Wednesday night.

Which finished a bracing 89-80 Arkansas smack in the face to hand the Cards their first L of the campaign.

Dykes is an obvious SEC fan, an acolyte, and his authoritarian tone is off putting to many. Still he is one of the more perceptive and observant commentators doing college hoops.

At some point early in the 2d, when the Cards were down 15 or so, he said to Karl Ravech, “What Louisville is missing is nastiness.”

Mic Drop.

The tale of the tilt in a nutshell.

More disappointing than the loss was the lack of fight.

Lack of fight underneath. U of L was manhandled on the boards, 46-36. More salient, the victors grabbed 18 off the offensive glass, turning those retrievals into 27 second chance points. U of L had 12 ORB, but only scored 9 from them. -18.

Lack of fight on defense. Louisville made a run after intermission, but couldn’t get any consecutive stops of consequence. It seemed like the Cards were getting beat off the dribble way too often.

The Cardinals cut the lead to 5 thrice.

The Razorbacks answered every time on their following possession.

Louisville could never grab the game by the short and curlies.

The first half which ended with an insurmountable 18 point deficit was disturbing.

Walton Area, normally one of the most daunting atmospheres around, was just kind of quiet.

Yet Louisville played timidly, tentatively and as Arkansas’s lead grew, the Cards offensive flow — such as it may have been — disintegrated.

The Cards headed to the locker room -12 at the FT line, -12 points off turnovers, -15 bench points, -6 on the boards, and had 0 fastbreak buckets vs. 8 point for the home team.

Who was the alpha dog?

Uh, nobody.

* * * * *

One needn’t be a hoops savant to have observed from the beginning of the season that U of L’s inside presence isn’t deep nor championship-quality robust.

Aly Khalifa, as much as we love him, is a one trick pony. He was of no help underneath against the Razorbacks assertiveness.

Khani Rooths and Kasean Pryor who ostensibly might have provided some junkyard woof saw but 14 minutes of PT between them.

* * * * *

Next: Indiana Saturday in Indy.

The Hoosiers will also be reeling from a comeuppance. They fell at Minnesota while the Cardinals were losing a heat check in Fayetteville.

— c d kaplan