Louisville To Final Four: Peyton Siva Leads Cardinals Past Duke 85-63 After Injury To Kevin Ware

INDIANAPOLIS — Crying and shaken by the sight of Kevin Ware writhing on the court, his right leg splintered, Rick Pitino and his Louisville players had no idea how they were going to pull it together with a half still left to play and a Final Four berth on the line.

Ware showed them the way.

"I don't think we could have gathered ourselves – I know I couldn't have – if Kevin didn't say over and over again, `Just go win the game,'" Pitino said. "I don't think we could have gone in the locker room with a loss after seeing that. We had to gather ourselves. We couldn't lose this game for him.

"We just couldn't."

With Russ Smith, Peyton Siva and Gorgui Dieng leading the way, the Cardinals finally shook off their grief early in the second half, erupting for a 13-2 run that Duke was powerless to answer. The 85-63 victory clinched a second straight trip to the Final Four for the top-seeded Cardinals, who are determined to win it all for Ware, a New York City native who moved to the Atlanta area for high school.

The Cardinals (33-5) will play Wichita State in the national semifinals next Saturday. The ninth-seeded Shockers (30-8) added to their streak of upsets with a 70-66 victory over Ohio State on Saturday night.

As the final seconds ticked down, Ware's best friend on the team, Chane Behanan, put on the guard's No. 5 jersey and stood at the end of the bench, screaming. Cardinals fans chanted "Kevin Ware! Kevin Ware!"

"We talked about it every timeout, `Get Kevin home,'" Pitino said.

Smith finished with 23 points and earned Most Outstanding Player honors for the Midwest Region. Siva added 16 while Dieng had 14 points and 11 rebounds.

Mason Plumlee had 17 points and 12 rebounds for Duke. But the Blue Devils (30-6) couldn't overcome a poor start by Seth Curry, who scored all 12 of his points in the second half, or their foul trouble.

"I thought we had a chance there, and then, boom," coach Mike Krzyzewski said. "That's what they do to teams. They can boom you."

This was the first time Pitino and Krzyzewski had met in the regional finals since that 1992 classic that ended with Christian Laettner's improbable buzzer-beater, a game now considered one of the best in NCAA tournament history.

This game will be remembered, too, but for a very different – and much more somber – reason.

With 6:33 left in the first half, Ware, who has played a key role in Louisville's 14-game winning streak, jumped to try and block Tyler Thornton's 3-point shot. When he landed, Ware's right leg snapped midway between his ankle and knee, the bone skewing almost at a right angle. Ware dropped to the floor right in front of the Louisville bench and, almost in unison, his teammates turned away in horror. Thornton grimaced, putting his hand to his mouth as he turned around.

"I heard it and then I seen what happened, (the bone) come out," Smith said. "I immediately just, like, fell. I almost didn't feel nothing."

Pitino went to help Ware up and then saw the leg, which broke in two places.

"I literally almost threw up," Pitino said, his voice catching. "Then I just wanted to get a towel to get it over that. But all the players came over and saw it."

Louisville forward Wayne Blackshear fell to the floor and Behanan looked as if he was going to be sick on the court, kneeling on his hands and feet. Luke Hancock patted Ware's chest as doctors worked on the sophomore and Smith walked away, pulling his jersey over his eyes. The arena was silent, and several fans wept and bowed their heads.

Pitino had tears in his eyes as he tried to console his players. Dieng draped an arm around the shoulders of Smith, who repeatedly wiped at his eyes and shook his head.

"It was really hard for me to pull myself together," Smith said. "I didn't ever think in a million years I would ever see something like that. And that it happened, especially, to a guy like Kevin Ware, I was completely devastated."

As the Cardinals (33-5) gathered at halfcourt to try and regroup before play resumed, Pitino called them over to the sideline, saying Ware wanted to talk to them before he left.

"Basically, the bone popped out of the skin. It broke in two spots," Pitino said. "Remember the bone is six inches out of his leg, and all he's yelling is `Win the game, win the game.' I've never seen anything like that."

Added Siva, "He told us countless times: `Just go win this game for me. Just go win this game. Don't worry about me, I'm fine. Just go win this game.' I don't know how he did it. I don't know how he got strength to do it, but he told us to go out there and win."

News of the injury dominated social media. Joe Theismann, whose NFL career ended with a horrific broken leg, said on Twitter, "Watching Duke/ Louisville my heart goes out to Kevin Ware."

Pitino wiped away tears as Ware, whom Smith described as the Cardinals' "little brother" was wheeled off the court. Surgeons reset his leg and inserted a rod in his right tibia during a 2-hour operation at Methodist Hospital. Ware is expected to remain in Indianapolis until at least Tuesday, and Pitino said he, his son Richard and the Cardinals' equipment manager planned to visit the player later Sunday night and again Monday morning.

"He'll come back," Pitino said. "We'll get Kevin back as good as new."

But when play resumed, it was clear the Cardinals' minds were elsewhere. They missed four of their next five shots along with two free throws, and were uncharacteristically sloppy. But they regrouped after a timeout, with Smith's finger roll sparking a 12-6 run to finish the half that gave them a 35-32 lead.

Smith picked up where he left off at the start of the second half, making all three free throws after being fouled on a 3-point attempt to give Louisville a 38-32 lead, its largest of the game to that point.

But just as he did against Michigan State, Curry got hot after halftime, making two 3s in the first three minutes. A Plumlee dunk tied the game at 42.

That, however, was all Louisville needed.

Clawing for every rebound, diving on the floor for loose balls and cranking the intensity up even higher on their ferocious defense, the Cardinals were not going to lose.

And everyone, Duke included, knew it.

This was only the second time the Blue Devils have reached the regional finals and failed to make it to the Final Four. The only other time? In 1998, when the Blue Devils lost to eventual national champion Kentucky.

"We got beat by a better team," Krzyzewski said.

Smith made a layup. Siva had a nice jumper at the top of the key, and then followed with a layup. Just like that, Louisville was off. Siva had seven points during the run, which was only halted by a timeout. But Dieng kept it rolling with a jumper and a tip-in. After Plumlee made a pair of free throws, Hancock made a 3 and the roof of the Lucas Oil Stadium nearly blew off.

"When Kevin went down, it was devastating for all of us," Siva said. "We just came together and Kevin Ware really was the reason why we pulled this game out.

"Everybody on the team just wanted to step up for him. For us to show that focus and that determination, we just tried to do it for him."

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Multi-Level Marketing: Generating Leads

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How to Generate Leads and Grow Your List with Facebook Marketing

If you’re struggling to grow your email list and want to generate more leads, I’ve put together a free email series where I show you my system for generating massive leads on Facebook in the next 30 days. And, each of my seven strategies can be implemented in less than 20 minutes. For access to my free email series, click here.

Rick has written 1 awesome articles for us at Basic Blog Tips

Twitter: @rickmulready | Facebook | Google+ | Blog ? Rick Mulready

by Rick Mulready on February 15, 2013 · 29 comments

in Guest Posts, Social Media

Ah, Facebook.

The social media platform that everyone (well, not everyone, but many people) loves to hate.

Since going public last year, Facebook has taken its fair share of bad PR and public outrage. Some of it may be justified and the rest I think is just over-reaction.

I’m a Facebook homer, though, as I teach small businesses and online entrepreneurs how to grow their business using Facebook marketing.

And, when I tell people what I do, I hear the full spectrum of responses.

The good.

The bad.

And a lot of the ugly lately: Facebook doesn’t “work” because none of my fans see my status updates anymore. I’ve tried Facebook ads and I lost all my money without any return on my investment.

I’m on a mission to show you how Facebook marketing can be an effective and efficient way to grow your business, without breaking the bank.

With over a billion users, over half of which login every day, the opportunities are just too big to write off as “not worth it.”

Let me show you a couple ways Facebook marketing rocks.

As bloggers, we want as many highly targeted readers as possible. It’s even better when those people are on our email list.

After all, the money is in the list, right?

Facebook marketing offers a unique opportunity to grow your list on autopilot.

Two really effective ways to this are through custom apps and Facebook Offers.

Apps are the little boxes just below your page’s cover photo:

When someone clicks on an app, they’re taken to a landing page (within Facebook) that can contain an opt-in form. This is where you can give away something of value (like an ebook, video series, webinar, etc…) in exchange for a person’s email address. Ms. Ileane does this well with her “Blogging Tips” app shown above.

Don’t worry, apps are easy to create using sites like Heyo, ShortStack and even AWeber. You don’t even need to know any coding as they both use drag and drop functionality. And, depending on how many fans you have, they can be free to use!

Once you’ve created your app you need to drive people to it. Each app has its own unique URL which means you can use that URL in your Facebook posts or ads (including Facebook Mobile ads).

The reason this works so well is because you’re keeping the person within Facebook. It creates trust between you and the user.

Think about when you’re on Facebook. You’re there to share updates with your Facebook friends and family, post pictures, etc. If an ad catches your eye and you click on it, you likely don’t want to be taken outside of Facebook, far from what you’re doing. By keeping people within the same platform, you’re more likely to get them to take the action you want.

Lastly, you can use your app’s unique URL in your business emails or marketing materials. Rather than sending someone to your Timeline, why not send them to your custom app where you can collect their email address and then they can also check out your Facebook page?

I’m betting you’ve seen Offers in your news feed before but might not have known what they were.

Here’s an example of what one looks like:

Offers are a great way for website owners and businesses to promote products and services through targeted word-of-mouth marketing on Facebook. You can even use them to promote your free products that people get when they join your email list.

In order to use Offers, your business page needs to have at least 400 fans (although I’ve recently seen where they are available to anyone). You have the option of choosing whether someone can redeem your offer online, in your actual store, or in store & online.

Offers can be awesome word-of-mouth promotion for your website, too, because when someone claims your Offer, it shows up in their News Feed. Friends of that person can then see that their friend just claimed your Offer.

Offers do cost money to use. It’s a form of advertising, after all. But before you dismiss it, I want to tell you about a little ninja trick.

As you’re finishing up creating your Facebook Offer, check the “Promote Later Using Another Facebook Ad Tool” box. This allows you to create an ad out of your Offer in your Ads Creator and bypass the pre-set budgets Facebook gives you. You can then choose whatever budget you’re comfortable with.

Finally, I realize the issue of Facebook “cutting” the number of your fans who see your status updates has raised some concern.

Yes, they did make a change to their algorithm late last year that affected the percentage of fans who see your posts. It all has to do with their EdgeRank formula that Ms. Ileane discusses in-depth here.

And yes, if you want to reach all of your fans now, there’s a cost associated with doing so in the form of a Promoted Post or Page Post ad.

I know, I know how dare they start charging for something that was previously free. I don’t love it either but I also understand why they’re doing it.

Here’s my take on it:

1) Facebook is now a public company and has to show they can monetize their billion plus users. Charging brands to promote a post to their entire fan base is one small way to do this. If you want to play you have to pay. After all, social media is an investment.

2) They’re your fans, yes, so shouldn’t they see all of your posts? If I saw every post from every page I’ve liked my news feed would be crazy inundated with stuff. I’d never see everything because posts would constantly get buried in a matter of seconds.

This is one reason why the EdgeRank formula exists. It’s designed to filter out the content that you want to see most. Remember, Facebook is all about engagement. If you want to see more updates from pages you’ve liked, start liking, sharing and commenting on their posts.

3) Think of your Facebook posts like email marketing or Twitter. If you have a list of 1,000 people and you send out an email to them, how many actually open it up and read it? How many even see it in their jammed email inbox? And, these people have opted-in to be on your list, just like they might be a fan of your Facebook page.

With Twitter, people have chosen to follow you. But how many of your followers actually see your tweets? If they aren’t on their Twitter account when you tweet, they likely will never see what you posted.

4) If you are going to promote one of your posts, I recommend targeting your fans rather than fans and friends of fans. I’ve seen and heard too many cases where when you promote a post to your fans and their friends, it gets shown to people outside of your ideal audience. Until Facebook works this out, just be aware this is happening.

As you can see, Facebook can be a powerful platform to grow your blog or business.  I’m only just scratching the surface here of what’s possible, but hopefully you can see that smartly leveraging Facebook marketing can be a very effective complement to your blog growth strategies.

I’d love to hear your experience. Do you have a community on Facebook full of engaged Fans who fit your customer profile? Have you used custom apps or Facebook Offers yet? Please leave a comment below and let me know!

Tagged as: Facebook Marketing, Facebook Offers, list building

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Fiscal Cliff Leads To Finger-Pointing From Both Sides

There was a brief burst of optimism after Barack Obama’s reelection that Democrats and Republicans would finally go the grownup route and avert the so-called fiscal cliff.

Read the whole story at Daily Beast

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