Kentucky-Louisville encounter has numerous subplots this season

LEXINGTON, Ky. – A Kentucky-Louisville game normally is notable, if only because of the heated rivalry between the teams and their respective strong basketball traditions.

But when No. 4 Louisville (6-0) and No. 23 Kentucky (6-3) meet today at Rupp Arena, there will be plenty at stake besides pride. For a change, the fact that Louisville coach Rick Pitino once had the same job at Kentucky won’t be such a big deal.

Louisville is undefeated but also untested, having run through one of the nation’s softest early-season schedules. Meanwhile, Kentucky has lost two of its last three games and is reeling after a 26-point loss to Indiana – the Wildcats’ most lopsided defeat in 16 years. Another loss by the Wildcats likely would drop them out of the Top 25, where they’ve been ranked for 85 straight polls.

Pitino, who resurrected the Wildcats’ probation-scarred program in the 1990s, will make his third trip to Rupp Arena as the Cardinals’ coach. He’s 1-1, having lost in 2001 and won in 2003, when Kentucky was ranked No. 2.

This season’s Louisville squad, with seven newcomers and only two returning starters, has yet to play away from home, and Pitino has tried to steel the Cardinals for the chaos they’ll experience today. He said it should prepare them well for playing on the road in the Big East Conference.

“Our message the whole week has been, we’re going to be in this type of atmosphere seven or eight times this year,” Pitino said.

“It’s a very strong home-court advantage, as strong as it gets in college basketball.”