Wednesday Cardinal Couple -- WBB, Volleyball in action tonight

WEDNESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

- Louisville WBB travels to Bowling Green for WKU

- Louisville Volleyball hosts UConn

Thanks to Burn Brother for forwarding this Jude picture

We all know the plot lines. Former assistant goes up against mentor. Former Cardinal and Louisville high school greats on WKU bench as assistant and staff. Frormer Cardinal assistant faces previous employer. Toss in a wise-cracking detective, blonde in an overcoat, and shadowy figures and you've got a great mystery thriller. (No...Jeff, Jenny, Paulie and Sonja are not playing the aforementioned character actors)


Yes, the University of Louisville women's basketball team travels to Bowling Green tonight. Michelle Clark-Heard (head coach), Candyce Bingham (assistant coach), Margaret Richards (assistant coach), Greg Collins (assistant coach) and Laura Terry (program assistant) all have ties to either UofL or the city in one fashion or another.

And Jeff Walz has ties to WKU, serving as an assistant to Paul Sanderford...who still has ties to WKU and mentored Jeff.

I know, it's beginning to sound like a Waltons' Mountain reunion (maybe Cortnee Walton will show up) or family picnic...so let's get to the game itself.

WKU hosts the Cards and is on a three-game win streak. Their only defeat on the season came to Vandy. Last out they went on the road and whipped NKU (another Commonwealth of Kentucky directional school) 74-64.

Louisville travels in with an unblemished record...downing Free Shoes University (aka Florida State) 69-59 in overtime in the YUM! Sunday. The Cards are either #4 or #3 in the nation (choose your poll) and can't get caught looking ahead to UK on Sunday.

The Toppers have talent. Alexis Gowin and Chastity Gooch put up a combined 36 points against NKU. The game is a big one for Topper fans, staff and players...a top five ranked team hasn't visited E.A. Diddle Arena since 1998 and the Toppers won that one...against LA.Tech.

CHASTITY GOOCH

Playing Louisville: “I feel like this is a huge opportunity for us. I feel like this game should tell us where we stand. It’s very exciting. How many teams can say they get to play a No. 4 team in the country?

Handling Cardinals’ pressure: “We just have to talk to one another. We have to calm each other down. If we see someone kind of getting out of control, we’ve got to tell that person it’s OK and just take care of the ball.”

WKU is rolling out all the stops for this one. Free tickets at area IGA grocery stores, 1000 free "white out t-shirts" for attending fans.  A food deal including a hot dog, bag of chips and soda for $7 bucks. A coat drive by the Bowling Green Jr. Women's Club.

Attendance should be huge. E.A. Diddle Arena holds about 7300. Can the Toppers fill it on Thanksgiving Eve?  

The Cards will be looking to perform a little better at the start of this one than they did in their only other away game this season (Oklahoma) or last game against FSU (at the YUM!).
Louisville has weapons galore, a surprisingly good rebounding margin over opponents this season and Shoni.
That should be enough to translate into a "W" for the Ville.

Game time is 8 p.m. EST and ESPN 3 has the broadcast. It's also on Cards TV, Cards Radio 790, WKU PBS in the Bowling Green area and the Hilltopper Sports Satellite Network.

Cardinal Couple will be there also and we'll have a full report on the action and events Thanksgiving morning. We sincerely hope that the Cards don't go down to Bowling Green and become turkeys. We'd love to see them carve WKU up. Drumsticks crossed, we'll have thankful news and a story line that involves a UofL win.

I have this feeling, though...this one is going to be a close one...decided in the final minutes. It's a potential season-changing game for WKU and Michelle Clark-Heard's team doesn't quit until the final buzzer goes off .

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Louisville Volleyball moves to Cardinal Arena for action tonight at 7 p.m. against UConn. The Huskies haven't had a season to boast about in the AAC...but it's a good idea to always be a little wary of any team that sports the Huskies logo.

Brooke Mattingly had 12 kills and six blocks to lead the University of Louisville to a 25-13, 25-19, 25-16 win over UConn at UConn on Oct. 27th.

We'll have a recap on this match also in the Thanksgiving edition of CC.

With the home slate complete, the UConn women's volleyball team (13-18, 4-12 American) hits the road this week to close out the 2013 season. UConn will face Louisville (21-7, 16-0 American) on Wednesday at 7 p.m., then conclude the regular season with Cincinnati (2-28, 2-14 American) on Friday at 12 p.m.

-paulie-