And Then there Was One
Volleyball has put away the knee pads for the season, meaning we here at Cardinal Couple are left with only a single team in action this time of year. Thankfully, it's a sport that we cover heavily, and is deeply embedded in the zeitgeist of the state of Kentucky.
Of course I'm talking about Basketball. We won't be too long before we see other sports start to spin up either their winter seasons, such as indoor track and field, and swimming and diving; or spring seasons, such as Softball and Lacrosse. But for now, we have basketball. I suspect we're all ok with that state of affairs for the moment. (I do plan to write up more of a retrospective on the amazing Volleyball season...but to be honest, I'm still processing it a bit)
Basketball
OK, so basketball it is for the moment. And in the moment, we have a competition at Boston College to look forward to today.
The Cards are in Chestnut Hill getting ready to take on Joanna Bernabei-McNamee's squad. She's in her 6th season with the Eagles and continues to, slowly but steadily, build the program into something the school can be proud of.
They boast a current record of 10-4, which at first blush looks respectable. As you look through the opponents, however, they're not exactly leading the way in strength of schedule. As a side note, Paulie and I did chuckle during the CCRHP yesterday about the presence of "Holy Cross" and "Sacred Heart" on their schedule, and the overlap of the names with Louisville area high schools. It was this morning that I noticed that they had also played Providence, continuing the amusement.
Back to being serious, BC has been increasing their level of competition as their season progresses, certainly a reasonable approach to scheduling, with more recent competition being against a ranked Ole Miss, Oregon State, Arkansas, and Virginia.
Today's game launches, in earnest, the ACC conference season for both teams. Both have had a conference game before going back to one or more non-conference foes, but it's conference the rest of the way for both.
Boston College has a fairly balanced offense, between four players averaging double digit scoring. That starts with a graduate student 6'0" guard, Dontavia Waggoner averaging just over 12; junior 6'0" guard T'yana Todd coming in just short of 12; senior 6'0" guard Andrea Daley approaching 11; and junior 6'1" forward Teya Sidberry at about 10.5.
Todd will be the main threat beyond the arc, though Daley and Sidberry can hit some as well. Waggoner will almost certainly not attempt any. Conversely, Todd will not be much of a rebounder while the other three average between five and seven per game.
The Cards still feel like one big question mark of a team to me. We've seen the team excel against some pretty good teams, and play competitively, even if to a loss, against some top tier teams, but then sometimes they seem to come out and just completely lay and egg. They've had a couple of lengthy spans between games, eight days since they last played (Memphis), and six days before that. So coach Walz has had some time to work with them in the gym, they got a break to potentially head home, or get away from the practice gym, and hopefully get into a good mindset to come back and put together a good run in conference play. We'll see.
The game today is available on The ACC Network, the linear channel, and is of course also available through ESPN/ACC Network Extra streaming. With the linear channel appearance, it's a 2pm tip.
Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast
Paulie and I played through some adversity to get the CCRHP recorded. It's always a bit more challenging to keep the conversation flowing smoothly when it's only two people on the call, but it gets exceedingly difficult when, sporadically, the audio between the two participants drops out so they can't reliably hear each other. The challenges didn't seem to impact the audio flow to the broadcast, but as you're listening, bear in mind that at times one of us couldn't hear the other, and occasionally neither of us could hear each other.
Despite the challenges, we did end up having a really good discussion wrapping up Volleyball for the season, and looking forward to today's basketball competition in Boston.
Check it out:
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JMcA
I'm thinking we're gonna see a more cohesive team going forward. The talent is there, just a matter of players understanding roles now👍
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