Monday Cardinal Couple

Softball Goes West

The Softball team has their 13th consecutive NCAA tournament appearance ready to go.  They were placed in the Columbia Regional hosted by Missouri.  Their first opponent will be Nebraska, who has a record of 33-19 compared to the Cardinals 35-15.  Missouri is also, obviously, in the regional, and their first opponent will be BYU.  Missouri boasts a 39-14 record, and a 15 seed in the tournament, while BYU comes into the tournament 35-19.

Louisville met Nebraska twice in the regular season, as part of the ACC/Big Ten Challenge in Raleigh NC.  Nebraska won both of those, 4-3, and 3-0.

The softball tournament is much like NCAA Baseball, with 4-team regional tournaments that feed into a 2-team Super-Regional.  The eight teams that emerge from that advance to the Women's College World Series (WCWS) in Oklahoma City.  All three portions of the tournament are some form of double-elimination.  The regionals are straightforward double-elimination, the super-regionals are only two teams, so double-elimination devolves to a best-of-three series. 

The Women's College World Series format needs some explanation of its own.  It essentially consists of two 4-team double-elimination tournament brackets, but there is some "cross-over" when a team loses, they may move over to the "loser's" bracket of the other 4-team bracket.  The eventual winners of these two double-elimination brackets then meet in a "Championship Series" which is, itself, a best-of-three series.

The first game for The Cards will be Thursday, May 19th at 5:30 (or so, as multi-game softball events always involve some "ish" scheduling).

Track & Field Goes to the Podium

Track & Field wrapped up the ACC Outdoor Championships in track & field and two Cardinal women deserve shout-outs.

Raven Grant finished 3rd in the 100m, while Emmonnie Henderson finished 2nd in the discus.  Both earned All-ACC honors for their performances and "E" also picked up the Most Valuable Field Performer award.

The NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships will be June 8-11 in Eugene, OR.

Volleyball Goes East

The Volleyball Cards are about to embark upon a Eurotrip.  They will be leaving Wednesday for a nearly two week trip to various countries in Europe to play against multiple different professional teams.  Alas, I don't have the full itinerary in front of me as I type this, but there will be stops in Italy, Slovenia, and The Czech Republic (which we can now officially call "Czechia").

In addition to being an amazing opportunity to see some of the wider world, the chance to play against professional level teams is a big boost as well.  The team also has gotten a benefit from this trip as it allows them to have a significant number more practice sessions in preparation.  The NCAA allows (I believe) a trip abroad once every five years and allows extra practices to prepare for the trip, so it is a big benefit to the team to take advantage of it.  Of course, a trip like this will give the team even more of a chance to bond with each other and build an esprit de corp...even more than they already have.


The Cardinal Couple Radio Hour

If you missed the Saturday broadcast of the Cardinal Couple Radio Hour, here's the link:


LINK: https://soundcloud.com/chradio/cardinal-couple-20160514


Some very good interviews with Jared Anderson, Louisville Softball, Louisville Lacrosse and Louisville golfer Olivia Cason...plus reviews of Louisville women's athletic results.

- JMcA