BIG EAST/ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE

Bowen keeps Louisville reeling

— An acrobatic tip-in from a player who has scored all of 49 points in three seasons at Georgetown has put No. 5 Louisville into must-win mode.

Aaron Bowen contorted his body enough to guide in the ball after a missed layup by D’Vauntes Smith-Rivera with 31/2 minutes to play Saturday, the unlikely winning basket in the Hoyas’ 53-51 victory which was the Cardinals’ third consecutive loss.

“I tell l him all the time that he’s probably one of the most athletic people on this planet, and when the shot went up, he just came out of nowhere,” guard Markel Starks said. “And he just, I don’t know, he just ... it was unbelievable.”

Coach John Thompson III was rolling his eyes as he listened to that description, but there was plenty that happened Saturday that might have been deemed unbelievable only a couple of weeks ago. A Hoyas team that fell to South Florida, Marquette and Pittsburgh has now beaten ranked teams Notre Dame and Louisville in consecutive games.

And the Hoyas (14-4, 4-3Big East) are doing it without Greg Whittington, their second-leading scorer on the season. Whittington is sidelined indefinitely for academic reasons, the main reason that players like Bowen are getting some minutes.

“I’m thinking of suspending a player,” quipped Louisville Coach Rick Pitino, when told that Georgetown is 4-1 without Whittington.

Thompson’s take?

“We might have been 5-0 with him,” the coach said. “He is a loss. It’s a big loss. But at the same time we have people that have stepped up and hopefully will continue to step up.”

Meanwhile, the Cardinals (16-4, 4-3) have their longest losing streak since January 2010. No. 1 in the country a week ago, Louisville has fallen to Syracuse, Villanova and Georgetown and has Pittsburgh at home Monday.

“We have to get this win. It’s a must game for us,” Pitino said. “Because four [in a row], now you’re on the verge of getting a sub-.500 record in the league, and you don’t want to mess with that.”

In other Big East games, Ryan Arcidiacono hit the tying three-pointer with 2.2 seconds left in regulation, and James Bell hit consecutive threes in overtime to send host Villanova (13-7, 4-3) to its second victory over a top-five team this week, 75-71 over No. 3 Syracuse (18-2, 6-1). The Wildcats defeated No. 5 Louisville 73-64 on Tuesday and became the first unranked team to beat two top-five teams in the same season since Florida State in 2011-2012, according to STATS LLC. ... Jerian Grant scored 18 points and Tom Knight had 17 as No. 24 Notre Dame (16-4, 4-3) won 73-65 over host South Florida (10-9, 1-6). ... Vander Blue scored 13 points to lead host Marquette (14-4, 5-1) to an 81-71 victory over Providence (10-10, 2-6) in a game delayed several times because of a dive-bombing bat. The delays occurred in the second half because of the bat circling the arena - and occasionally swooping to the floor, sending coaches, players and referees scrambling. ... Trey Zeigler scored a season-high 18 points as Pittsburgh (17-4, 5-3) blew out DePaul (10-9, 1-5) 93-55.

ACC

Duke bounces back

DURHAM, N.C. - Duke is used to being on the right side of a blowout- not the losing end - and thanks to Rasheed Sulaimon, the Blue Devils got back to that familiar role.

The freshman scored a season-high 25 points and No. 1 Duke bounced back from one of its worst losses under Mike Krzyzewski by routing Maryland 84-64 on Saturday.

“This was just a game to show basically what our character was like,” Sulaimon said. “Are we going to fold after a big loss, or are we going to step up and be men?”

Mason Plumlee added 19 points and Seth Curry had 13 for the Blue Devils (17-2, 4-2 Atlantic Coast Conference), who were coming off a 90-63 loss to No. 25 Miami, Duke’s most-lopsided regular-season loss since 1984.

Wells and Charles Mitchell both had 13 points for the Terrapins (15-5, 3-4). They have lost four of six and were denied their first victory at Cameron Indoor Stadium since 2007 and first victory over a No. 1 team since 2008.

In other ACC games, Justin Anderson and Akil Mitchell scored 16 points each and host Virginia (14-5, 4-2) took command with a 16-3 run in the second half of a 65-51 victory over Boston College (9-10, 1-5), the Cavaliers’ third consecutive victory. ... Robert Carter Jr. scored a career-high 20 points, including seven in host Georgia Tech’s 16-0 run to open the game, and the Yellow Jackets (11-7, 1-5) won 82-62 over Wake Forest (10-9, 3-4) for their first Atlantic Coast Conference victory. ... Lorenzo Brown had 20 points and 11 assists to help No. 18 North Carolina State (16-4, 5-2) end a 13-game losing streak to visiting North Carolina (13-6, 3-3), winning 91-83.

Sports, Pages 27 on 01/27/2013

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