Pat Kelsey after facing Lamont Butler: 'I still see that kid in my nightmares'

The Louisville Cardinals have taken a major step forward from last season under Pat Kelsey. Still, when they ran into the Kentucky Wildcats, the Cardinals still fell short of their rival, thanks in large part to the play of Lamont Butler.

Immediately following the game, Kelsey praised Butler, admitting that he’s had nightmares about him for some time now.

“I want to give Kentucky credit,” Pat Kelsey said. “They played a great game. It was a great college atmosphere. I thought it was a great college game. Lamont Butler was magnificent. I still see that kid in my nightmares cause we played against him when I was the head coach at College of Charleston and he was the point guard at San Diego State. We played an epic battle in the first round.”

The game Kelsey is referencing came back in March 2023 when Butler was at San Diego State and helped the Aztecs earn a defensive win. In the game between Kentucky and Louisville, however, he was all over the floor on offense, scoring 33 points to go along with six assists and three rebounds.

Butler was able to have that kind of impact despite concerns he wouldn’t be able to play due to injury. He had been nursing an ankle injury but was able to play through that anyway.

“He’s just a warrior, he’s a winner,” Kelsey said. “He’s been out the last couple of games and there was all these — people were talking about whether or not he was going to play and I was like, ‘that Cat’s playing in this game. You can mark that one down.’ He is a stone-cold killer and a really, really good player. He’s obviously a good shooter, but he’s more of an attacking downhill driver. I want to say, I might have this wrong, he’s got seven made threes on the year and he made six tonight. A lot of them — he made tough shots, big shots. We had momentum and he stopped the momentum with a lot of those threes.”

Butler’s head coach, Mark Pope, similarly had nothing but praise for the star guard following the game.

“The numbers back it up. The way he came into it backs it up,” Pope said. “And you think about when you go out and you are trying to recruit and our guys, our staff is so good and those guys identify a winner, then this is what you get from him, right? I’m so proud of him and major credit — major credit.”

Louisville and Kelsey will be back in action on Saturday against Florida State. That’s a conference battle. Meanwhile, Kentucky has another non-conference game against Ohio State on Saturday.