Louisville basketball: Pat Kelsey praises team after NCAA Tournament loss
Louisville basketball coach Pat Kelsey praises the Cardinals following an 89-75 loss to Creighton in the first round of the 2025 NCAA Tournament.
- After reportedly visiting Louisville basketball on March 28, Adrian Wooley is joining the Cardinals via the transfer portal.
- The 6-foot-5 guard was named Conference USA Freshman of the Year after averaging 18.8 points, 5.2 rebounds, 3.6 assists and 1.4 steals per game for Kennesaw State in 2024-25.
Louisville basketball on Monday scored a commitment through the NCAA transfer portal from former Kennesaw State guard Adrian Wooley, who quietly had one of the best 2024-25 seasons of any freshman across the country.
Wooley, a 6-foot-5 native of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, reportedly visited with coach Pat Kelsey and the Cardinals on Friday. At the time of his pledge, 247Sports had him as the top-ranked combo guard on the market.
Wooley was named Conference USA Freshman of the Year and became the first rookie since the conference was founded in 1995 to average more than 17 points per game while shooting better than 50% from the field. His 11 CUSA Freshman of the Week honors are the most in league history.
“(He’s) a guy who can just stuff a stat sheet,” 247Sports analyst Travis Branham told the publication’s director of scouting, Adam Finkelstein, on Thursday. “But he does it very efficiently. … When it’s all said and done, you look back in one or two years, I think he’s an all-conference guard at the power-(conference) level and/or he’s playing in the NBA.”
Wooley started all but one of the Kennesaw State’s 33 games and had 15 outings of 20-plus points. He led the team in scoring (18.8), field-goal percentage (51.2%, 42.2% from 3-point range) and assists (3.6) with 5.2 rebounds and 1.4 steals to boot across 33.6 minutes per contest. One byproduct of that high usage rate: turnovers, 109 to be exact.
When Wooley was crowned the CUSA’s top freshman on March 10, the Owls reported he was one of only two first-year players across the country to pace their respective squads in scoring and field-goal percentage. The other player was Duke’s Cooper Flagg — the projected No. 1 pick in this year’s NBA Draft.
The following players from Kelsey’s inaugural team are in line to return, if they don’t elect to pursue opportunities elsewhere: J’Vonne Hadley, Aly Khalifa, Kasean Pryor, Kobe Rodgers, Khani Rooths and James Scott. Joining them are two newcomers, McDonald’s All-American point guard Mikel Brown Jr. and 21-year-old German big man Sananda Fru.
The transfer portal closes April 22; players who enter it after that date will need a waiver to be eligible for the 2025-26 season. Players can commit to a school at any time, but the regular signing period begins April 16 and ends May 21.
This story will be updated.
Reach Louisville men’s basketball reporter Brooks Holton at [email protected] and follow him on X at @brooksHolton.
