CARDINAL COUPLE

CARDINAL COUPLE
We report on the joy and excitement of UofL women's sports here. Thanks for checking us out! Click the picture of Louie to hear the latest Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast!!

Monday, February 24, 2014

Monday Cardinal Couple -- A great day to be a Cardinal fan!


MONDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

It was a big weekend for Louisville Women’s athletics, and my how they responded. 
Softball went 4-1 at home this weekend to get back above .500.  Lacrosse won two on the road putting up big offensive numbers and the women’s basketball team defended home court and swept Rutgers on the season.

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A-Tayy gives us that beautiful smile
(Photo by Charlie Springer - UofLCardGame.com)
A career performance by Asia Taylor led the team to 73-58 win over the Scarlet Knights.  The win ties a school record of 17 home wins in a season and guarantees the Cardinals no less than second place in conference play in their sole season in The American. 

The Cardinal faithful came out to support the women today, topping out at 14,327, to celebrate the annual pink game and get their fix of this team, and seniors, as the season rapidly winds down.   

Robbie Bartlett got things started for the day by singing the National Anthem.  We were just talking about Robbie, and the lack of her Ballgame National Anthem apperances, on the Cardinal Couple Radio Hour yesterday.  It was nice to see a local favorite back out on the court getting us all ready for the opening tip.  Robbie sings the opening and closing music for our show each Saturday.

Julie Hermann was back also in town...seated behind the Rutgers' bench to see how her new university would do against her former school. Julie in a skirt...not a bad sight to see at all...

Bria attemps inside (Photo by Charlie Springer)
The Cardinals played a very good game against a young and very tough Rutgers team. This is an exciting and talented team.  Tyler Scaife, the freshman who lit us up in Piscataway, had another dominant performance for the Scarlet Knights, but it was not enough to tip the balance in their favor.  17 points Sunday.

Rutgers is also leaving The American at the season’s end, to join the Big 10.

With a poor shooting performance for several Cardinals, it is heartening to see a double digit win in a tournament like atmosphere.   Sara Hammond went 3-10, Bria Smith went 1-6 and Antonita Slaugher  went 0-5 behind the arc and the Cardinals were still able to win going away. 

 The Cardinals started a little slow offensively, with Rutgers taking an early lead. Hammond missed 3-4 early chippies under the basket before she stepped back and sank a three.   Slaughter, who had an off shooting night, was able to affect them defensively hustling on several key plays keeping the Cardinal ball alive. 

Breast cancer survivors help lead a cheer
While there were many contributions from varying players throughout the game to change and shift momentum, there was no bigger player today than Asia Taylor.  She flat out balled.  Taylor left nothing on the court, and in doing so, had a career performance of 25 points, 15 boards, 3 assists and 3 steals.   Taylor played like the 5th year senior that she is taking full advantage of her last year in a Cardinal uniform. 

The Cardinals have two games left.  Next Saturday in Cincinnati and the final game of the regular season back at the Yum Center against #1 ranked Connecticut.  Monday, March 3, against Connecticut, is your last time to see this team, and these seniors, in their final regular season game.   With hard work and a little luck, we may just get to see them return to the Yum for the regionals of the NCAA tournament.

Future prospective LadyBirds and Cheerleaders lead the crowd
March 3 will be a celebration of the seniors, Asia Taylor, Tia Gibbs, Antonita Slaughter and the always interesting Shoni Schimmel.  It is also Native American Appreciation day.  The lower bowl of the arena is sold out, but there are still seats to be had.  $5 is a bargain to see this game. Get your seats folks and get there early.  It is going to be an exciting finish to the season. 

Call (502) 852-7254 or e-mail johnathan@gocards.com to get your seats!


EDITOR'S NOTE:

NOT ENOUGH CAN BE SAID ABOUT THE PERFORMANCE OF A-TAYY TODAY. THE 'LOOK' WAS THERE TODAY. SHE GETS THIS LOOK (sometimes) DURING GAMES...LIKE A HAWK GETTING READY TO SWOOP DOWN ON AN UNSUSPECTING PREY...OR A SLEEK, SLIM PANTHER ABOUT TO RUN DOWN AND DISABLE A GAZELLE.

 A LOOK OF INTENSITY. OF CONFIDENCE. A LOOK OF CLARITY AND UNDERSTANDING. WE LOVE IT WHEN A-TAYY COMES OUT WITH 'THE LOOK'. YOU KNOW ALL IS GOING TO BE OK...

A LOOK THAT SAYS...WINNER.

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Softball finished a weekend of play against Northern Kentucky University winning 8-0.  The Softball Cards got out to a quick lead by scoring 4 in the first inning.  While that is all they would need to win for the day, the game officially ended in the bottom of the sixth due to the run rule.  (The run rule is in effect when a team leads by more than 8 runs after the 5th inning.) 

Freshman Tiarra Sanabria got her first official start on the mound and went two innings giving up one hit and striking out two.  Sanabria was relieved by Caralisa Connell, who fanned 4 in two innings, and Maryssa Becker closed out the game and got the win on the day. 

The softball team heads to the west coast next weekend to participate in the Mayfair Tournament in Fullerton, CA.   They will return home the weekend of March 7-9. 

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Lacrosse finished their Virginia road trip at William & Mary on Sunday and won in a dominant performance, with a final score of 18-5.

Nikki Boltja had a season-best 7 goals to lead the Cardinals.  The Cardinals had a 21 minute stretch in the game where they scored 14 unanswered goals.  This was the 4th best unanswered stretch in school history. 

Coach Kellie Young had this to say about her teams performance on Sunday:
 
"This was one of the best overall efforts of my college coaching days," head coach Kellie Young said. "End to end, every player gave their best effort and showed incredible attention to detail."

Sounds like a great win and great team play for Lacrosse.  Next up for the team is a return home for a match up on Saturday, March 1 against Denver.  With very few home gams on the schedule for the team this will be a rare opportunity to see a game.  

jenny obryan
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4 comments:

  1. ESPN's latest bracketology....Cardinals remain a #2 seed and travel to Baton Rouge to potentially face LSU in the second round. Other top seeds in Louisville Regional are UConn #1, West Virginia #3, Kentucky #4, Michigan State #5 and North Carolina #6.

    How about UConn vs UK and Louisville vs North Carolina?

    Although I still have trouble believing that the NCAA would put UConn in Louisville setting up a potential fourth matchup prior to the Final Four.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm with you Mike, I just do not see the committee putting Connecticut in the Louisville regional. I hope we are both right. A win next Monday would go a long way in insuring that does not happen.
    The stars may be aligning to make this a possibility. 8 scholarship players.
    KML currently sidelined with mono. Mo Jefferson is wearing a boot on her foot (though playing through whatever is going on with her foot...Geno described her as "hobbled") and Banks has been playing on and off all season on a bum ankle that keeps getting turned.
    It will have to be a perfectly executed game plan to pull this off. I am feeling hopeful with this matchup, which is certainly not the usual case.

    I look at Creme's bracketology, mostly for fun, though I do not put a lot of stock in his selections.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I really think that a consideration which will quietly and seriously be considered by the committee is our team having fans that travel well. I don't think they want to force a knockout of either UConn or Louisville so early as I think the fan base of both are important to the committee. If they are not, why all the talk of geographic location of the team placements?

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  3. I hope we get a #1 seed too but in all honesty unless we beat UConn on the 3rd and TN beats SC in their final game of the season it's pretty hard to argue that we deserve a #1 more than SC, particularly considering their overall SOS and the 23 point beat down they laid on UK last weekend.

    With us hosting a regional we clearly have the inside track but SC seems like a #1 seed looking at it objectively. Hard to tell with Stanford given their schedule, but I think they are a lock due to the West Coast thingy. To me objectively it looks like UConn, ND, Stanford, SC.

    Not trying to be negative here but to me once you get to the tourney it doesn't matter. The worst thing a team can do is worry about seeding going into the dance. They need to just focus on balling their brains out. You're eventually going to have to play and beat the best if you are going to be a champion. Assuming we finish the season strong I like our mojo going into the tourney, regardless of seed.

    Go Cards!

    ReplyDelete

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