Pat Kelsey breaks down how Chucky Hepburn draws so many fouls

Now a veteran point guard for the Louisville Cardinals, Chucky Hepburn has been incredibly valuable to head coach Pat Kelsey in his first season. That has shown up in a major way by drawing fouls this season.

Hepburn had a special game drawing fouls against the Florida State Seminoles. In total, he drew 11 fouls out of the Seminoles and made 17 free throws in the game, which set a franchise record. After the game, Kelsey praised him and broke down how he had been able to draw so many fouls.

“That’s very, very, very efficient basketball,” Pat Kelsey said. “Like we say the highest percentage shot in the game is a free throw. So, when we talk about the shots we want to generate, you obviously want to try to generate the highest percentage shot in the game first, and that’s free throws.”

One key for Kelsey has been to get the Louisville team to attack downhill on offense. He wants them to stay in control and take good shots. That should lead to good offense and is something that Hepburn does well.

“So, that’s just playing off the attack, playing downhill, but you have to play poised as well. I felt like there were sometimes in the first half we had several guys that were shooting a couple what we call Simone Biles shots around the rim,” Kelsey said. “And if you shoot Simone Biles shots, those are high degree of difficulty shots. She does 8 million twists and all this stuff, and she gets a higher score from that. In basketball, if you double clutch and go up and do all this stuff, you still get two [points]. So, when you shoot some odd shots against these guys, that’s like a turnover. Turnovers against these guys are touchdowns at the other end.”

In the game against Florida State, Louisville drew 25 total fouls and made 30 out of 34 free throws. 11 of those fouls and 17 of those made free throws were from Hepburn. He’d go on to finish the game with a team high 29 points. That came in the midst of a season where Hepburn is averaging 15.6 points, 6.0 assists, and 3.3 rebounds per game. He’s making 85.7 percent of his free throws.

“Chucky just plays with such poise when he drives, you know, like he can, you know, he draws contact on a drive,” Kelsey said. “But sometimes he just gets in there and doesn’t just play with, kind of, what I say, classical music going on in his head, instead of heavy metal, right? Heavy metal is [Kelsey made guitar noises] and it looks like there’s 700 guys out there. He just stays calm and cool. Can kind of survey and spray if somebody’s out on the perimeter, but he just has that good knack for drawing contact as well. It was really big for us tonight.”

Since the Florida State game, Louisville added a sixth straight win against the Virginia Tech Hokies. Hepburn’s free throw attempts were down from 19 to four total attempts in the game. The most free throws he’s attempted in a single game this season was 20 against the North Carolina Tar Heels.

Louisville will be back in action on Saturday when they host the Pitt Panthers.