Louisville’s regular season turmoil gone in 66-53 win over Iowa

SEATTLE — The turmoil that seemed to follow the Louisville Cardinals during the regular season was nowhere to be found Sunday night.

Sophomore guard Terry Rozier scored 25 points on 8-of-13 field-goal shooting and added seven assists to lead fourth seed Louisville past the Northern Iowa Panthers 66-53 and into the Sweet 16.

The Cardinals (26-8) will face No. 8 seed North Carolina State in the East Regional semifinals.

Louisville, which was making its first-ever trip to the state of Washington, earned its 21st trip to the Sweet 16 as the Cardinals made it that far for the fourth year in a row. Coach Rick Pitino led Louisville to the Sweet 16 seven times in his 14 years at the school.

Rozier scored seven points and added two alley-oop assists over the final 14 minutes to help the Cardinals pull away from the pesky Panthers (31-4).

Forward Seth Tuttle had a team-high 14 points for Northern Iowa.

After a tight opening 10 minutes, Louisville pulled away midway through the first half and never trailed again.

Northern Iowa made a run to cut the deficit to six points, at 42-36, early in the second half and again when reserve forward Nate Buss pulled the Panthers to within 55-49 with 4 1/2 minutes remaining, but Louisville answered each time.

Rozier’s most important play was not a shot but an alley-oop assist that forward Montrezl Harrell threw down for a dunk with 3:30 remaining. The dunk gave Louisville a 57-59 lead and took the wind out of Northern Iowa’s sails after point guard Wesley Washpun came up short on a fast-break dunk attempt on the other end of the floor.

Rozier added another alley-oop to Harrell with 1:25 remaining, leading to a dunk and foul as the Cardinals opened up a 61-50 lead and essentially put the game away.

Pitino’s Cardinals were caught up in a scandal involving starting point guard Chris Jones, who was dismissed from the team in February following allegations of sexual assault around the time the Louisville program was struggling through a 1-3 stretch on the court. Since then, the Cardinals have gone 6-2 while completing their fourth consecutive trip to the Sweet 16.

Rozier scored 16 first-half points to lead Louisville to a 36-27 halftime lead.

Northern Iowa stayed close for most of the half before Louisville guard Quentin Snider hit a baseline 3-pointer with 4:42 remaining to give the Cardinals their biggest lead at 28-21. Rozier scored twice in the final 2:05 to expand the lead to nine points at the break.

NOTES: Louisville freshman G Shaqquan Aaron, who played high school basketball at Seattle’s Rainier Beach, saw significant minutes in Sunday’s first half after sitting out the Cardinals’ second-round game. … Louisville is making its fourth consecutive trip to the Sweet 16. … The Panthers had hoped to go back for the second time in school history (2010), but came up short.