Mikel Brown Jr. Dazzles in Louisville's Rivalry Win Over Kentucky

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - While the Battle of the Bluegrass has been fairly lopsided over the last two decades, this year, it's the Louisville men's basketball who runs the Commonwealth.

On Tuesday night, the Cardinals welcomed the arch rival Kentucky to the KFC Yum! Center, and sent the Wildcats back to Lexington with a 96-88 victory. It marked UofL's first win over UK in four years, and it was a game in which they led by as much as 20 points in the second half.

Of course, Louisville needed a bunch of players to step up in this game. Ryan Conwell finished with 24 points. Sananda Fru had 10 points, seven rebounds and a team-best +11 in defensive plus/minus. J'Vonne Hadley nearly has a double-double with nine points and eight boards. Isaac McKneely and Adrian Wooley both had nine points and five rebounds.

On a night where Louisville's depth was on full display, no one's star shone quite as brightly as Mikel Brown Jr.'s did.

The star true freshman point guard for the Cardinals was nothing short of spectacular against the Wildcats. He finished the night with a game-high 29 points on 8-of-16 shooting plus 10-of-11 on free throws, as well as five assists and two rebounds.

The 6-foot-5, 190-pound guard scored the fourth-most points by a true freshman in program history, and the most since Edgar Sosa had 31 vs. Texas A&M back on Mar. 17, 2007. He was Just three points away from tying LaBradford Smith's record of 32, which he accomplished twice during the 1987-88 season.

As prolific of a scoring night as he had, Brown was simply trying to earn he win and not fill up the stat sheet.

“I really don’t look into my stat line," he said after the game. "The biggest thing for me is coming out with the win, and that’s whatever I've got to do to get that win, I’m going to do it. So, I think tonight they encouraged me to just keep going and keep being aggressive and keep making plays, and that’s what I did tonight, and I think that was the separator for us.”

Brown came Louisville as one of the most highly-regarded prospects to ever commit to the program. Coming out of high school, he was ranked as the No. 1 point guard and No. 8 player overall in the Class of 2025, per the 247Sports Composite.

That being said, his unofficial UofL debut - their exhibition vs. Kansas - left some to be desired. While he had 10 points, it came on 2-of-15 shooting, and he had just two assists. In the second exhibition against Bucknell, he looked much better, pouring in 28 points, six assists and four rebounds.

Since the regular season began, Brown has been a force to be reckoned with. In just 18 minutes against South Carolina State, he had 11 points, six assists and three rebounds. In 26 minutes played during the next game against Jackson State, all three totals increased, with Brown putting up 18 points, nine assists and five rebounds.

Through three games, Brown is Louisville's leading scorer at 19.3 points per game. He's also the first UofL true freshman to score in double figures in the first three games of a season since Samardo Samuels did so in the first seven games of the 2008-09 season.

"That game against Kansas, Mikel put so much pressure on himself, and I just love how he's responded since then," head coach Pat Kelsey said. "Not that he didn't have a certain focus about him, because he's always focused. He always works hard. He's mature beyond his years. He's been a monster ever since that game. My goodness, was he special tonight."

What made Brown's performance against Kentucky so great is that he was both tone-setter and a finisher.

Of his 29 points scored, 20 of them came in the first half, shooting 7-of-12 from the field and 3-of-4 from the free throw line in the period. This helped the Cardinals lead by as much as 18 in the first half before the Wildcats trimmed that down to a seven-point halftime advantage.

In the second half, to say things got hairy would be an understatement. Louisville led by 20 with just over 12 minutes left, but Kentucky was able to turn into just a four-point lead with three minutes to go.

Enter Mikel Brown Jr.

With 2:52 left in the game and Louisville clinging to that four-point lead, Brown hit a tough driving layup, drawing a foul in the process and hitting the ensuing and-1 free throw. Kentucky got a basket on the other end, then Brown added two more free throws to put the Cardinals up seven with 2:17 left. Soon afterwards, all the Wildcats could do to try and come back was foul.

"I don't want to sound cocky or anything, but I trust my work," he said. "I know how much work I put in to get to this point. There's been a lot of hours put into the gym. The unseen hours, they come on to the court, and I think it's just expected to me. That's the expectation I set myself to, and without the help of my teammates, I don't think it's possible. They definitely encouraged me to be myself."

For Brown, his performance wasn't simply about making a statement - although he certainly made one. It was all about helping secure a rivalry win for a fanbase that was in desperate need of one.

"We knew how important this game was, especially for our fan base," he said. "You walk down the street, go to class, and they're telling us 'beat UK. That's all we care about.' To be able to get the job done for them meant a lot to us."

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