20 minutes into its game against Louisville in Puerto Rico, Minnesota is close to winning the turnover battle, Nate Mason looks much older than a freshman and Andre Hollins is back to his sharpshooting ways. 

Yet, the Gophers trail the No. 8 Cardinals by 13 at halftime. The catalyst? Excessive fouls and poor shot selection. 

Minnesota fouled 18 times in the first half and head coach Richard Pitino had to dip deep into his bench to replace starters Carlos Morris, Mo Walker, DeAndre Mathieu and Joey King who are all in foul trouble. 

Louisville converted 67 percent of its free-throw attempts while the Gophers made less than half of theirs. The shooting woes didn't stop there, with Minnesota hitting just 35 percent of its field goals in front of Louisville's aggressive defenders. 

Hollins leads Minnesota with 10 points off of 4-for-8 shooting. Mason, who has looked poised bringing the ball up the court in his first collegiate game against suffocating point guard Chris Jones, has six points and leads the Gophers with five rebounds. 

Louisville forward Montrezl Harrell has lived up to the hype, scoring 17 points off of just six shots. He started the game with a three-pointer and capped off the first half with an acrobatic transition alley-oop slam.