We now know what caused DeMarcus Cousins to drop a forearm MMA style during a scrum for a loose ball at the beginning of the game…Pitino did it. There was trash talking before the National Anthem by the Louisville Cardinals directed toward Cousins to get him riled up. It worked. Pitino did it. The game was rough, rough , and rough the entire game; challenging our highly touted freshman on every position. Pitino did it.
I hate Rick Pitino. Always have. I loved the teams he had at Kentucky, but I always hated Pitino’s arrogance. Arrogance is what almost got UK beat yesterday. Pitino had his team get in the minds of the Cats early and often. He knew Cousins would turn into “Sheed” and make him go nuts
I remember when John Chaney from Temple told one of his players to go in and knock out a player on the opposing team. I think Pitino told his players to do the same thing , just not physically. Rick Pitino almost succeeded in mentally knocking out DeMarcus Cousins and Eric Bledsoe at the beginning of the game because he knew he couldn’t win with them playing. He double teamed John Wall the entire game and with the other 2 freshman studs thrown out or mentally out his team would be up for the upset.
If you don’t think that all the trash talking and the “in your grill” type style of play that Louisville performed was not Pitino’s idea than you don’t know how important this game was for him. If Louisville would have won, Pitino would have started over with a clean slate. In his mind the happenings of the summer would have been forgotten. He would have beaten Kentucky in the way he would have loved most: With the mind. Now all he can do with his mind is think about next year.
