Washington , DC-

In another must win game for the Hoyas tonight against Louisville Cardinals produced an outcome that really has them looking in from the outside when it comes to a possible NCAA Tournament berth.

Georgetown who never came any closer than 10 points tonight in the late minutes in a game that was must win for the Cardinals if they wanted to possibly take the Big East regular season title.

The Cardinals started 9-for-9 from the field and their first miss from the field came almost 11 minutes into the first half. The big note of the evening was the Cardinals was their 7-for-7 shooting from 3-point range in the second half.

Chris Wright scored 12 points, and Greg Monroe had 10 for the Hoyas (14-12, 5-10), who have lost nine of 11 games and have to limp into a game next week against the 10th ranked Villanova Wildcats.

"There is no denying that we have one the toughest finishes of any of the teams in the Big East, but we have to keep our heads up and focus on Villanova next week and finish out strong with some momentum against DePaul and come into the Big East Tournament and get us back to where we were a month ago," said Hoyas Head Coach John Thompson III.

The loss also dropped the Hoyas to 12th place in the Big East, just six weeks after they were ranked No. 9 in the country.

Asked about his team's NCAA tournament chances, coach John Thompson III said: "If there's one good thing about being in this conference it's that you get to go to New York and you get a chance to fight and you get a chance to win it. We have to continue to improve and we have to be better when we get to New York, it's as simple as that."