Lady Cards slow down Racers with 43 point win...105-62

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WEDNESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE:

-Lady Cards romp Murray State...KY next.

The University of Louisville women's basketball team ripped by the Murray State Racers 105-62 in women's college basketball Tuesday night in the KFC YUM! Center. Louisville scored the first 16 points of the game in a four minute stretch and led by as many as 34 in the first half. Walz started the game with Becky Burke, Sara Hammond, Cierra Warren, Shoni Schimmel and Bria Smith and the fivesome dominated play from the opening tip.

The Lady Cards were on fire and Becky Burke ignited the flames with eight of Louisville's first ten points. Her three-pointer with 18:56 remaining in the first half put her in the 1,000 point club...the 22nd. Lady Card to reach that plateau. Louisville...despite having to deal with mass substitutions every two or three minutes of four or five Racer players...had no problems keeping the Racers at bay while seemingly scoring at will. A nifty Monique Reid layup off a Shoni Schimmel pass made it 20-5 with 11:50. The Schimmel sisters got into the act after that...Jude with two free throws and Shoni with two three point bombs and the Cards were up 30-5 with 7:53 left in the half.

Contributing Cardinal Couple writer Jenny O' Bryan
 gives me "L"
during our halftime discussion.

Monique Reid took over from there...scoring 12 of her game high 18 points in the final six minutes of the half...the Lady Cards went in at halftime up 50-18.

Murray State did open the second half with the first score, but Louisville responded with the next 12 points to take a 62-21 lead with 15:48 left. The Cards slowed down a little for a six minute stretch...getting outscored by M.S.U. 20-15...but still had a comfortable 77-41 lead with nine minutes to go after Jude Schimmel put in a layup she took coast to coast.

The only real question left after that was whether the Cards would reach the century mark and they accomplished that with 47 seconds left in the game on a Sherrone Vails jumper in the paint that put Louisville up by 43. The teams scored five points each in a frantic final 30 seconds...Louisville winning 105-62.

Halftime dunk contest for kids!

Even distribution was the tone of the evening...Jeff Walz playing dozens of different combinations...including a five minute stretch in the first half where both Schimmel's were on the court at the same time. No player saw more than 22 minutes (Jude) or less than 12 (Mo). Besides Mo's 18 points four other Lady Cards hit double figures...Shawnta Dyer and Shoni with 14, and Sara Hammond and Becky Burke with 10 each. Bria Smith and Jude had eight points each, Shelby Harper and Sherrone Vails six, Cierra Warren five, Antonita Slaughter with four and two for Asia Taylor. Louisville shot 53.4% for the game and went 21-25 from the foul stripe...Shawnta Dyer going a perfect 6-6.

Mariah Robinson bombed in 22 for M.S.U., including five from beyond the arc.

The Cards out rebounded the Racers 62-32...Shoni grabbing nine...and a whopping 45 of those were on the defensive boards. 

Murray did force Louisville into 23 turnovers while committing 20 of their own. They also had 14 steals, one more than the Cards. 

We're still trying to figure out the Racers substitution strategy...they did try to press most of the game...but Louisville had 27 points off turnovers and won the fast break battle 18-4. Murray State head coach Rob Cross pulled all five starters at the 18:33 mark and then sent all five back in less than a minute later. Two minutes later, he did the same thing...and it was a pattern he continued nine more times in the first half...three, four or five players coming in and going out. The Chinese fire drill occurred 14 times in the second half. Cross used 14 players against the Cards...we were ready to suit up and give him 2-3 minutes...everyone else in the KFC YUM! Arena seemed to play...

The Cards were looking for a good tune-up before facing UK and they got it tonight against a hard-playing, pressing, three-point crazy Racer team. Sean Moth, Cardinal public address announcer, got a workout also, announcing lineup changes with the frequency of a auctioneer at an estate sale...

THINGS WE LIKED TONIGHT:

-Cards early point production. Louisville scored early and often and in a variety of ways to begin each half tonight. Whether it was Burke bombing, Warren in the paint, or Sara Hammond putbacks...the Cards weren't missing much and getting plenty of opportunities.

-Inside play. The Cards scored 56 points in the paint tonight and limited Murray to just 16. Shawnta Dyer and Sherrone Vails picked right up where Hammond and Warren left off...and the deadly threat of Mo inside was as strong as usual.

-Hey, Jude! The freshman came out with fire tonight and got the Cards thru their offensive progressions from the point. She had four assists tonight and easily broke thru the full-court Murray State defensive pressure most of the time.

-Free throw shooting. The Cardinal team that struggled to reach 60% from the foul line last year is long gone. 21-25 for 84% gets a big 'thumbs up' from us.

THINGS TO WORK ON:

(Not much here to discuss, but here's a couple)

-Turnovers. Still too high at 23 but Coach Walz seems to think anywhere between 18-25 is usually going to be expected. Nature of the Cards offense, we get that...just hate seeing them. High risk, high reward.

-Offensive rebounding. No Lady Card had more than four tonight (Slaughter and Warren)...but when you shoot 53% for the game and a smoking 64% in the second half....there aren't a lot of rebounds out there.

THEY SAID IT:

Monique Reid on the Murray State substitution pattern:

"I was shocked. It seems like they all played forty minutes cause they were coming in and going out it seemed like every play!  I've never seen anything like it."

Becky Burke's take on it:

"We knew they'd press the whole game, that's what they do...so maybe that was it."

Monique on her game tonight:

"I know my role and what it is. I'm a scorer and that's what I come in and do."

Monique on Shawnta Dyer:

Mo and BB...the two Lady Card seniors

"She's definitely getting better out there. She's getting more confident. I know it's rough...sitting out a whole year. She's getting her feet up under her and I think she's ready to go."

Becky on reaching the 1,000 point mark:

" (Laughing)...Yeah, I forgot to get into our press after I made it, I was happy... and I got yelled at...so...(Mo and Becky laughing)...yeah, but I knew I was really close and it's definitely an honor to be there and follow Mo there. I'm glad I got to play enough minutes and shoot well enough to reach it."

Becky on the UK game:

"This is everything for us. We're not going to go out getting embarrassed. This is our (referrring to her and Monique) last time playing UK at UK's place and we're going to do everything we can to get the win."

Mo on the UK game:

"Sunday is a huge rivalry. I can't wait. It's like the biggest game of the year for us...for me...I'm from Louisville and it's going to be huge in there Sunday."

Coach Walz on the effort tonight:

"It was nice. We came out and played extremely well and it was nice to see us get off to such a great start. "

Walz on Murray and their 37 three point attempts:

"Yes, we expected it. That's what they like to do...come out and press and run and shoot the three. I though we did a very good job in the first half...being there on the catch and trying to force them to put the ball on the ground. Second half I thought we were rather poor on discipline, on getting help from the ball side, they'd drive and they'd kick to the corner for threes."

Walz on playing time:

"There comes a point in time where you have to take advantage of your playing time. Doesn't matter when you're in there or what the score is. There's no such thing on my team as scrap minutes. Coming in and picking up the slop, there's no such thing. I evaluate you the entire game. If you can't play when you're up twenty...what makes me think you can play when it's a four point game? So, I've explained that to them and challenged them."

Walz on Kentucky:

"We'll start watching some film tomorrow and develop a game plan on Thursday. That'll give us three days to prepare. They like to press and trap and we'll need to take care of the ball. They defend extremely well, they rotate and trap. It's like I told the kids...I don't prepare for this game any differently that I would for...like the Murray State game. It's the next game on our schedule and that's the way I always look at it. I know, for our fans, it's the UofL vs. UK game and they're all ready to go at it. I've never gotten into all that and I'm not going to. You win on Sunday or you lose on Sunday...it's not going to make or break your season. For us, it's a non-conference game against a very good team and we'll try to get ourselves prepared as we move on. It's a very good challenge for us and, win or lose on Sunday, we're going to learn a whole lot."

Walz on Burke reaching 1000 points:

"You know, that was just great. She's really worked hard over her four years. She's really become a lot more than just a stand-still three point shooter. I'm proud of the way she's learned to take the ball to the basket. Her game is really starting to evolve and she's been working hard on her ball-handling. She's very coachable right now and I'm very excited for her."

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