LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Clearly aware he had a hot hand, Mikel Brown Jr. wanted to see what scoring heights he could reach before cooling off.
The heralded Louisville guard ended up topping the Atlantic Coast Conference's most recent freshman phenom and matching a Hall of Famer and Cardinals' legend.
Brown hit a career-best 10 3-pointers and scored 45 points to break Cooper Flagg's ACC single-game scoring mark of 42 set last season as No. 24 Louisville routed N.C. State 118-77 on Monday night. His total also tied Wes Unseld's Louisville scoring mark against Georgetown College on Dec. 1, 1967.
“I did not know,” Brown said when asked about the Unseld record on a night in which he shot 14 of 23 from the field and 10 of 16 from long distance. He also made all seven free throws, grabbed a career-high nine rebounds and had three steals and two assists. His 10 3s tied Reyna Smith's single-game record from last year.
"To be honest, I was just so locked in with just staying with it and just not having it drop off. Just maintaining my aggressiveness and my will to create for myself and for others as well. I think the gravity that was being pulled toward me kind of opened up everybody else and we had walk-in layups and was getting open shots.
"I definitely wasn't thinking about the record until they (teammates) just came to me, and I'm like, I'm going to go get it."
Fittingly, Brown's record-tying 3 came dead center from just past Louisville's dunking Cardinals logo, sending 14,389 white-clad fans into a frenzy. Had Brown not juggled the ball while going up for a dunk earlier in the second half, he might've had the Louisville record all to himself.
Not that being mentioned alongside a Louisville Hall of Famer — or prospective NBA rookie of the year favorite — was a bad thing.
“That means a lot, just because he's a legend,” Brown said of matching Unseld. “I couldn't do this without my teammates. They encourage me every single day to be myself and to stay aggressive and just be free.”
Almost overlooked among Brown's white-hot shooting was teammate Ryan Conwell, who added 31 points on 10-of-14 shooting to flirt near his own career best. Then again, the energy Brown created was going to rub off.
“His gravity on the floor, he makes it easy for me,” Conwell said of Brown.
Brown started the season strong, highlighted by a 29-point performance against rival Kentucky back on Nov. 11. Then came a lower back injury that sidelined him for eight games from mid-December until early January.
He returned to score in double digits in three of five games, including 20 points twice. The accuracy and rhythm seemed off, but Brown insisted in an interview with The Associated Press that it was just a matter of time before things would fall into place.
One game, it turned out.
The Orlando, Florida, native had 21 points at halftime and early in the second half surpassed LaBradford Smith's Louisville single-game freshman mark of 32 points set twice, most recently on Feb. 15, 1988.
Brown has now set the standard for freshmen at Louisville and the ACC, in addition to taking his place alongside a Cardinals great.
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