And we’re going to take it all the way back to April 8th, 2013 when the Louiville Cardinals won their “third” National Title against the Michigan Wolverines with a final score of 82-76. The leading scorer for the game was Michigan’s Trey Burke with 24 points, but it just wasn’t enough for the Wolverines, and as for the Cardinals Luke Hancock went 5-5 from deep range and had 22 points. 

The Louisville Cardinals went into the NCAA Tournament with a 29-5 record and a 1 seed coming out of the Midwest side of the bracket. One of the most unforgettable moments of the tournament for the Cardinals team was when guard Kevin Ware went up to block Tyler Thorton’s three point shot and fell on his leg awkwardly and suffered an open fracture of the tibia in his right leg. Ware was not a well known player at this time as he only averaged 4.5 PPG, 1.8 RPG, and .8 APG. After the injury occured it blew up on social media with the quotes “Win for Ware” and “Pray for Ware”. Louisville gained almost the entire country rooting for them after the injury, because what their team had to go through. 

Eventually they went on to win the 2013 NCAA Tournament, however it was taken away back in 2018. This all happened after the head coach Rick Pitino was fired because of possible allocations of cheating and scandals. Those allocations included having players play on the team when they were no longer eligible by NCAA rules, and Pitino would also arrange striptease dances and sex acts for prospects, student-athletes and others. Eventually the NCAA finished their investigation and the Louisville Cardinals were stripped of their NCAA title. Since then they have been coached by Chris Mack making two appearances in the tourney, but not making any type of noise. As for Rick Pitino he was just hired by Iona college, and hopes to rest his name with this new challenge.