ACC Basketball: 5 biggest takeaways from first month of 2019-2020

1. Louisville Cardinals

The Louisville Cardinals have had a very eventful last 10 years. Under former head coach Rick Pitino, they won the 2013 National Championship, then due to numerous NCAA violations and other assorted allegations the legendary Pitino was let go for Louisville, the 2013 title revoked, and the rebuild was set to begin. Everyone knows the story of how the rest went. Chris Mack made his way to Louisville from Xavier University. After his first offseason of recruiting it is clear he is going to have Louisville back to being the power program that they were before all the NCAA violations.

Currently, the Cardinals are the number one team in the country and they have played like the best team in the country all year. The margin of victory has been laughable, they have dominated virtually every opponent they have played. The one close game they played against Akron was a game that the Cardinals led big and took their foot off the gas in the second half. It may not be a story the Louisville is good, they were expected to contend near the top of the ACC and they have one of the best players in the league in forward Jordan Nwora.

The story is how good Louisville is. Many expected them to be good as they were ranked in the preseason top 5, but no one expected their average margin of victory to be by 20 points. Even if you are in the camp that they didn’t play anyone of note until they beat Michigan, winning all your games by 20 points is hard to do. It will be something to follow over the next couple of months how Louisville responds to adversity and how they respond in a hostile environment on the road.

The Cardinals have only played one true road game, against Miami to open the year. One thing the first month has taught us is Louisville is good and is going to be a factor in the race to the National Championship.