Louisville's Sananda Fru Plays Crucial Supporting Role in Battle of the Bluegrass

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - The rivalry between the Louisville and Kentucky men's basketball programs hadn't felt like much of one over the past two decades, but on Tuesday night, fortune certainly favored the Cardinals.

Squaring off with the Wildcats in their annual Battle of the Bluegrass rivalry showdown, UofL put together a largely dominant performance against UK, and ended up capturing a 96-88 win. A game where they led by as much as 20 snapped a three-game losing streak in the series.

Without question, the biggest contributors to the final outcome were guards Mikel Brown Jr. and Ryan Conwell. Brown finished with 29 points and five assists, while Conwell added 24 points and two steals.

As important as those two guards were, they were backed up by an incredible supporting role by German big man Sananda Fru.

"Sananda was really good," head coach Pat Kelsey said. "He's just getting more comfortable. It's a new style of basketball than what he's used to. It's a new system. It's different than what he was a part of. You move from another part of the world, new culture, new food, new friends, no family. It's just takes a little bit of time for those guys to adjust. But man, he was really good. Rebounded the ball for us. He was good in the pick and roll, finishing around the rim. Thought he was really, really good."

The 6-foot-11, 245-pound forward/center might not have had the flashy scoring outing that Brown and Conwell both had a good game when you look at his stat line. He finished with 10 points on 4-of-4 shooting and 2-of-2 at the line, while also logging seven rebounds, three assists and two blocks.

But like Kelsey said, what Fru did that doesn't show up on the stat sheet is what made him so valuable against Kentucky.

While he had been shaky on defense in the first couple games to start the year, against the Wildcats, Fru was rock solid down low in the post, doing a great job of both altering shots close to the rim and not getting caught on ball screens. In fact, Fru held UK's Brandon Garrison to just three points, and he finished with a team-best +11 defensive plus/minus

Additionally, he was a tremendous asset in the pick-and-roll game for Louisville. Whether he was purely screening to set up guys like Brown and Conwell, or rolling towards the rim for an open basket for himself, Fru was utilized very often on Tuesday night. Not to mention it was his best game in a Cardinal uniform when it came to finishing around the rim.

"The efficiency, the things that (the bigs) were doing that relates to winning, maybe doesn't show up on the stat sheet," Kelsey said. "I talked about the one day Sananda had two field goal attempts, but he was the second-most efficient guy in our efficiency standards. But that takes everything into account: defensive grading, defensive responsibility, pick and roll coverage, screening, screen assists, everything. Those guys do so much, and they were big for us tonight."

The Berlin native has shown tremendous growth over a short period of time. In the exhibitions against Kansas and Bucknell, Fru combined for just 12 points and five rebounds.

Once the regular season started, Fru began to find his footing. He then had nine points and eight rebounds in the season-opener vs. South Carolina State, then had 12 points and five rebounds against Jackson State.

So far through three games, Fru is averaging 10.3 points on 81.3 percent shooting, while also putting up 6.7 rebounds, 1.3 assists and 1.3 blocks. If you ask Brown, the win over Kentucky couldn't happen without the performance from Fru and the rest of the bigs.

"The people that do dirty work inside and the interior, they played hard today," he said. "They helped us out with boxing out. We came in and cleaned it up, and got out in transition and they played their butts off. I think that was another separator for us, so I want to give them props."

Before joining Louisville this offseason, Fru played for Lowen Braunschweig in the Bundesliga. Last season, he was named the Bundesliga's Best German Young Player, which presented annually to the league's most valuable player under the age of 22, who also has German nationality.

Appearing in 29 games for Lowen Braunschweig, he averaged 12.3 points on 66.0 percent shooting, while also putting up 6.2 rebounds and a league-best 1.6 blocks per game. His player efficiency rating of 17.4 led the entire BBL.

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