No. 5 Kentucky men’s basketball defeated the Louisville Cardinals 93-85 on Saturday evening inside of Rupp Arena.
Kentucky point guard Lamont Butler, who missed two games after suffering an ankle injury at Clemson on Dec. 3, was able to draw back into the lineup on Saturday and was accompanied by the other usual UK starters: Otega Oweh, Jaxson Robinson, Andrew Carr and Amari Williams.
The Cats started off by winning the opening-tip, which was followed up by an early non-shooting foul on Louisville’s Noah Waterman. Following that, Williams landed a bank-in-layup to give the Cats the first two points of the contest.
Williams went on to finish the game with six points, eight rebounds and four assists.
On Louisville’s first trip down, Chucky Hepburn responded with a triple that would give the Cardinals an early 3-2 lead.
Hepburn gave the Cards his best effort as he, despite the loss, went on to finish the game with 26 points, five rebounds and five assists.
From there, the Cats grasped a strong 14-5 lead courtesy of Robinson and Butler, who were able to contribute back-to-back made 3-pointers. The mix of the 3-pointers and blaring noise potioned a timeout by first-year Louisville Head Coach Pat Kelsey.
By the time there was 10:30 left in the first half, Kentucky led 30-19 and was shooting 12-15 (80%) from the field and 4-4 from deep.
Throughout the opening 20 minutes, Louisville clawed its way back in and found a way to shrink the deficit to just six as UK went into the break leading 46-40.
Louisville came out and opened the second half with a slam, which was then followed by a made 3-pointer by Butler. Through the first 3:28, Butler had nine of UK’s 11 second-half points, shooting 3-3 from deep.
Butler went on to have the best game of his career, recording 33 points on 10-10 shooting from the field and 6-6 shooting from deep.
At the 7:37 mark, Kentucky found itself up 74-64, capitalizing off of Louisville’s failed efforts as the Cardinals went on a 2:55 scoring drought while missing their last six attempts from the field.
With 3:45 to go Kentucky only tacked on five points while Louisville was not able to do significant damage, only adding eight points to its total. At that point, UK led 79-72.
With under two minutes to go, Oweh intercepted a pass and brought it the length of the floor for a slam. Then, a few plays later, Oweh drained a corner triple and cemented the victory for UK.
Oweh finished the game with 17 points, one rebound and three assists.
Kentucky will return to action on Saturday, Dec. 21, against the Ohio State Buckeyes inside of Madison Square Garden in New York City. That game can be viewed on CBS Sports.
