There must be something about the end of November.

It was nearly six years ago to the day when the Alabama Crimson Tide had to play the final ten minutes of their game against Minnesota with only three players because of an insane run of injuries and ejections, and despite the two man disadvantage, the Tide actually managed to outscore Minnesota 30-22 in the final 10:41 of the game.

Today, the Louisville basketball team hosted the New Mexico State Aggies in an inconsequential non-conference game that is only noteworthy to fans outside of Louisville and Las Cruces because the Aggies ended the game with only four players on the court, and the Cardinals barely hung on in overtime.

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A win is a win, but it's not a great look for the Louisville Cardinals, who are coming off a four-win 2022-23 season (Louisville's first single-digit win season since 1942) and was not expected to make much noise in the ACC this year. The fact that they struggled with New Mexico State, a Conference USA opponent that was picked the finish 8th out of 9 teams in the conference's preseason poll, indicates the prognosticators were not too far off with their assessment of the Cardinals.

What's strange is, it was just earlier last week when Louisville managed to give the 15th-ranked Texas Longhorns all they could handle in the semi-finals of the Empire Classic, followed by a tough effort in a loss versus the Indiana Hoosiers. Louisville's got a home game against Bellarmine before they visit Virginia Tech in their first ACC game of the year.