Senior guard Preston Knowles has tallied a game-best 16 points, including five 3-pointers, to help the Louisville Cardinals (No. 16 in the AP poll and No. 17 in the USA Today/ESPN Coaches poll) earn a 40-30 halftime advantage over the No. 12/13 Syracuse Orange in a Big East Conference contest in the KFC Yum! Center. The Cardinals (18-6, 7-4 Big East) made nine 3s and ended the first half on 21-4 run. Junior guard Kyle Kuric has added 11 points, including three 3-pointers, while teammate Chris Smith's chipped in with a 3-ball.
The Orange (20-5, 7-5) are led by senior point guard Scoop Jardine who has a team-best 12 points. Jardine attempted SU's first eight of 13 shots and opened his scoring by making two 3-pointers -- the second gave SU an early 10-6 advantage. From there, the game changed leads six times (nine overall) until Syracuse used a 11-2 spurt to take a 26-19 advantage with 5:40 to play. But the Cardinals caught fire from behind the 3-point line and took the double-digit lead into the locker room. SU's best player, senior forward Rick Jackson, hasn't attempted a shot.
Syracuse finished the half shooting 10-of-20 from the floor and 2-of-6from behind the 3-point arc. Louisville shot 14-of-32 (43.8 percent) on field goals and 9-of-17 (52.9) from 3-point land.