Louisville found themselves on the wrong side of a game once again on Wednesday night against fourth ranked North Carolina and it was largely attributed to their dreadful start to this game.

This game was almost out of reach in the first few minutes of action, as the Tar Heels jumped out to a 26-11 lead over Louisville, who couldn't buy a basket, nor defend their offense. Another game from the Cardinals where they didn't look prepared at all to begin the game, without a real gameplan or knowledge of the scouting report. Louisville had some quality stretches in this game, as they always do, but there comes a certain point in time where you have to find a way to sustain that level of play. These players have the talent to compete with some of the top ranked teams in the country, they just don't have a coaching staff to prepare them well enough, which is why they showcase what they could do at different spurts, but can't sustain it for an entire game.

This stretch coming up for the Cardinals is arguably the toughest stretch of the season, and soon, they'll be looking at another subpar record for a basketball program of their caliber. Louisville is the most profitable program in the country when these fans have something to actually cheer for and moral victories isn't one of them. Losing will never be seen as acceptable in this city, so Louisville's Athletic Director Josh Heird will be faced with a tough decision at the end of this season, but it's a decision that he'll most likely be forced to make with this coaching regime not giving him anything to work with.

Kenny Payne's team couldn't have got off to a worse start in this game, which is something you just couldn't have if they wanted even just a slither of hope on the road agaisnt one of the best teams in the country. The woes, in my opinion, start to take place much before the tip-off. Not only is this team always lacking a solid gameplan versus their opponents with built in contengency plans if things don't go as planned, but if you've ever noticed, Kenny Payne usually allows his team to warmup for about two and a half minutes before the game and their opponents are already out there minutes before them allowing them to have more of a rhythm than his team. Another thing that's pretty hard to make sense of is why Danilo Jovanovich and Hercy Miller are in the starting lineup and usually don't return in the game after they're subbed out. This poorly constructed starting lineup is the second straight game that got Louisville in a hole that they cannot dig themselves out of.

Last game against N.C. State, that same starting lineup was down 12-0 on their homecourt, which is inexcusable in more than one way. Even after seeing that with his own two eyes up close, Kenny Payne still puts that same unit out there on the road against a far better team and you guessed it, Louisville was down 21-6 in the first eight minutes of action. They couldn't buy a bucket to start this one, but when Payne changed his lineup, the offense started to hit some shots, but they were already down by 15+ points, so these baskets had no real effect on the game. Pair that with what is likely the worst defense in all of Power Five, and you have a 20 point deficit in the first half that was cut to 17 at halftime. The defensive strategy that Louisville runs just isn't effective in the slightest and it starts with again, the scouting report prepared before the game. North Carolina's Cormac Ryan is on the court for one reason and one reason only, to shoot three pointers, yet his first four looks from beyond the arc were wide open with Louisville defenders sagging off of him like shooting isn't his speciality. That's why he started off 4/4 from beyond the arc, because the Cardinals didn't know to run him off the three point line.

The second half was where you could see the talent that this team has. There's a misconception that this team doesn't have the personnel to compete in the ACC and with other teams around the country, and that couldn't be further from the truth. These players aren't being used as effectively as they should and it's been evident for majority of the season. For example, Skyy Clark is a talented scorer who's much more effective off the ball when he's in a shoot-first role, because that's his strength, not facilitating and directing an offense. This coaching staff sees this every day, yet they have him playing point guard, which results in some careless turnovers that should be prevented beforehand. He's had the most success when he's putting pressure on the defense, but this staff isn't putting him in those successful positions consistently.

Another example is why Ty-Laur Johnson is only playing 17 minutes in this game and he's the best pure point guard on the roster, capable of creating his own shot and opportunities for his teammates. We've already been over this at the beginning of the season and it seemed like the coaching staff understood this, which is why he was named a starter shortly after, but they're back to only playing him in spurts and that limits the impact he can have on the game. In the second half particularly, you could see how Johnson was impacting Louisville on the offensive end and all of a sudden, the Cardinals were within five points agaisnst the Tar Heels. Without that dreadful start, Louisville couldv'e very well took the lead in the second half after mustering up a few stops and baskets at the other end. What hurt them after this solid run was free throw shooting, which they shot below 50% for the game (6/13), simply not good enough to beat a formidable team on the road.

Those defensive stops only lasted so long, as the Cardinals started looking like normal when the Tar Heels ran some different offensive actions. It's safe to say we won't see in drastic improvements on that end for the rest of the season. North Carolina's lead grew from five all the way back up to double digits almost seamlessly and by that point with under five minutes to play, the game was out of reach for Louisville. These games used to be an ACC showdown between two elites, but the Cardinals are indeed a shell of themselves. Louisville fans went from celebrating competing for championships to looking for silver linings in games they lose by ten or more points, oh how the might have fallen. If Louisville doesn't find some type of rhythm during this hard stretch of ACC play, they could very well end up losing ten games in a row.

Louisville will have a chance to get back in the win column this Saturday on the road at Wake Forest at Noon (ET), another opponent who's undefeated at home this season.