Louisville, KY- Louisville men’s basketball went undefeated in January for the first in 16 years as Terrence Edwards Jr. scored 18 points as No. 21 Louisville cruised to a 72-59 win over Wake Forest on Tuesday in the KFC Yum! Center.
A 12-0 run midway through the first half gave the Cardinals (16-5, 9-1 ACC) a 26-11 lead with 8:26 left and they led by 29 in the second half.
Reyne Smith chipped in 16 points, and Chucky Hepburn finished with 14 points, a pair of steals, and eight assists as Louisville extended its winning streak to 10 games.
Hunter Salis, who came in third in the ACC with 18.9 points per game, scored 13 for Wake Forest (15-6, 7-3) before he was ejected with 14:47 remaining after picking up his second technical foul. Wake Forest lost in back to back games for the first time this season.
The Cardinals moved to 9-1 in ACC play and won their 10th-straight game overall thanks to a well-balanced attack and a defensive effort that frustrated the Deacons from the jump. Louisville managed to swing 17 points off of turnovers, Louisville led 45-21 at the end of the first half. The margin was the Cardinals largest at the break of an ACC game since 2019, and also the fourth straight game where the Cardinals have led by 10 or more points after the first 20 minutes.
Wake Forest shot 41.1% from the field to the Cardinals 39%. Wake Forest shot 38.6% from deep to 30.6% for the Cardinals. The Demon Deacons outrebounded the Cardinals 39-35. The Cardinals had 17 assists to Wake Forest’s 10. Wake Forest hurt themselves with 15 turnovers. Both teams did well in the post, Wake Forest with 28 and Louisville with 22.
The Demon Deacons came out sloppy, turning the ball over 9 times in the first half and shot 30% from the floor in the first 20 minutes. The Cardinals turned those 9 turnovers into 15 points and made 8 3-pointers in the first half. Louisville was slinging the ball around and dicing up the Deacons defense, to finish the half with 13 assists on 17 made baskets. Wake Forest had 3 assists on 8 made baskets in the first half.
Takeaways
Wake Forest: Just two days after holding No. 2 Duke to a season-low 63 points in a close loss, the Demon Deacons trailed Louisville 67-41 with 7:45 left. Wake came in allowing just 65.6 per game.
Louisville: A week after crushing SMU on the road, the Cardinals came back home and easily handled another potential NCAA Tournament team from the ACC.
Wake Forest Coach Steve Forbes on the loss:
“We just got off to a really poor start. We had five turnovers before the first media timeout and our shot selection was poor, outside of Hunter [Sallis]. It was just a bad recipe for success. We were a step slow in the defensive transition. They are so good in transition and we were just behind the play. We did well in the halfcourt defense, but they really hurt us in transition. It’s hard to win when they make 11 threes. We made eight but those came really late. They were plus-ten at the line and the turnovers were really hard for us, especially when we haven’t really turned the ball over like that. It’s a credit to Pat [Kelsey] and his team. He’s got a really nice team and a really deep team that can shoot the ball. They play hard defensively and they have great cohesiveness. We lost our composure there when it got loud in the building and we got some interesting technical fouls called on us. We fought hard to finish it, but there were no moral victories.”
Up next
Wake Forest returns home to face Pittsburgh on Saturday. Louisville travels to play Georgia Tech on Saturday.
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