Cardinal Couple - Thursday Backward and Forward

THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

( Jeff McAdams hops in the jeep and takes us on a rambling ride through five of the active fall sports currently taking place on the Belknap Campus for the Thursday edition of CARDINAL COUPLE. Maybe we'll stop for ice cream or burgers! Sit down, buckle up, hold on and enjoy the ride!) 



Thursday seems to be a good day to look forward to the weekend of women's sports activities ahead.  And because of that, its a good day to look back on the past weeks worth of events as well.  We're solidly into fall sports at this point, with all of the true fall sports having gotten their seasons under way.  Alphabetically, then...

Cross Country

Cross-country had their first meet in Evansville, IN at the Mid-America Opener.  With Louisville's seven scoring runners all finishing in the top nine, the Cardinals handily won the meet over teams from the Evansville and Indiana State.

There are no women's cross-country events in the coming week.

Field Hockey

In their season opener on Friday, Justine Sowry's Field Hockey team played a hard fought game against pre-season 7th ranked Virginia in Charlottesville, VA.  Playing to a halftime 1-1 tie, the Cards traded shots with Virginia in the second half, but couldn't quite match the play of one of the better teams in the country, losing the contest 3-2.  Despite the loss, not a bad start for the Field Hockey squad.

The opening weekend continued on Sunday down the road at Richmond.  The Spiders got out to a 1-0
halftime lead, but the Cardinals battled back and got the 2-1 win in the end in what Coach Sowry described as a "brutal" game. Make sure and catch the Saturday 11 a.m. broadcast of CARDINAL COUPLE RADIO Hour...when Paulie discusses the games with Coach Sowry.

Field Hockey opens their home slate of games with two events this weekend.  They face William and Mary in a Friday afternoon game with a 1pm start time.  On Sunday, the Field Hockey team will try to get Louisville's second overall win over the Ohio Bobcats.  This is also a 1pm start time.  Both events are at the Trager Field Hockey Stadium on Floyd street on campus.

Women's Golf

Golf isn't a true fall sport as they play throughout the whole academic year, but the women's team starts their competition for 2013-2014 with the IU Fall Kickoff in Noblesville, IN on Sunday.

Women's Soccer

The Women's Soccer team was scheduled to have two games this past weekend at the Wake Forest Invitational in Winston-Salem NC, but officially only played one.  The game that did officially happen was a Friday afternoon game against a nearly-nationally ranked Virginia Tech team.  After two sudden-death overtimes, the game ended in a 1-1 tie.  UofL was scheduled to play host Wake Forest on Sunday at 2pm.  Officially the game didn't happen.  The teams did compete for about 50 minutes of play, but bad weather in the area caused a two hour delay at halftime.  After resuming for a few minutes of second half play, the weather caused another delay and eventual cancellation of the game.  Wake Forest was leading 1-0 at the time of cancellation.  Wake Forest was, at the time, ranked 10th in the country and have advanced to 7th in the most recent poll.

The Women's Soccer team next travels to Lexington, KY for a 7:30pm game against Kentucky.  There is a free bus trip for students that will leave the SAC circle at 5:30 and includes food and a t-shirt.  Contact Bailey Bolin at 502-852-8421, or bailey (at) gocards.com to reserve a spot.

Women's Soccer will also be playing Miami (OH) on Sunday with first kick at 1pm in Oxford, OH.

Volleyball

Last, but certainly not least, the Louisville Volleyball team travelled to State College, PA to compete

in the Penn State Invitational Tournament.  The student beat the master on Friday evening with a 4pm first serve between Louisville, coached by Anne Kordes; and Syracuse, coached by former UofL Head Coach and former coach of Anne Kordes, Leonid Yelin.  Louisville won this match in straight sets 25-20, 25-19, 25-17, but the score doesn't really tell the tale.  Louisville was pretty clearly the better team here, keeping Syracuse out of system most of the match with strong serving and attacking.

Saturday evening saw the marquis matchup of the tournament with Louisville meeting then #2 ranked Penn State.  This matchup featured sisters Maya and Deja McClendon.  Maya is a stand-out freshmen playing for Louisville, while big sister Deja is a powerhouse senior for Penn State.  Despite a large contingent of McClendon's in attendance wearing roughly equal amounts of red and blue, this matchup was pretty much all Penn State, with the Nittany Lions winning in straight sets 25-15, 25-16, 25-13.

Despite the loss to PSU, Louisville moved up two spots in the national rankings to #17.

The Volleyball team continues their road-heavy schedule this weekend at the Fargo Doublewood Inn Classic in Fargo, ND.  The Cards will first play against host North Dakota State with a 7pm (central time) start on Friday.  Kordes' team will get two matches in on Saturday, starting with a 10:30am (central time) first serve against Northern Iowa, followed by a 4:30pm (central time) match against not-quite-nationally-ranked Wisconsin.

In Other News...

Head Lacrosse coach Kellie Young was named to her alma mater's inaugural Hall of Fame class at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts.  In addition to excelling at Lacrosse, with multiple all-region and all-conference selections, and a Most Outstanding Player award for the squad, Coach Young also lettered in soccer, basketball, softball.


-Jeff McAdams

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