Junior guard Kyle Kuric scored 20 points off the bench Wednesday to help the Louisville Cardinals (No. 19 in the AP poll and No. 15 in the USA Today/ESPN Coaches poll) beat the visiting St. John's Red Storm, 88-63, at the KFC Yum! Center. The Cardinals (15-3, 4-1 big East) used a 21-2, first-half run to take an 40-19 lead with 4:52 to go in the first half and command of the game. Kuric scored 14 first-half points to help Louisville take a 44-31 lead into halftime. In the second half, the Cardinals increased it's lead to as much as 26 points, 71-45, with 9:02 remaining in the game.
Freshman forward Paris Horne scored eight of his team-best 13 points in the first half for St. John's (11-6, 4-2). Teammate senior forward Justin Brownlee had 11 points and five rebounds. Sophomore guard Malik Stith had 11 points. St. John's is now 6-3 in it's last nine games.
Senior guard Preston Knowles scored a game-best 25 points for Louisville, who entered the game scoring a conference-best 80.7 points-per game.
The St. John's schedule has the AP polls No. 25-ranked Cincinnati Bearcats (16-3, 3-3) coming to Carnesecca Arena on Saturday (4 p.m.).