Villanova defeated the Cardinals at Freedom Hall, 92-84, in what was an intensely competitive game, but no one will wish to see it in full again. Forty-four turnovers, 67 fouls (plus a technical on Jay Wright), 94 free-throw attempts — this game had all the flow of a Los Angeles freeway interchange. Highlights only, please.

It’s impossible to get a full grasp of how the game was played from the final score — or even the Four Factors above — but the one thing that is easy to see is that this game was foul-marred. Ten players on each team played at least five minutes, and all but one — Louisville’s Reginald Delk — committed at least two fouls. Nine players committed at least four fouls.

Was the game that physical? I suppose. Louisville plays a style that promotes reaching in and aggressive on-ball defense, and this was not a night when the officials — John Cahill, Karl Hess and Michael Stephens — elected to permit such aggression. Villanova was the perfect counterpart to Louisville to create a foul-filled game. The Wildcats are the only Big East team that sends its opponents to the line more often than Louisville does.

The fouls resulted in those 94 free throws, and the two teams combined to make 74 of them, an impressive 78.7-percent success rate. Villanova (first) and Louisville (fifth) are among the best Big East teams at shooting free-throws, and that was evident on Monday night. The Cardinals’ Samardo Samuels made all 13 of his free-throw attempts to help Louisville convert 39-of-45.

What is not evident from the final score or the Four Factors is how thoroughly Louisville controlled the game in the first half. With 5:30 to play in the first half, the Cardinals led, 38-21, and Villanova found itself unable to even advance the ball into the frontcourt. The Wildcats committed 17 first-half turnovers, as it didn’t appear they had any clue how to approach Louisville’s defense. With the short turnaround after Saturday’s win over Marquette, it’s understandable that Villanova was unable to fully internalize the gameplan, but a veteran team should not have been so flustered by a defense it had seen several times before.

The last five minutes of the first half, though, was perhaps the game’s most important stretch. Villanova went on a 15-5 run thanks to a series of empty possessions from the Cardinals as well as big shots by Maalik Wayns, Corey Fisher and Scottie Reynolds. The Cats then started the second half on an 18-10 run, and, when Taylor King completed an and-1 at the 14:06 mark of the second half to give Villanova a 57-55 lead, the Cats would never trail again.

Too many threes: Louisville’s dependence on the 3-pointer at the expense of interior touches for Samuels ensures that its offense will be inconsistent. The Cardinals have the 15th best (or second worst) 3-point percentage in the Big East (31.5), yet take more 3-pointers than any other Big East team (39.6 percent of all field-goal attempts), an inefficient distribution of shots to be sure.

Edgar Sosa (39.8) and Reginald Delk (45.7) are the only Cardinals shooting it well this season. Every other Cardinal who has attempted a 3-pointer has made less than a third of those attempts. Jerry Smith and Preston Knowles have the track record of good shooters, and Mike Marra has shown flashes, but as long as those players are shooting in the 20s, Louisville will have nights like Monday, in which it made just 7-of-33 3-pointers (21.2 percent) and essentially shot itself out of the game.

All the while, Samuels had to wonder what he needed to do to get the ball. He led the Cardinals with 21 points and did not miss a single shot from the field (4-for-4) or foul line, but Samuels could only stand and watch as Jared Swopshire, Smith, Sosa and Knowles made just 8-of-38 field-goal attempts. The inability to get Samuels more touches is more egregious when one considers that Louisville is fourth in the Big East in 2-point percentage (52.7), but all non-Samuels shooters were just 8-for-23 (34.8 percent) on 2-pointers on Monday night. There were times when it was evident that Louisville wanted to get the ball inside to Samuels — he was often fouled on these occasions or forced to pass back out thanks to a double-team — but mostly it seemed like the Cardinals were impatient, far too willing to chuck up 22-footers.

Toughness: Villanova showed great mental toughness to battle back from down 17 and overcome its 17 first-half turnovers. Under Wright, the Wildcats are rarely the biggest or strongest, but they always play physically and with toughness, and they never give in. The Wildcats limited themselves to five second-half turnovers, turned around a lopsided battle on the boards — Louisville had out-rebounded Villanova, 27-9, in the first half — and let Reynolds take them home. The senior didn’t miss a field-goal attempt until the closing minutes, finishing 9-for-10 and a perfect 5-for-5 on 3-pointers. He scored 36 points against a team that had witnessed some of his poorer games at Villanova.

Depth: Both teams have the kind of depth that will benefit them during the grueling, 18-game Big East season. Villanova and Louisville both play 11 players, and several bench players can be significant contributors. Villanova got 74 minutes and 31 points out of its reserves, while Louisville got 71 minutes and 29 points out of its bench. Louisville gets the most minutes out of its bench of any Big East team (38.8 percent of all minutes); Villanova is seventh (32.6). With two teams that like to push the tempo — Villanova and Louisville are fourth and fifth in the Big East in adjusted tempo — and that often attack on defense to the point of fouling, depth is more important to these two teams than most.

Up next: After being knocked from the Big East unbeaten, Louisville will try to blemish Pittsburgh’s undefeated conference mark (if UConn doesn’t do the deed first on Wednesday). The Cards travel to Peterson Events Center on Saturday. The Wildcats return home to host Georgetown, which will enter Sunday’s contest either 4-1 or 3-2 in conference depending on how the Hoyas fare against Seton Hall on Thursday.

Dance card: Every conference game is crucial for Louisville, which likely needs to finish at least 10-8 in conference to make the NCAA Tournament. Villanova is in position for a very good seed should it finish near the top of the Big East. The Cats should be favored in each of its next five games, which means a 9-0 start isn’t out of the realm of possibilities. Ken Pomeroy’s projections put the Cats chances of going through the first half of the Big East season undefeated at about 25 percent.

Two freshmen, Maalik Wayns and Isaiah Armwood, hit 3-pointers in the last two possessions to bring Villanova back from a late five-point deficit with 1:42 to play. The basket was Armwood’s first of his career, and it came after he was forced into action thanks to severe foul trouble for Villanova’s frontcourt.

The fouls were the main thing that made this game a strange one.

Those free-throw rates are borderline absurd. The two teams combined for 54 fouls committed. Nine players accumulated at least four fouls, including the four Villanova Wildcats who fouled out. Among those four were Antonio Pena, Taylor King and Maurice Sutton or, in other words, all the height in Villanova’s rotation since freshman Mouphtaou Yarou was sent back to Philly with a viral infection.

Perhaps the strangest aspect of this foul fest is that George Mason was just the 262nd most proficient team at getting to the line in the nation last season. Of Patriots returners, Ryan Pearson and Mike Morrison were the best at getting to the line, and yet they combined for just four of the 37 free-throw attempts for Mason. The Patriots made 27 or 73 percent of those. Villanova had 39 attempts, making just 23, 59 percent.

Because of the way the game was officiated, foul shooting played a major role down the stretch. At one point, Villanova missed four of five free throws in the game’s final minutes, but it was George Mason that saw its free-throw shooting betray it in the last possessions of the game. The Patriots went 4-for-8 from the line in the game’s final two minutes to keep Nova alive.

The second thing that sticks out in that box above is the rebounding. Villanova had 19 offensive rebounds, 11 more than George Mason, but it was 6-foot-1 Corey Fisher who led the Cats with five. Since Jay Wright likes to play small, the guards must crash the glass, and Fisher’s production is a positive step in the right direction. His aggressiveness on the floor also translated into 18 free-throw attempts, of which the junior made 14.

King, the transfer from Duke, had four offensive rebounds of his own, and the 11-offensive rebound difference allowed Villanova to make up for the 17 turnovers it committed to GMU’s 14. The first half was especially troubling to Wright as he saw his team full of veteran guards commit 11 in the opening 20 minutes. Reynolds had a nightmare first half. He ended the game with eight turnovers but was able to score 18 points after the poor start.

While the win was the key for Villanova on Thursday, my takeaway from this game is that Villanova really misses what Dante Cunningham and Dwayne Anderson brought last season. Those two players — and departed Shane Clark as well — were the Cats who were most adept offensively on the interior.

Cunningham hit 52.7 percent of his 463 2-point attempts in Villanova’s Final Four season, a total more than twice as many as anyone else on the team. Anderson hit 55.7 percent of his 132 attempts, and Clark made 52.7 percent of his 112 attempts. Of the rest of last year’s team, only Reggie Redding made at least half of his 2-pointers last season, and he won’t be back until the end of first semester. Therefore, it wasn’t a great surprise that Villanova made just 39.3 percent of its 2-pointers against George Mason.

On the defensive end, the problem is just as acute. Cunningham was the team’s best interior defender last season, and without him, the Wildcats did nothing but hack George Mason around the basket. Pena is notoriously foul-prone, and Sutton is very inexperienced, but foul-outs should be a rarity for King. Wright would prefer not to have to use King against opposing interior players, which means Pena needs to stay on the floor, and the 6-foot-9, 240-pound Yarou best get better quickly.

Villanova’s next opponent is Dayton on Friday. The Flyers are not a team that forces their way to the line, but its star, 6-8 Chris Wright, does draw fouls. Dayton is terrific at defending the rim, finishing third in the Atlantic 10 in 2-point defense last season. To win on Friday and consistently throughout the season, Villanova has to stay disciplined to keep its frontcourt on the floor, or the poor 2-point shooting and the excessive fouling is likely to be a problem that crops up periodically.