Monday Cardinal Couple -- Lacrosse to face Ohio St. in 1st round of NCAA women's lacrosse tournament

MONDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

- Lacrosse plays Friday in Evanston, Ill.

- Welcome to the Ville, Brianna!

- Softball wins regular season finale, gets #3 in AAC

- More Asia


Cards face familiar foe in NCAA first round


The LAX Cards will have a familiar opponent in the opening round of the 2014 NCAA Women's Lacrosse Tournament. They'll head to Evanston, IL. and the Northwestern Wildcats campus to face Ohio St. Friday. The winner gets #5 seeded Northwestern on Sunday. Ohio State received an at-large bid.

The two squads met during the regular season...OSU taking a 12-11 win over Kellie Young's crew in Columbus. Louisville was down by three late but rallied to cut it to one.

Leave it to NCAA Lacrosse to come up with a head-scratching format. Six teams were seeded and received first round byes. 12 other teams will battle to face the seeded entries. Eight other teams will battle in the first round of play...hoping to win and advance to the second round to face one of the other winners of those four games.

Louisville is one of two BIG EAST teams to play in the Tournament. Georgetown got an at-large bid and will face John Hopkins in first round action...the winner getting #3 seed NC State.

The ACC, where Louisville will play lacrosse next season, got seven school into the tournament and has the top three seeds in #1 Maryland, #2 Syracuse and #3 North Carolina. Virginia got a #6 seed. Notre Dame, Boston College and Duke also received bids from the ACC.

The Cards played five of the teams this season that got bids. Duke, Denver, Georgetown, Ohio State and Notre Dame. They went 3-3 against them...dowing Georgetown twice and Denver.


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Brianna Jones a 2015 verbal to Louisville

We know it is old news by now, but Louisville WBB has received a third verbal for the 2015 class.


Brianna Jones, a 5-foot-9 junior shooting guard from North Babylon (N.Y.), has given a verbal commitment to play for Louisville. She is ranked 14th in the class of 2015.

The No. 14 prospect in the 2015 class, Jones also had considered Ohio State, Penn State, Duke, Michigan and West Virginia. She is ranked as a 5 star recruit by Hoopgurlz.
 
Jones, who averaged 17.1 points and 10.3 rebounds for North Babylon as a junior, is the third player in the 2015 class to commit to Jeff Walz and the Cardinals. She joins Taja Cole, the No. 18 prospect, and Maya Benham, a three-star recruit.

Jones is a scorer who excels at the mid-range jumper. That's worth its weight in gold.

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Softball downs Memphis to end regular season.


Senior Katie Keller and junior Kayla Soles each had four hits while senior Rachel LeCoq scattered four hits as the University of Louisville softball team wrapped up the regular season with a 6-2 win over host Memphis Sunday afternoon.


The Cardinals (33-20, 14-7 American) jumped to a 2-0 lead in the top of the first when Brittany Duncan drew a two-out walk and Taner Fowler followed with a hit to set up Katie Keller's two-run double.


Louisville put up a three-spot in the sixth when hits by Keller, Hannah Kiyohara and Maryssa Becker loaded the bases for Kayla Soles' RBI single. Jordan McNary's sacrifice fly plated Kiyohara. Soles came home on a hit by Whitney Arion to make the score 5-0.


The Cards added another run in the sixth when Keller connected on her second double and fourth hit of the game, took third on Kiyohara's groundout and scored on an RBI single by Arion to increase the lead to 6-0.


Entering the bottom of the seventh, Louisville's Rachel LeCoq had retired 17 straight batters
following an error which put a runner on in the first. Wheeler Hill sent a high chopper to third base to break up LeCoq's no-hitter. Brittany Vaughn followed with an infield single and Kelly Braman's RBI hit put the Tigers on the scoreboard. A single by Ellen Roberts loaded the bases for Jaye Smith's sacrifice fly which made the score 6-2.

LeCoq (11-8) got the win, allowing two earned runs on four hits and striking out seven in a complete game effort.


Keller was 4 for 4 with two doubles, two runs and two RBIs. She now has a team-best 19 doubles on
the season which moves her to fourth on the school's single-season list. Soles was 4 for 4 with a double and two RBIs to lead the Cards at the plate.


Ellen Roberts (12-19) took the loss, allowing five earned runs on 10 hits in 6.0 innings. The Tigers drop to 23-32 (5-15 American). Louisville will travel to Houston for the American Athletic Conference championship which will be held May 8-10.


Louisville is the #3 seed and will open play Thursday morning  @ 11 A.M. against #6 seed Temple.

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A-Tayy getting that winning feeling in Minnesota


In case you missed it, here's a great link on Minnesota Lynx WNBA prospect Asia Taylor:

http://www.wnba.com/lynx/news/training_camp_day_6_2014_05_03.html

paulie