With Forrest's nasty dunk, FSU Basketball finished what Louisville started

It wasn't the exclamation point on Trent Forrest's Florida State career. There's too much basketball left to be played for that.

At the same time, there is no denying that this dunk came with some punctuation.

It delivered a message to a chippy Louisville Cardinals squad that had dominated the first half and let the Seminoles hear all about it. It perhaps also delivered a message to the entire college basketball world.

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With the No. 6 Seminoles leading by eight points and just over two minutes remaining -- and with 10th-ranked Louisville scrambling to force a turnover with a full-court press -- Forrest caught an outlet pass from junior guard M.J. Walker, took one dribble from the 3-point line and slammed home a monster dunk over the top of Louisville star Jordan Nwora.

It wasn't a picture-perfect moment. It was a poster-perfect moment.

"I feel like in that situation, kind of just to finish off the game, you have to go dunk the ball," Forrest said. "Whether he jumps or not, I feel like you have to have that mentality, to kind of just finish off the game. ...

"I just kind of made up in my mind I was gonna have to dunk it, regardless."

The old-fashioned three-point play put the Seminoles ahead by 11 points en route to an 82-67 victory, but that wasn't the true significance of the dunk.

This was a firm backhand to an opponent who dared come into this house -- an arena where Florida State has lost just three times in the last five years -- and not only tried to win the game, but flexed while they were doing it.

This was Trent Forrest, a 6-foot, 4-inch guard who continues to be one of the most underrated players in the country, imposing his will on a 6-7 forward from Louisville who was the Preseason ACC Player of the Year.

This was FSU proving that its previous victory over Louisville -- a 13-point win and the Cardinals' only loss in the KFC Yum! Center in a calendar year -- was no fluke.

"Those guys, I guess you could say have beef with us, just from what happened when we played them up there," Forrest said. "They did their part, I guess, for the first half of the game. But it's a 40-minute game. So if you're going to start something, you've got to finish it."

Finishing is something this Florida State men's basketball team has done amazingly well all season. It may be the only common thread between all 24 of the Seminoles' victories (with just four losses).

They have raced out to early leads, seen them evaporate and then pulled away at the end. They have cruised from start to finish. And they have done what they did on Monday -- fallen behind early only to storm back like Usain Bolt in his prime over the final 40 meters.

Five minutes into the second half of this game on Monday, Florida State trailed by 11 points. The scoreboard read Louisville 51, FSU 40 after 25 minutes of play.

Over the final 15 minutes, the Seminoles scored 42 points and held the Cardinals to 16.

"There were moments in the game that you could see that each player took it upon himself to make a major contribution," FSU coach Leonard Hamilton said.