Jim Larranaga discusses what likely added to El Ellis' motivation prior to defeating Louisville

Miami secured their fourth straight win in conference play on Saturday, defeating Louisville 93-85. The Hurricanes may have avoided their first conference loss at home of the season, but they could not avoid the offensive onslaught put on them by Louisville guard El Ellis. Ellis had just seven points in his last meeting with Miami, making one field goal, but dropped a career-high 33 points on Saturday.

“He probably used that to motivate himself, they hadn’t played well against these guys the last time,” Miami head coach Jim Larranaga said. “I told the players after the game, there were two things that I think highly motivate players.”

Ellis is the ACC’s fourth-leading scorer, averaging 17.4 points per game this season. He had another uncharacteristic, seven-point game in the Cardinals’ previous matchup versus Pitt in the game prior, which Larranaga believes combined with his last game versus the Hurricanes was a recipe for disaster for Miami.

“One, they didn’t play particularly well against us the first time and we won with a substantial margin. And then second they lost early in the week to Pittsburgh at Pittsburgh and they had a really bad game. So that fires you up, well we don’t want that to happen again and we know we can play a lot better. And so they were very focused, played with a lot of energy and I was very impressed with them,” Larranaga said.

Louisville snaps multiple historic streaks with Saturday loss vs. Miami

The Louisville Cardinals played one of their best games of the season against the Miami Hurricanes on Saturday night, and unfortunately it still wasn’t good enough to come away with a victory. The Cardinals scored 85 points and they still somehow lost to Miami 93-85. The loss snapped a historic streak for the program–the team had a 158-game winning streak when scoring at least 85 points in regulation. Not only that, Louisville had also won 42 straight games over the past 28 years when shooting at least 57.5% from the field.

The Cardinals were torching the nets, shooting 57.9% from the field, 43.5% from three-point range, and still came up short. El Ellis led Louisville with 33 points and five assists. The loss also mathematically eliminates the Cardinals from a winning season, which means the basketball program will endure back-to-back losing seasons for the first time since 1942.

While Louisville played well, the Hurricanes had three players pump in over 20 points apiece–Isaiah Wong (21 points), Norchad Omier (21 points), and Nijel Pack (22 points).

Louisville’s Jae’Lyn Withers also stuffed the stat sheet with 18 points, five rebounds, and one assist in the losing effort. While the Cardinals did lose, it’s hard to be disappointed with the effort if you’re a Louisville fan, because they did play exceptionally well. Sure, it wasn’t enough on Saturday night, but it’s pretty rare for a team to shoot as well as they did and lose.

That’s why the Miami Hurricanes are one of the most balanced teams in the ACC. They’ve got a number of weapons that can pour in over 20 points on a given night, and they got that on Saturday from Wong, Omier, and Pack. Pack was one of the most coveted prospects in the transfer portal this offseason and he’s been showing why. He’s been averaging 12.2 points, 2.7 rebounds, and 2.6 assists per game for the ‘Canes this year.

On3’s Wade Peery contributed to this report