Louisville Elite But Flawed

Well, that was authoritative.

Not surprising, though, that the top-seeded Big East regular-season and tournament champion would have no problem whatsoever with a 12-seed from the Pac-10. This was pretty close to a bye into the Elite Eight for Louisville. For the Wildcats to have had a chance, everything would have had to go perfectly for them. And the Cardinals' entire game is based on making sure things don't go perfectly for their opponent.

They bother every inbounds play, every pass, every shot, every step the opposing guard takes in transition. They come at you with athletes the way CBS comes at you with commercial breaks. You could tell from the opening tip that Louisville was on its high-energy game, and that nothing was going to come easily for Chase Budinger and his gang.

The way Louisville is constructed -- loaded with well-conditioned athletes, it's hard to imagine the Cardinals losing after four days off. If you're going to get them, it's going to be in the second game of the weekend, when they've only had one day to recharge. But a game like tonight's barely taxed them, so you have to imagine they'll be fresh for either Michigan State or Kansas on Sunday.

Question is, can they win it and get Rick Pitino to another Final Four? And it's a good question. So far, Louisville has beaten a 16-seed, a 9-seed and a 12-seed to get to the Elite Eight. They have not been pushed. From here on out, it's all 1s, 2s and 3s -- maybe a 4 if Gonzaga makes it to the final. Sunday is when we start to find out who Louisville really is as a national title contender.

It may well be one. The Cardinals have the talent. They have the size. They have the defense. They have the pedigree. Nobody else is walking around with a 19-2 record against Big East teams this year. They have all the makings.

But.

Having watched Louisville a lot this year, especially back in January, I've seen the flaws. I know how the Cardinals will lose if they do. They're a bad free-throw shooting team. Their point guard play is spotty, and symbolic of the larger problem that they sometimes get too sloppy with the ball. And that's a symptom of an even larger problem, which is that their focus can drift for huge, 10-minute stretches during which lesser teams or teams they have on the ropes climb back into the games.

Any one of these flaws can get Louisville beaten in any one of the next three rounds. It's only going to get tougher for the Cardinals from this point on. But they would counter with the indisputable fact that no team in the field -- with the possible exception of Missouri and its 40-minute mania -- makes things tougher on the other team than Louisville does.