CRAWFORD | Louisville's season stopped suddenly -- Pat Kelsey's momentum won't

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WDRB) – The game was over, and Louisville’s season, and Pat Kelsey emerged from Louisville’s locker room after a long talk with his team. Into the crowded hallway, he started into a small room, but Reyne Smith was inside getting an X-ray. He instead went into an adjacent room with defensive assistant Brian Kloman and offensive coach Mike Cassity.

The brakes, after an NCAA Tournament loss, slam with severity. And for a coach who has been described as, “all gas, no brakes,” it may be even more jarring. At the postgame news conference podium after Thursday’s 89-75 first-round loss to Creighton, Kelsey’s emotions were on his face.

He looked down. He closed his eyes. He was somewhere else, it seemed. How long does this stinking thing last?

When his time came around again to answer questions, he spoke candidly.

“Yeah, it hurts really bad when it ends, and it ends so abruptly,” Kelsey said. “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.”

Let me tell you about Kelsey. I don’t know him. I’ve never had a one-on-one conversation with him. Not that it matters. When he was hired, I had my doubts. I liked what I saw and heard from him. And then I just didn’t hear much. I heard through other reports. I heard through radio interviews. Or podcast interviews. I didn’t get to personally interview him for a few months, and I haven’t gotten to since. I just tried to gather what scraps I could get for a story here and there.

But one thing I have tried to remain conscious of is not letting access, or lack of it, color my coverage. Whether a coach talks to me is irrelevant to the job he is doing. And Kelsey was doing a good job. He was getting solid players. He had a plan. He attacked the job with confidence. I liked his message, and more important, his players liked it, and Louisville fans liked it.

When he came out in a space suit and said, “Louisville basketball is back,” again, I had some doubts. I’d seen it when it was going, 20,000-plus in the downtown arena, Top 10 rankings. I thought he was out on a limb.

Watching him over the past few months, there have been few times when he didn’t have an answer. So it was strange to see him have so few on Thursday when Creighton got it going.

The Bluejays dropped off Louisville’s bigs and dared them to shoot. They left 7-footer Ryan Kalkbrenner, the four-time Big East defensive player of the year, back in drop coverage, and Louisville struggled to attack.

I usually sit on the baseline, on the court, watching games through a camera’s viewfinder. For much of this season, Louisville was a difficult team to shoot. The ball moved fast. Players were everywhere. In the last several weeks, particularly since a high ankle sprain to Smith, they’d become much easier to photograph. Three-quarters of the photos were of Chucky Hepburn and Terrence Edwards, not out of their ego, but out of necessity. The ball was in their hands.

Even with Smith back on Thursday, Kelsey was seeing too little movement and too much isolation.

“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,” Kelsey said. “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.”

But by then, the double-digit margin had been established, and there was nothing Louisville could do defensively to slow Creighton.

“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,” Kelsey said. “So, the adjustment we made was start trying to be aggressive with the pick-and-roll and hedge more. No. 1 (Steven Ashworth) 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 ten or 12, whatever it was, when the knucklehead head coach got technical, that didn't help.”

Yeah. About the technical. I’m not sure what it was about. After the game, Kelsey wouldn’t say. Terrence Edwards went up for a three and Ashworth defended him. After the shot, Edwards’ leg flew out and went under Ashworth’s arm. Was it pinned there? I don’t know. Was that even what Kelsey was arguing? He didn’t say.

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

From the other bench, Greg McDermott said, “I don't know what happened on the other end, and that led to the technical. But as it ended up, obviously, a couple free throws were nice at that point in time.”

It wasn’t Kelsey’s best moment, or best game. It wasn’t anyone’s best game in red and white. Creighton had a lot to do with that. Heck, I could’ve written this column better.

But coming from a guy who had some doubts, there wasn’t a time all season that Kelsey didn’t seem to have his players and coaches together. Not a time that he didn’t have a plan. Not an instant where he didn’t try to adjust.

And coming from a guy who had some doubts, I leave this season with no doubt that Louisville has a coach who can lead it the rest of the way back. All Kelsey did was build a team of high-quality guys, get them to buy into his on-court philosophy and off-court culture, and restore the excitement of a city and culture.

Already there are signs that what he built this season in Louisville, more players want to be a part of.

“Proud of our guys,” Kelsey said. “It's been a long journey since June 5th 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 ten 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.”

At one point, a media voice behind me got the microphone. I recognized it as the voice of Jerry Eaves, national championship guard and radio host in Louisville. His question was no question.

“Tremendous year,” Eaves said. “You carried yourself with grace and integrity, and I just loved it. I appreciate you being a Cardinal. Continue doing what you're doing.”

As the kids at the podium sometimes like to say, I have nothing to add.

Except maybe this. I covered Bob Knight for a few seasons at Indiana and Denny Crum for his final season at Louisville. I covered Rick Pitino for a lot of years and wrote a book with him. I covered Bruce Pearl for his first eight seasons as a head coach. I covered Scott Davenport during a Division II championship season (and Pearl too, for that matter). I’ve covered Jeff Walz in four Final Fours and a couple of championship game trips.

I’ve been blessed to see a lot of good coaching. What we saw this season in Louisville was good coaching.

Without a doubt.

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