Louisville basketball still has plenty to prove under Pat Kelsey
Louisville basketball has taken steps forward under Pat Kelsey, but Saturday's NCAA Tournament loss to Michigan State shows UofL has a ways to go.
BUFFALO, NY — To lift Louisville basketball back to the level of competing for national championships, second-year coach Pat Kelsey will have to win games like Saturday’s, with elevated stakes like advancing to the NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16 . He’ll have to do it against perennial powerhouse programs like Michigan State. And he’ll have to beat coaches like the Spartans’ Hall of Famer Tom Izzo .
It’s the next big step for Kelsey and the Cardinals’ program to take. It’s the most difficult one. And one that UofL's 77-69 loss to the Spartans showed it's not quite ready to make.
But it’s also the one that will have the biggest impact in thrusting the program forward. Kelsey led the "ReviVille" last season just to get the program back to competing at a high level after it won only 12 games during former coach Kenny Payne’s two seasons . Had they beaten Michigan State, Kelsey could have laid claim to the "ArriVille" despite whatever disappointments the season may have had from the will he or won’t he play back injury saga of Mikel Brown Jr .
Kelsey doesn’t look at it that way. He never has in coaching stints at Winthrop and College of Charleston, where winning one game was looked at as some kind of signal that he’d made it. On Friday, Kelsey said even if the Cards won, he wouldn't view it like he's arrived.