Louisville finally got themselves back into the win column as they snapped their six-game losing streak with a victory over Florida State last Saturday at the KFC Yum! Center. Their defense as usual was essentially nonexistent, but they were scoring at will and their offense propelled them to a much needed win. Freshman guard Ty-Laur Johnson has shown flashes all season when he gets an opportunity, but he's coming off his best game in a Louisville uniform, finishing with 27 points, 11 assists, and six rebounds.

This impressive performance led to Johnson winning ACC Rookie of the Week honors and they'll need him to continue to keep up that good play down the stretch of this season, starting with the Syracuse Orange, who are sitting middle of the pack in the ACC.

This was a back and forth contest for 40 minutes straight that came all the way down to the last possession of the game. Louisville would've had an opportunity to score and win the game, or go into overtime for another five minutes of action. The reason why they didn't is because of the blatant wrong call for goaltending as Kaleb Glenn clearly hit the ball before it touches any part of the glass, and anyone with eyes could see that block was as clean as they come. It's unfortunate that officials make these game-altering bad calls that rob teams of a different possible outcome and the worst part of it is they won't go back and change it, which leaves room for situations like this to happen. The Cardinals played better than Syracuse in the second half of this game and that goaltending call ended up being the exact difference in the game.

That's back-to-back games with strong starts for Kenny Payne's group and if they continue to stay in the game for the first 20 minutes, you see how much easier it is for them to compete in these games and take the lead. Louisville has consistently outplayed their opponents in the second half all season, but the usual halftime deficit makes it tough for them to pull out wins. The Cardinals jumped out to a 9-2 start against the Orange, and you could tell that Louisville was clicking on offense from the jump. Ty-Laur Johnson is the engine that makes this offense go and it's evident. When he's playing aggressively and setting up his teammates for open looks, this Louisville team can score in bunches as they've shown in the last two games. He's flirted with being a starter throughout the season, but the way Louisville has played thus far, he has to be a full time starter no matter what. The games that Kenny Payne has experimented in and played him less than 20 minutes or so, the product looks abysmal for lack of a better word. No one knows the future of Louisville as of right now, but if Johnson stays next season, he's going to turn into a great player.

At this point in time, defense for this Louisville team is a lost cause and it's been their main achilles heel this season. A defense that's even decent would've helped Louisville squeak out at least three to four more wins on the year, but they refuse to work on it, so this is what you get on a game to game basis. The recipe that Kenny Payne uses isn't effective for this group of players, because their offense isn't consistent enough to get in shootouts with every team in the country, only other teams with problems on defense as well. Another reason why the offense isn't as consistent as they need to be is the careless turnovers that they have in each game. Louisville finished this game with 17 turnovers, compared to Syracuse's ten, which ending up leading to 23 points off those turnovers for the Orange, compared to the Cardinals' 11. That's not going to get it done when you combine all of that with the worst defensive team in the ACC. It's hard to win a game on the road against a team when you allow them to hit 61% of their field goals for the entire game. The entire game was a battle of "who's going to score more?, the only difference is that these teams have more discipline on both ends than Louisville and that's all you need to win sometimes.

Louisville had a balanced scoring effort but it wasn't enough to get them over the hump. Brandon Huntley-Hatfield finished with 19 points and 13 rebounds, Skyy Clark had 23 points and Tre White has came on as of late, he finished with 17 points and 12 rebounds. Every time the Cardinals made a run though, Syracuse followed it up with an answer of their own. Louisville allowed the Orange's Chris Bell to score a career high with 30 points on an outstanding 73% from the field. Bell also added eight three-pointers as well, which shows you Kenny Payne hasn't fixed the perimeter defense either. After a player hits his third three, from that point on every attempt has to be difficult and then you live with the results, but Louisville will continue to leave these shooters time and time again and it always bites them in the end. The second half was a little bit better than the first, but not by enough for Louisville to pull away when they to due to their turnovers down the stretch. Even after all of that, it still came down to a wrong call against Louisville, but if the coaching staff helps them work on the little things it takes to win, that last call wouldn't have effected the game. Same story, different day for the Cardinals, who will continue to show potential, but won't do what it takes to go up another notch.

Louisville's next game will be against a solid Georgia Tech squad at the KFC Yum! Center this Saturday at 6:30 P.M. (ET)