LOUISVILLE, Ky. – NC State grad guard DJ Horne scored a season-high 27 points to lead the Pack to an 89-83 win over Louisville Saturday afternoon inside the KFC Yum! Center.
With the win, NC State improves to 12-4, 4-1 in the ACC. The Pack has also now won all three of its conference road games this season. It’s the first time since the 2001-02 season that NC State has won its first three road games of its ACC slate.
After a poor shooting night against North Carolina on Wednesday, Horne shot 9-of-14 from the field, including 6-of-9 from three-point range on Saturday afternoon at Louisville. The six three-pointers tied a season-high.
DJ Burns, Jr., and Casey Morsell added 13 points while Michael O’Connell added 11 points and a game-high six assists.
Mohamed Diarra scored seven points and pulled down a game-high 11 rebounds.
Horne came off the bench for the first time this season and his 27 points helped lead NC State to 40 bench points on Saturday. The 40 points off the bench are the most for NC State since scoring 45 bench points on Dec. 22, 2019 against The Citadel.
The Pack scored the first basket of the second half to extend its lead back to double-digits but Louisville responded with a 9-0 run to get within two with 16:19 to play.
NC State kept the Cardinals behind for the next five minutes before a Louisville three-pointer with 11:55 remaining gave Louisville its first and ultimately its only lead of the game, 55-54.
The Pack responded with a Michael O’Connell three-pointer on the next possession to retake the lead and the Cards could never get back in front.
But while Louisville never led again the Cards did not go away. The Pack’s lead was 65-62 when it went on an 11-2 run to take a 75-64 lead with 5:47 to play.
The Pack would eventually push the lead out to 83-69 with 2:18 to go, but the Cardinals had one last spring in them as UofL scored 11 consecutive points in one minute and 36 seconds to cut its deficit to 83-80 with 52 seconds to go.
Horne continued his excellent game by completing a three-point play with 31 seconds left to push the advantage back to six. Louisville again came down and hit another three to cut the deficit in half, but Horne went to the line and made both ends of a one-and-one with 14 seconds left to end the Cardinals threat.
NC State finished the game with a season-high 15 turnovers and lost the turnover battle (-5) for just the third time this season.
NC State jumped out to a 12-0 lead as the Pack forced Louisville into four turnovers in the first four minutes of the game.
The game stayed in double digits for the majority of the first half, but a 6-0 Louisville run brought the Cardinals with six, 31-25, with 4:28 to go in the opening half. NC State responded with a 13-5 run though, taking a 44-30 lead on three Morsell free throws with 1:17 left. The Cardinals scored the final five points of the break to cut the deficit to nine at intermission.
The Pack returns to action Tuesday night when it hosts Wake Forest at PNC Arena. Tipoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. and the game will be televised on the ACC Network.
