A house divided: Louisville is split, often angrily, between UL and UK fans
Ground zero for Saturday's Final Four matchup between top-seeded Kentucky and No. 4 Louisville is set for the Superdome in New Orleans.
But Louisville is where Cards and 'Cats fans work and play.
And it also happens to be the hub of the Commonwealth's latest Civil War reenactment.
Nobody knows the venom between the fan bases in Kentucky's largest city better than Rick Pitino, who spent eight seasons at Kentucky and is in his 11th at Louisville.
"It ends up with a lot of bad marriages — a lot of mixed marriages that end up bad," Pitino said. "You have a Louisville woman with a Kentucky man, and it always ends bad. We've been trying to do something about it here, and it just doesn't work.
"Now if you go to Lexington — if someone had a Louisville jacket on, they'd be killed by 12 o'clock at night, so it's different. We have to live amongst our competitors here."
In 2005, the Louisville Courier-Journal surveyed 1,281 adults in Kentucky to find sports fans' allegiances.
The numbers showed Kentucky was favorite for 67 percent of respondents, Louisville at 17 percent and other schools at 16 percent.
But in Louisville, 57 percent of those polled said they cheer for the Cardinals, 33 percent for the Wildcats and 10 percent for other teams.
"Once you get anywhere close to 70-30 or 60-40, it feels like half," said Adam Lefkoe, a sports reporter and anchor at WHAS11 in Louisville.
Lefkoe, who produced a video series on the rivalry leading up to the teams' first meeting in December (Kentucky won 69-62), said he treats his job as if the fans are split 50-50.
A story on Louisville means he needs one onKentucky. And if Lefkoe leads with one team or the other, he always has a reason why.
"Sometimes you'll get e-mails from Kentucky and Louisville fans on the same day complaining about who got more time, and I just forward those emails to each other," Lefkoe said. "You reach a point to where the complex is always there."
Really, it is.
Cards-'Cats is a rivalry that meant Louisville fans were printing "Got Pitino?" shirts after the former Kentucky coach signed with the Wildcats' bitter rival in 2001.
It's Louisville opening a 22,000-seat waterfront arena in 2010, and neighbor Lexington then starting discussions to renovate aging Rupp Arena.
It's Kentucky coach John Calipari arranging for his Dominican Republic National Team to play a game against former Kentuckyplayers last summer in the new KFC Yum! Center.
"It's 365 days a year here, which is why that one game is so important," said Mike Rutherford, college basketball editor at SBNation.com and manager of CardChronicle.com. "When you lose the game, you have to face people in the city for the rest of the year knowing they have ultimate bragging rights."
The rivalry will hit its peak at this weekend's Final Four — appropriate because that's where it re-started again back in 1983, when the teams met in the Elite Eight. Thanks to a piece of state legislation, the series resumed on an annual basis and the teams have played each year since.
Rutherford said the rivalry is part of every day life in Louisville whether basketball is in season or not.
"UofL fans grow up with Kentucky fans, and they're used to having those fans in the area and how they act," Rutherford said. "I remember when Louisville would lose games, I'd come to school in third, fourth and fifth grade and people would have put mocking signs up in my locker. And I'd do the same when UK lost. It means everything."
A city without big-time professional sports, Louisville lives and breathes college basketball.
In February, ESPN released data that named Louisville the top college hoops market among 56 metered nationwide.
The city's CBS affiliate, WLKY, also ranks No. 1 in ratings share for the NCAA tournament. Its 25.8 rating was 46 percent higher than second-place Cincinnati during the tournament's first two weekends.
Calipari, speaking after Kentucky beat Baylor to ensure a Final Four meeting against the Cardinals, said, "The city of Louisville drives our state."
His Wildcats play a game each year in Freedom Hall, the Cardinals' home from 1956-2010, and Kentucky has a large alumni base there.
Added Calipari: "The University of Louisville drives that city. So it’s a very important thing for our state, and it’s important that that school does well. It’s important for our state. Literally, they drive our state."
And the rivalry. If there was ever a chance to win the war, it's this weekend.
Nobody knows exactly what to expect Saturday in Louisville regardless of which teams wins. Police announced plans on Tuesday that include willingness to close roads and make arrests if celebrations turn to riots.
"There's a lot more disrespect in the younger generation when it comes to the rivalry than the older ones," Lefkoe said. "That's why I'm a little worried about what's going to happen Saturday night. Hotter heads will prevail, and that can be a scary situation."
Jonathan Lintner is a Spring 2012 Paste BN Collegiate Correspondent. Learn more about him here.
This story originally appeared on the Paste BN College blog, a news source produced for college students by student journalists. The blog closed in September of 2017.