Rick Pitino benched Chris Jones for flop against Kentucky: Report

University of Louisville junior Chris Jones was on the bench when the starting lineups were introduced before Tuesday's game against Long Beach State for the first time all season — and the reason was interesting.

The senior guard played only nine minutes in the 68-43 win, after Cardinals head coach Rick Pitino told reporters that he kept Jones out of the starting lineup due to Saturday’s well-documented acting job (video below) against Kentucky.

“I didn't start Chris, not because of his shooting percentages, I didn't start him because of the flop issue,” Pitino said of the embarrassing dive.

“I was very upset at that,” Pitino stressed “We don’t do that type of thing, and then to fake with the jaw like you got hit, you can’t fake like you got hit. You can’t fake it. …That’s something Louisville guys don’t do.”

After the game, Jones admitted he developed his fall-down theatrics at Northwest Florida College, where he was the National Junior College Division I player of the year in 2013.

“I used to be able to time the elbows in junior college,” Jones said. “I knew what guys were going to do.”

Sorry Chris. You're not on Off-Off Broadway anymore.

Rick Pitino blasts NCAA about Louisville-Manhattan matchup: Report

After insisting he doesn’t care about his team's No. 4 seeding in the NCAA Tournament, Louisville head coach Rick Pitino laid into the NCAA selection committee for matching him up against his friend and former assistant Steve Masiello in the opening round-of-64 game.

Pitino brushed off the low seed, but didn’t hold back regarding his displeasure at his defending national championship team being matched up with 13th-seeded Manhattan and Masiello. He went so far as to call it “unjust” because of how close he is to the Manhattan coach.

“I don’t think it’s right for either one of us,” he said. “I don’t know why (the selection committee) would do it.”

Besides the snub and the awkward matchup with Pitino's protege, the committee also placed Louisville in a bracket with a potential Midwest-region semifinal matchup against a bitter rival — Kentucky.

Whew.

Masiello, himself, has also been suggesting for days that playing against Pitino — “a man who means so much to me,” has taken some of the fun out of this trip to the tournament for him.

The Jaspers coach wasn't shy about the fact that he’s copied most everything Louisville does and kidded at his press conference that he has changed everything this week, installing a triangle-and-two zone defense in place of his full-court press.

“Louisville has been the brand that I’ve tried to model (his program) after,” Masiello said on Wednesday.

But there is also the matter of Manhattan dealing now with a Louisville team that is playing its best ball of the season, winning 12 of its last 13 games, and coming into the tournament with something to prove.

Even after remarking “it doesn’t bother me, it really doesn’t,” Pitino said just enough about the lower seed to make it clear Louisville feels disrespected.

“I think everybody else is more shocked than I was,” Pitino said. “Sometimes when people say you fit the eye test (as a No. 1 seed), it depends who’s looking at it. If you have a bunch of football ADs looking at it, how would they know what the eye test is?

“But the selection committee is very fair, very honorable, so I can’t protest too much because they’re doing the best job they can do. Maybe they’re a bunch of soccer ADs, I don’t know.”

Yeah, he's peeved.

Rick Pitino follows through on promise to get Louisville tattoo

Louisville coach Rick Pitino made a midseason promise to get a Cardinals tattoo on his body if his team won the NCAA title.  Well the team won and, true to his word, the coach got his left shoulder inked with a big "L" and the words "2013 NCAA Championship 35-5" Friday morning. And it's way bigger than anyone would have imagined.

It was also probably a lot less painful to get because he had the championship trophy in the tattoo parlor to cling on to.

Kenny Klein, the university's Senior Associate Athletic Director, tweeted the big news.

Way to go coach.

Louisville Coach Rick Pitino follows through on his promise to his team to get a tattoo #L1C4 twitter.com/KKcards/status…
— Kenny Klein (@KKcards) April 26, 2013

St. John's Loses Ugly In Front Of Lavin And His Beautiful Wife

Steve Lavin—who had missed the last nine games recovering from prostate cancer surgery— took a place high above the court and watched his St. John's team get thoroughly beaten by Louisville, 73-58, last night at Madison Square Garden.

If the sight of his struggling team in front of the Red Storm head coach wasn't very good, at least he could look sideways and see his beautiful wife Mary Ann Jarou.

While the St. John's (7-7, 1-2) team— one of the youngest in the country— goes through growing pains, it is an encouraging sign to see the second-year coach getting closer to court side.

Lavin spoke to the team during the pre-game shootaround and told them to play "scrappy."

Too bad the players didn't hear the first letter "S" and what Lavin saw on the court last night was ready for the litter box.

The Red Storm players shot 14% (on 5-of-35 FG shooting) and went almost 10 full minutes without a score in the first half.

They were 1-for-27 during a stretch and looked totally out of sync with each other.

Louisville ( 13-2, 1-2) used a zone defense to frustrate the Red Storm— who have six first-year players in their seven-man rotation.

The second half was a little better and, after running off six straight points, got to within, 51-39, with 8:36 left in the game.  The rally was short lived and the Cardinals defense manhandled the home team for the rest of the game.

The Red Storm team looked totally demoralized  and there was little that Lavin— sitting nine levels up—could do.

"[They are] Young guys that aren't one-and-done type guys and you have to develop them," said Louisville head coach Rick Pitino.  "They're going to mentally lose faith.  They have some very good young players, but when things don't fall, it can get complicated."

Lavin knows his return to the bench might take some time.  He said he was tired after coaching back-to-back games in November and knew he wasn't feeling right and will now let nature take its course.

"I'll be going back on the road to recruit Thursday so this was an opportunity on the calender to attend a game and support the team," Lavin said through a spokesperson. "I will  continue a modified schedule with duties that include being at practices, recruiting the 2012 class and attending certain games.

If the Storm keep playing like last night, I would would recommend bringing your actress wife— the view will be better.

UConn, Syracuse Tie For 1st In Big East Coaches' Poll

It had to be one of the most awkward Big East media days in memory.  The coaches picked both  national champion Connecticut and soon-to-be-gone Syracuse as the best teams in the upcoming  season.  However, the real topic hanging on everyone's tongue at Wednesday's annual event was conference expansion and realignment.

Most of the talk centered around Syracuse and Pittsburgh's announcements that they were leaving the Big East to join the Atlantic Coast Conference and the TCU team which ran away.

TCU was slated to join the Big East but is now headed for the Big 12 before the Big East could do anything about it.  Big East commissioner John Marinatto announced at the conference he was looking to bring in schools to make up for the defections and prevent any others from leaving.

There has been a lot of talk-- some by the governor of Connecticut-- that UConn would also be interested in joining the ACC.  Marinatto would have none of it.

"In the past five years, we've had the best basketball league in the country," he said.  "We had [a record] 11 teams in the NCAA tournament last year and, on paper today, nine of them would be in it again."

Opinions about the defectors and the effect they will have on the league were at a fever pitch at the Manhattan gathering. 

"My problem is not them leaving," said Louisville coach Rick Pitino-- in a statement dripping with irony.  "My problem is you did it in 36-48 hours.  Don't run away with a girl after one date to get married in Las Vegas when you've been dating someone else for three or four years.  You've been dating this woman for 30 years, show a little respect."

Pitino, as you will recall, is the same man who almost threw away his career by cheating on his wife of thirty years for a 15-second fling with a woman who later tried to extort $10 million from him.

Last September, Pitino also compared Pitt's move to the ACC to Sal Tessio betraying the Corleone family in "The Godfather."  Funny, because rumors have been swirling about the Cardinals jumping ship as well.

Pitino's poorly-chosen analogy, along with Pitt and Syracuse wearing track shoes and ready to bolt aside, there were plenty of other topics at hand including the upcoming season and the coaches' pre-season picks.

Connecticut, which closed out their season with an 11-game winning streak by winning the Big East tournament and the national championship will have to do it without All-America guard Kemba Walker, the heart and soul of the team.

Head coach Jim Calhoun has three returning starters-- including sophomore guard Jerry Lamb, a pre-season first-team pick-- and junior Alex Oriakhi, a second-team selection.  Freshman center, 6-foot-11 Andre Drummond was chosen pre-season rookie-of-the-year.

Syracuse, which had five first place votes-- two less than UConn-- has senior Kris Joseph, a first-team selection, and second-teamer junior Scoop Jardine returning to the court.

Asked if he thinks the team will be treated differently during road games because of the school's decision to leave the Big East, Boeheim was philosophical.

"Nobody has ever cheered for us on the road," he said.  "We never get a lot of cheers."

Louisville, which got three first place votes, was third followed by Pittsburgh.

Pitt's senior guard Ashton Gibbs was selected pre-season player of the year after leading the conference in scoring (16.8) and 3-point shooting (49%) last season.

Cincinnati was fifth followed by Marquette, West Virginia, Villanova, Notre Dame, Georgetown, Rutgers, St. John's, Seton Hall, South Florida, Providence and DePaul.  In addition to Gibbs, Lamb and Joseph,  the pre-season first team included seniors Darius Johnson-Odom of Marquette and grad-student Tim Abromaitis of Notre Dame.

Next year's coaches' poll might be without some familiar teams but not if Marinatto has his way.  The commissioner said he will not let Syracuse or Pitt out of their contracts, which requires them to stay in the league for two more years.

Georgetown coach John Thompson III got sentimental about the Big East's fracturing conference.

"When I think of the Big East, I think of Georgetown-Syracuse, Georgetown-St. John's, " he said.

So do a lot of fans.