Saturday Cardinal Couple - A Pair of Wins

Field Hockey Comeback Win

Field Hockey made the trip up to Boston to take on the basement dwellers of the ACC, Boston College. Of course, BC is only one game behind UofL in conference, and is nationally ranked #13 in the coach's poll, and #12 in RPI. Just another day in ACC Field Hockey land, in other words.

The first approximately quarter of play was a scoreless tie, with The Eagles getting on the board first 16 minutes into the game. A mere two minutes later BC got a series of three penalty corners and finally got into the goal on the last one.

The Cards answered, and answered in a big way. 25 minutes into the game, UofL got the scoring started, and they finished the job within about four minutes. The first came at the hands of Nicole Woods, with an assist to Elisa "Chili" Garcia, and a second assist to Erin McCrudden. Another penalty corner two minutes later saw Chili and Woods team up again for goal. And, finally, with only about 4 minutes elapsed from the first Cards score, Stephanie Byrne was fed by Hailey Netherton to put UofL in the lead 3-2.

After the flurry of scoring in the latter part of the first half, the halftime score of 3-2 held all of the way through the second half to be the final tally of the game.

With this game being played near the Charles River, Cardinal Couple didn't have anyone on hand to provide any particular insights, nor do we have post-game audio available from Coach Sowry. It is encouraging to see two scores on penalty corners, which UofL have not capitalized well on throughout the season. Standing firm on defense has been a Sowry calling card, and that was definitely in evidence in the second half with freshman goalkeeper Ayeisha McFerren chalks up four saves with BC outshooting the Cards 6-5 and 3-0 on penalty corners after the break.

Like last week, the tendency is to relax a little for an out-of-conference Sunday matchup, last week against UMass, and this week at NorthEastern, but the NE Huskies are sitting at 47th in the RPI. While it is a bit of a drop from ACC level competition, it's not a time to take a nap.

This game against BC wrapped up ACC play for the Cards...finishing 2-5 in conference. Duke is, after a loss last night to UNC, sitting at 2-4 with a game against top dog Syracuse still to go. Presuming Duke loses that, we end up tied for 5th in the conference. While it's tempting to be disappointed with that result, we're still sitting in 9th place in the coaches poll, and I don't expect that to change drastically unless, perhaps, Liberty drops a game and gives us room to move up to 8th.

Volleyball Sweeps Wake Forest

Celebrating breaking into the Top 25 in volleyball, the Cards swept the evening against Wake Forest. Wake isn't a powerhouse team in the ACC, but they also showed why you can't take any match for granted in a good quality conference. The competition level in all ACC Sports is nothing to be taken lightly.

UofL started out the first set with a small run out to 6-1, but Wake Forest started climbing back into it to tie it up at 10. The score traded back and forth, with UofL just barely staying on the higher side of it, but not able to achieve any real separation until late in the set when they ran off the last 5 points of the set to win it 25-20. Wake was never able to get on top during the set, but did keep it close for most of the set with six ties.

The second set was a bit more of what I expected UofL to be able to do against Wake. This one was never in any doubt, with a couple of lead swings early, but the Cards quickly got out in front and pulled away for a 25-14 win.

The third set was more like the first. With an early Cardinal lead, Wake rallied to get back to a tie at 17. Louisville was able to get some separation near the end, scoring 8 of the last 12 points to capture the set and match.

ACC Freshman of the Week, Aniah Philo lead the team in kills with 16 with only three miscues for a very impressive .419. Get used to that name, you're going to be seeing it a lot over the next few years, if she plays tomorrow, like she did last night, I think there will be a great argument for her being ACC Freshman of the Week twice in a row.

Erin Fairs also had double digit kills, with 12 for a good .310 percentage. The sophomore middle pair, Tess Clark and Maggie DeJong, both put 5 shots down on 9 attempts, for .444 and .333 respectively. Janelle Jenkins got 8 kills, but four errors dropped her percentage to .211. Two aces in the match, both to Katie George, but both of the "service specialists", Lyndsey Palmer and Gabbie Wiley came in to served tough and got Wake out of system several times, but didn't get on the stats sheet with any aces. Defensively, Molly Sauer dug a pretty typical 13 shots. Fairs, Dejong and Clark all had solo blocks, with Tess also getting in on three that she shared with others.

Volleyball will be back in action at the KFC Yum! Center against Duke. This one starts at 1pm, which is a time change from when it was originally scheduled.

Pre-Season Honors for Basketball

Asia Durr has been named College Sports Madness Freshman of the Year, with Mariya Moore and Myisha Hines-Allen being named to the publication's preseason All-ACC second and third team, respectively.


SOCCER TONIGHT

The Louisville Women's Soccer team faces another #1 in Florida State tonight at Lynn Stadium. A 7 o'clock kick is scheduled for this tough ACC contest. 

It will be a measuring stick for the 2015 Louisville Wide Netters. FSU dominated UofL last year in Tallahassee 6-0. Most of that team returns for the 'Noles. 

Hmmm...Florida State in football @ noon today and then Florida State in soccer tonight. Let's take two, CARDS!  


RADIO TODAY

The CARDINAL COUPLE RADIO HOUR airs today at 11 am on WCHQ 100.9 FM and on the internet at crescenthillradio.com. We have a full show ready to go with Volleyball, Field Hockey and Women's Soccer recaps...as well as our extended interview with UofL head softball coach Sandy Pearsall and the sounds from the WBB Tip-Off luncheon.

Another show where Paulie and Worldwide won't get in many words...join us, won't you?

JMcA
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