Cards Lose to WVU, Big East Officials Show More Incompetence

There are two big issues coming out of this game. The first is the Cards blowing another lead en route to their eighth loss of the year. The second being the total incompetence exhibited by Big East officials.

Louisville simply is not playing intelligent basketball at the end of games. Today, the Cards held a nine point lead with five minutes to play and proceeded to play like they were losing by nine.

The Cards launched quick shots, completely ignored their leading scorer Samardo Samuels, and as a result, allowed West Virginia to take back the lead. The end of game execution is simply awful and it’s a team wide problem. 

At some point, the Cards need to either man up late in games, or allow some other players to get a chance because the ones getting the late minutes now have not done anything to warrant staying in that role. Now, the officiating.

Simply put, the end of game officiating was embarrassing. Most people may point to the out of bounds call with six seconds, which appeared to go off Devin Ebanks, but was called off of Louisville, as the bad call.

After the game, Louisville associate head coach Ralph Willard said the explanation was official Jim Haney, out on the top of the key, claimed to have seen the ball go off a Louisville player down on the baseline…..OK.

However, the bigger call was on the possession before, which produced the go-ahead shot. WVU’s Joe Mazzulla drove to the left, stumbled, and the ball bounced out of bounds, which was called off Louisville’s Jerry Smith.

Oh, and for any West Virginia fans who claim Mazzulla was tripped by Buckles and there should have been a foul called, watch it again. Mazzulla stepped on Buckle’s foot and fell, that’s not a foul.

After watching the replay, the ball clearly bounced off Mazzulla, twice, before going out of bounds, but the officials awarded the ball to West Virginia. It was not even close. 

These calls will definitely warrant an official explanation from the Big East conference and quite frankly, the Big East has an officiating problem.

I’ll have more later, but for now, the Cards drop another game and Big East officials are still terrible.