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On Saturday Louisville will travel to Tallahassee to take on Florida State in the 12 p.m. ET slot. Louisville (22-6, 10-5) will be without senior point guard Chris Jones for the remainder of the season. Florida state (15-14, 7-9) has lost two straight in league play and will look to rebound at home, quite literally, as they face one of the best rebounding teams in the country.
Florida State is coming off a tough road loss but almost fueled a late comeback thanks to the unbelievable play of freshman guard Xavier Rathan-Mayes. Rathan-Mayes scored 30 points in the final 4:38 of play and finished with a game-high 35. Those 30 points weren’t enough as Florida State fell to Miami 81-77. If Florida State has any chance of beating Louisville at home, Rathan-Mayes will once again have to lead to way.
The Jones-less Cardinals are 3-3 over their last six games, including a road loss to Syracuse in which Jones did not play and a home win over Miami, a game which Jones did play and helped Louisville spark a come-from-behind victory. Without Jones at Georgia Tech, Louisville struggled to score but found a way to win 52-51.
Without Jones against Florida State, Terry Rozier will be forced to become a playmaker. Jones had the ability to penetrate defenses and find teammates for open shots or create a shot for himself. Rozier is an excellent shooter and leads the Cardinals in scoring with 17.7 points per contest.
Louisville doesn’t have another player to replace all of Jones’ abilities. Instead they will have to replace him by committee, with players like Quentin Snider, Anton Gill and Shaqquan Aaron if he can get out of Rick Pitino’s doghouse.
Prediction: Louisville wins on the road, 62-57.
James Szuba is college basketball writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @JamesSzuba.
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