Louisville coach Pat Kelsey explains what went wrong for Cardinals in NCAA Tournament loss

LEXINGTON, Ky. — For the second time in the 2024-25 season, the Louisville men’s basketball team has lost at Rupp Arena.

The first time — a Dec. 14 rivalry loss to Kentucky — ended up being a galvanizing moment for the Cardinals. U of L wound up winning 21 of its 24 games from that point onward.

But the second time — Thursday afternoon’s 89-75 setback to Creighton in Lexington — ended U of L’s season.

Eight-seed Louisville’s defeat to 9-seed Creighton came in the first round of the 2025 men’s NCAA Tournament in Rupp Arena.

Head coach Pat Kelsey’s first season in charge of the Cardinals ended in dour fashion. The Cards trailed for more than 37 minutes of their first-round exit to the Bluejays, who shot 45.8% (11 for 24) on 3-pointers.

Louisville’s return to the national postseason for the first time since 2019 also featured several other unfortunate moments.

Kelsey picked up a technical foul in the second half. U of L senior guard Reyne Smith reaggravated a right ankle injury that had kept him out of action since March 5. Making his return for U of L on Thursday, Smith limped off the court with 11:37 to go in the game, before later returning to the Louisville bench with crutches and his right shoe removed.

All in all, it was a bad day at the office for Kelsey and company, and one that ended Louisville’s season with a 27-8 record.

Louisville is still without a win in March Madness since 2017.

After the season-ending defeat, here’s everything Kelsey said during his press conference.

— Opening statement.

I’d like to congratulate Coach McDermott and Creighton. They played very well today. They were the better team today. Played in a very, very tough environment being right down the road from our school. Give them a lot of credit. Proud of our guys. It’s been a long journey since June 5 when these guys first came together for summer school. Zero scouting report players.

Built the entire team in a very, very short amount of time. They meshed quickly. We asked them to love each other from day one and these guys went all in with everything they had with everything I asked them to do. For 10 months and for the rest of my life and for the rest of my career, I’ll remember this group as one of the most special groups that I’ve ever coached. I know they are savvy, they are veteran. They are smart, hard-working, dedicated.

Just been a special, special group. I told them in there, you know, it will hurt bad today. It will hurt for the next several days. It will hurt for a while. But when they event actually are able to have perspective and get above the trees on what they have done and what they have accomplished, they have done some special, special things.

— Question about what this season’s Louisville team did to lay the foundation for Pat Kelsey’s future U of L teams.

Yeah, it hurts really bad when it ends, and it end so abruptly. You prepare so hard. You work so hard every day. You never think it’s going to end. And when it ends, it’s really, really hard. When you’re looking at those guys in the locker room, and they are distraught, emotional, this flood of emotions comes through you, too, and you just start thinking back to all the stuff you’ve been through with this group.

And you know, you realize how special it’s been and how special they are. We have the best fan base in the country, and in my opinion, it’s not even close. You saw, they packed this arena tonight. There were thousands of fans at our hotel before we left, and they have really, really rallied around this special group of young men.

I hate it for our fans. I hate it for our fan base that we weren’t able to get it done today. These guys wanted so bad to give these fans what they deserve, and that’s to put Louisville in the national spotlight in the national tournament, advancing in the national tournament. We just came up a little short tonight. The disappointment of today is not going to take away from the special season they had, but like we said earlier, it’s going to hurt for a while.

— Question about getting called for a technical foul in the second half.

I got frustrated and said something I shouldn’t have said and he teed me up, you know. Far less than an ideal time to get technical, I realize that.

So it is what it is.

— Comment about Kelsey bringing grace and integrity back to the Louisville basketball program.

Well, that means a lot coming from a legend like you. We talk about the great fan base we have but this history we have is crazy. I mean, you’re part of a national championship. We have All-Americans galore.

I came in as this kind of outsider that nobody really knew who I was, and to get a compliment like that from one of our former greats, means the world to me. So thank you. These guys worked their butts off every single day to make you guys proud. Thank you.

— Question about Creighton’s offense stretching the lead in the first half.

That was a huge stretch. I know it was early in the game but that was a 12-0 barrage that we, at the end of the day, struggled to recover from. They got them in a bunch of different ways, but I think first and foremost it started with transition. They binge score, as I like to call it. We tell our guys, like you can be on transition for five, six, seven minutes, and you relax for one second, and ball gets out of the net or off the rim, gets in their hands, pitch ahead, they get threes. When they missed them, they were getting second shots and got a couple kick-out threes, as well.

That was a big stretch. Our guys continued to battle. They are a very good team. They are very well-coached. They have one of the best centers in the country. They have a terrific point guard. Big kid. I always say numbers, this isn’t a disrespect, but I always say if we were playing the ‘96 Bulls, I would say 23 for Chicago but 11 is a load. Makes you make some really, really tough decisions on what you’re doing with pick-and-rolls, because he’s one of the best lob threats in the country, and the shooting that they have around him forces you to make tough decisions.

We were trying to drop the pick-and-roll and fight over the top and really be physical with the roll, and they were screening us and really turning the corner and getting to the rim. So the adjustment we made was start trying to be aggressive with the pick-and-roll and hedge more. No. 1 is a surgeon; he can really pick you apart. If you stay in the low position to take away the roll, he does a good job of throwing back and finding shooters. They got loose a couple times.

But our guys continued to fight. We cut it to 10 or 12, whatever it was, when the knucklehead head coach got a technical, that didn’t help.

But again, give them a lot of credit. They were the better team today.

— Question about Louisville having a successful season despite injuries and other adversity.

All I can think about right now is that loss and it hurts really, really bad. I wanted it so bad. Our players wanted it so bad. Our fan base wanted it so bad. They answered the call. There was so much red there. There was so much passion. There was so much noise.

All I can feel right now is just that, and it hurts really, really bad. There will come a time when we will look back and you kind of appreciate it a little bit more. But now is not the time. We’ve got a bunch of hurting guys in the locker room. We have some guys that will never put on a jersey again ever again. We have some guys that will go on and play professionally.

I really like to think, and maybe this sounds cliché and coach speak, but I really mean it. I think being a part of this journey for the last ten months, even if those guys were only in a Louisville uniform for one year, genuinely learned life lessons that are going to make them better in every facet of their life moving forward, and that’s something I’m passionate about and something my staff is passionate about.

— Question about Louisville’s roster construction plans for next season.

Right now is not the time.

We’re excited about what we have coming back. We’ll do a great job in recruiting, and in the transfer portal, and put a great team together that’s going to compete for a championship. I have all the confidence in the world that that is going to happen.

That’s not for this press conference. Just not for right now.

— Question about how Creighton defended Chucky Hepburn in the second half.

... So their defensive scheme is based around putting one of the best rim protectors in the country at the rim, and he doesn’t move much. What they try to do is really funnel everything to him, whether it’s an off-ball screen or whether it’s a ball screen. It’s like, they just play on top of you and force you to go there.

In new-age basketball analytics, the mid-range shot is one of the lower percentage shots in the game. Although No. 5 for them defied all human nature when it comes to basketball metrics today because that young man was shooting it in from the mid-range, and I give him a ton of credit. Tip the cap. He had an amazing game. I mean, he had 29, 12, six assists, and many of them were tough, tough shots.

I would say that about Creighton overall, too. Every time that we got a little momentum, it was like a dagger shot, whether it was No. 11’s deep three, whether it was No. 1’s three from, like, seems like from, I don’t know, another county down the road. That was a big, big one.

And No. 5 was hitting tough dagger middies that every time you turned around, you’re like, gosh.

They have a lot of movement on offense. Chucky exert a lot of energy chasing No. 1 around. He never stops moving and neither does Chucky, either. That was a really, really good matchup and a good battle.

Tried to do a little bit better job with our ball movement, people movement the second half, because in the first half it was much more dribble, dribble because we were setting middle pick-and-rolls, and they were forcing us down to the giant. And we were attacking him, getting some middies and getting some at the rim.

So I thought we did a better job and our percentages reflected better in the second half of having more fluidity and movement and cutting and screening to our offense.

— Question about a water bottle that was thrown on the court in the second half after Kelsey was called for a technical foul.

I didn’t see it to be honest with you. I just had gotten the technical and I’m talking to my team and they kept cleaning something up at the other end and I was like, what the crap is going on, and somebody said, threw a water bottle on the court. It’s unfortunate. You know, it happened.