Soccer Faces USC Upstate -- THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Louisville Homestand Continues

The Louisville women's soccer team will continue their run of matches at home today as they look to move to 4-1 with a match against USC Upstate. Today's match will come at an extremely unique time, likely at least somewhat to do with the upcoming holiday weekend. The Cards will host the Spartans with a kickoff at 3PM. While that wouldn't be terribly strange for a Saturday or Sunday game, today is Thursday. USC Upstate apparently needs to catch an early flight to get back, creating an unusual midweek "getaway day" game. At any rate, Louisville has found itself with some unseasonably mild weather this week, so the mid-afternoon start shouldn't be too terrible with a high of just 79 degrees. 

A quick click of the "history" link on this matchup takes you directly to the general UofL women's soccer history page, indicating that this is the first ever matchup between these two teams. Sounds like a great time for the Cards to add a new team to the list of "teams against whom Louisville has an all-time winning record." The Spartans (who hail from Spartanburg, South Carolina) are 1-2 so far this season. They opened with a 1-0 win over Wofford but followed that victory with 3-0 and 2-1 losses to Davidson and EKU, respectively. Interestingly, despite opening the season in Spartanburg, USC Upstate has yet to play a regular season match at their home stadium as Wofford is also located in Spartanburg. The Spartans played EKU in Lexington last Thursday and had Sunday off, so they probably wouldn't have minded Louisville scheduling their bunny games a bit differently. 

Last season, USC Upstate finished quite strong. The Spartans went 10-5-4 overall with a 5-1-2 record in the Big South Conference. They won the Big South Championship, giving them the automatic qualifier and earning the honor of heading to Chapel Hill to be throttled by the champions-to-be. UNC won that first round game 8-0. The Spartans finished the season ranked 155th in RPI, second in their conference behind the Big South two-seed High Point by four spots. That couldn't have felt great, considering the Spartans had just thumped the Panthers 3-0 in the title game. 

USC Upstate returns 16 players from their 2024 roster, meaning they have plenty of familiarity with one another. Their returners also include their top points earner from last season as well as two of top three goal scorers. Dara Russo is a senior from Miamisburg, Ohio who scored nine goals and tallied five assists last year. While not the most efficient player on the team, her efficiency was considerable. Russo took 56 shots and put 27 of those on target (with 9 in the net). It would be in Louisville's best interest to deny her opportunities in front of goal this afternoon. 

When I asked Coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes about how today's match looked in the post-game on Sunday, she was just as unsure as I was. With a new opponent and not a lot of film available (nor time to watch it), Louisville will be depending mostly on how to do better on their own. There was plenty to take from the last 60 minutes of Sunday's game for that, but it was a successful outing nonetheless. I won't talk down about a 7-2 win. While Louisville is unlikely to have a third straight game with at least seven goals, I would expect them to seek a return to the clean sheet. The match against Wright State saw some defensive breakdowns, even from the starting crew (or most of it) and today is an opportunity to clean that up. 

If you're able, try to head down to campus today. I would imagine Louisville will take all the attendance they can get. If you aren't, you'll be able to catch this one on ACC Network Extra. After today's match, Louisville is back at home on Sunday against Coastal Carolina. The match against the Chanticleers will be the Cards' second straight against a new opponent. 

Until next time, Go Cards!

Case

WSOC Hosts Home Opener -- THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Cards Bring in Detroit Mercy

After an unceremonious end to their season-opening road trip, Louisville women's soccer opens their slate at Dr. Mark and Cindy Lynn Stadium tonight on what is the first day of regular season action on campus. Karen Ferguson-Dayes's squad isn't the first team to compete on campus today, nor are they the first team to compete in Lynn. The men's soccer team will open its home schedule this evening as well, as the two teams take part in a double header. Tonight marks the only soccer double header of the season, making next Thursday's 3PM kickoff for the women a bit of a head scratcher. At any rate, the men will get things started against Southern Indiana at 5PM with the women to follow against Detroit Mercy. The scheduled start time for the women's game is 7:30, and the match will be available on ACC Network Extra. 

The Cards are coming off of a 1-1 SEC road trip following a 1-0 win at Auburn and a 2-0 loss at Vanderbilt. Louisville may have preferred those results come in the opposite order for multiple reasons. The first of those is that Vandy was the 17th-ranked team in the country when the two teams met and the second is for momentum. The great vibes created by the win they toughed out in Alabama were a bit deflated by their mild dismantling in the first half in Nashville. Louisville could be buoyed by their second half performance where, although they weren't able to find the net, they outshot Vandy 10-4 (3-0 on frame).

I think what I would expect most from tonight's match is for the defense to be lockdown. Both goals on Sunday were the direct result of defensive errors. On the first, a high defensive line was beaten by a breakaway on a good through ball. While the high line can create offsides and keep the ball forward for offensive chances, that opening goal displayed the potential pitfalls. If you lose track of a player, especially a speedy one, you can give away one-on-one opportunities. (Personally, I would have played the situation a bit more aggressively in goal and challenged the ball harder at the top of the box, but Erynn Floyd chose to test the freshman forward and forced her to make a clean shot. Either option was fine. One-on-ones are difficult and usually favor the attacker.) 

Speaking of one-on-one chances, the second goal came on the most advantageous of those: the penalty kick. A clumsy tackle in the box led to a penalty, even after video review, and penalties have about an 85-90% success rate. I absolutely see the case for a penalty in that instance, but I wouldn't have minded the commentating crew at least acknowledging the case against it. Olivia Stafford was never going to get to the ball after her heavy touch toward the end line, and Hadley Snyder's stab at the ball didn't create the contact with Stafford; Stafford started to chase the ball and crashed into Snyder's leg. Like I said, it was clumsy, and since it happened in the box, the only option is to not call a foul at all, which wouldn't have gotten much applause from the home crowd. So it goes. 

Louisville's defense cleaned it up in the second half, allowing four shots for the second straight half but keeping Vandy from putting the ball on frame. I think the Cards will look to keep their second clean sheet of the season, and I suspect the defense would like to keep Detroit Mercy from taking any shots at all if they can. 

Offensively, I'll be looking for a bit more consistency from the attack. So far, KFD has been much more fluid with the lineup in the front, partially to keep fresh legs in the tough conditions of the first two games. Amelia Swinarski (118) and Liza Suydam (114) lead the way in offensive minutes for the Cards. It will be interesting to see if Mackenzie Geigle is back to full strength or not. We never got a full report on what kept Gigs out of game one, but she did return against Vandy with limited minutes (31). Nicole Jodoin has been a presence as a freshman, starting both games so far and helping the offense move along. We'll see if she can continue to break out against the run of somewhat easier competition on this home stand. 

Detroit Mercy brings in a 1-1 record after opening the season with a 2-1 home win over Valparaiso before losing 4-0 to Michigan in Ann Arbor. The Titans were just 10-8-2 last year, but they went 7-1-2 in conference play. Detroit Mercy's 23 points in Horizon League play saw them finish in third behind Milwaukee's 28 (9-0-1) and Northern Kentucky's 25. The Titans were knocked out of the Horizon League tournament by the Norse in the semifinals by a score of 1-0. 

Louisville has faced Detroit Mercy just once before, and the Cards hold an 0-1 all-time record against the Titans. That lone matchup came in 1994, the first year after Louisville's first winning season and the final year of Louisville women's soccer's time as an independent. The Cards went 7-10-3 in 1994 and lost to Detroit Mercy 3-1 on October 9th of that year. It seems that I brought bad luck to the Cards, as their 11-7 1993 season came right before I was born. Despite back to back .500 seasons in 1995 (9-9) and 1996 (9-9-2), 1993 stood as Louisville's only winning record until Karen Ferguson-Dayes fifth season saw the Cards finish 12-5-3. From 2004 to 2019, Louisville had just four non-winning seasons with losing records in 2009 and 2014 and back-to-back .500 seasons in 2015 and 2016. Covid was rough on the Cards, as Louisville has not finished above .500 since 2019. 

Louisville is off to a good start in their quest to improve on last year's near .500 mark (7-6-5), but they'll need to build a fair amount of confidence heading into conference play. The Cards have won more than four conference games just twice since joining the ACC (2018 and 2019). Tonight's game is a good time to start that confidence building. I'm disappointed to be unable to make it in person, but it should be a fantastic night for soccer, with the forecast showing 78 degrees and partly cloudy at kickoff. If you're able, get out and support the women's team, and get double the action if you head out early for the men's game. 

Until next time, Go Cards!

Case

WSOC Adds More Twins -- THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Cards Sign Morris Sisters

Louisville women's soccer was already set to have one pair of twins on the roster in the 2025-26 season with incoming freshman Karina and Kiley Peat from Wilmington, North Carolina. If that wasn't enough, though, their quantity of twins will be twice as nice as the team announced the signing of Taylor and Trista Morris earlier this week. 

Photos from Racing Louisville via GoCards

The Morris sisters were committed to join UofL next year anyway, but Karen Ferguson-Dayes will get the talented local products a season sooner as the two decided to reclassify and leave high school one year earlier. Out of the J. Graham Brown School, the two play club soccer for Racing Louisville. About the two, KFD had this to say: "Super excited to add Taylor and Trista to our 2025 class. Taylor is a dangerous and elusive forward who has a knack for scoring goals and Trista is an excellent defender who has the ability to play centrally or wide at the back! Both Taylor and Trista are high level athletes and it just made sense to start their development now!"

In high school, Taylor scored 104 goals and had 23 assists. She was a second team All-State honoree and twice was named first team All-Region and first team All-District. Trista scored 36 goals and had 41 assists out of the back. She was All-State honorable mention, made the All-Region first team twice, and was named to the All-A Tournament team three times. 

As a former high school soccer player in Louisville, two talented players coming out of Brown caught me off guard. When I played (which was getting to be quite a while ago at this point), Brown fielded a co-ed team and were regularly run off the pitch. For them to have developed not only a girls program but a fairly good one is a testament to the growth of soccer in the city since Louisville City and Racing Louisville set up shop. 

As we get ever closer to opening day (August 14th), we'll soon see players wrapping up their summer club duties and getting together on the training grounds at UofL. The addition of the Morris sisters means that Louisville will have 11 newcomers to the squad this season, so the sooner they can start to gel as a team the better. 

Until next time, Go Cards!

Case

Fall Sports Media Day at UofL -- Wednesday Cardinal Couple

 CARDS FALL COACHES AND PLAYERS SPEAK

(the "young" Karen Ferguson Dayes)

-- Joe Franklin...cross country and track and field:

JOE FRANKLIN

-- Karen Ferguson Dayes...women's soccer:

KAREN FERGUSON DAYES

-- Justine Sowry...Field Hockey

JUSTINE SOWRY

-- Dani Busboom Kelly...Volleyball

DANI BUSBOOM KELLY

-- Anna DeBeer, Elle Glock...Volleyball

Anna DeBeer and Elle Glock

A nice, "welcome back to campus" noon time for me and Sonja as roughly a dozen media and women's sports S.I.D.'s were in attendance at the press room in the Planet Fitness Kueber Center on Floyd Street on the UofL Belknap campus.  We also got Chick-Fil-A and water, plus chips...woo hoo! 

We got all of the pressers and Q&A except for men's soccer for you...(since we don't cover MSOC) and we already have almost an hour of interviews here already. Thanks to UofL for the feeds. Why volleyball was the only sport to send players is a question...but, hey, it's UofL's show and they did an otherwise wonderful jlob with it. We appreciate the yearly update. 

WSOC kicks off he fall sports season Thursday. Jared will look at the match tomorrow morning as the Cards face Bellarmine. A 7:30 pm match at Lynn Stadium, on campus. Admission is free. We'l have a large Cardinal Couple crew in attendance for this one. 

paulie 

Does WSOC and FH End of Season Collapses signal changes are needed? -- WEDNESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 Women's Soccer, Field Hockey are a combined 1-9-1 in last eleven matches. 

If you read us often, you've probably surmised by now that we basically throw our efforts into covering three sports in the fall UofL women's sports seasons. women's soccer, field hockey and volleyball. We're fortunate in the fact that we've got a photographer in Jared Anderson who loves all three and gets us great pictures, and our five combined writers have a lot of expertise in covering these three sports. They also get pretty decent venues to watch the sports they cover -- Trager Stadium for Field Hockey is one of the best venues in the nation for the sport. Lynn Stadium has a wonderful pitch  excellent seating for the women's soccer squad to conduct  business and Volleyball has two spots to pack -- the LNFCU, a smaller home court and the massive KFC YUM! Center for the huger matches. Word gets to me that Volleyball is considering  even more matches held downtown next year at the KFC YUM! Center and the huge crowds that have been attending them there are an encouraging sign that more success is likely in crowd attendance if they schedule more wide net events there. 

Two of these fall sports are struggling lately with the end of the season collapses and more than one of you, our readers, have asked me some pretty pointed questions on whether changes are needed in coaching direction at the top. 

For one of these fall sports, Field Hockey, I don't think any change in leadership or coaching is called for or needs to happen. 12-5 (the squad's current record) would be hailed as an incredible season so far at a lot of schools and, let's not forget -- at 11-1 Field Hockey was considered a top five school.. Three of the last four losses have also come at the hand of schools that are top 10, year in and year out, in the sport. 

If anything, all Field Hockey needs is one or two juggernauts who can become offensive threats beside the Plumb sisters.  Just one goal a game over the last five games is unacceptable and taxes too unfairly one of the best defenses in the nation. Let's also not forget the the ACC is the toughest league in DI Field Hockey and the Cards didn't take any easy non-conference roads, scheduling wise, with three top 10 foes. 

Being ranked #12 in the NFCHA poll is maybe not as good as some Cardinals fans might have wanted, but there are a lot of schools who would gladly have their name next to that record.  The Flock just needs to figure out how to start winning more end of the season matches, and that can be solved by scoring more. Not as easy as it sounds, but it is a logical cure. The Cards are probably on the fence for the Field Hockey NCAA Championships, a good ACC Tournament performance is imperative, in my opinion.

So...you don't throw Justine Sowry down the steep steps that lead to her office. She's one of the best at what she does and a less than top ten season can happen now and then. Load up on the scorers, coach. 

 

For women's soccer, the road is a bit rockier. At 3-9-5, WSOC has disappointed against several foes that weren't given much of a chance to beat an ACC school. Losses to Xavier and Dayton and ties against Indiana State, NKU and Wyoming are head-scratching. Turn those into "W"'s and 8-7-2 doesn't look too bad, but changes are needed in player personnel and offensive firepower. 

The Kickin' Cards are being outscored 25-14 on the season.

Louisville Women's Soccer doesn't have anyone on the roster who has scored three goals this season. And, they have only five players who have started in all 17 games. 

The roster is fairly young, with 14 players either sophomores or freshmen., but those underclassmen need to stick around and continue to grow with the squad and not leave. And, thee will be some big names to replace after this season...with Ravin Alexander, Autumn Weeks and Morgan Bentley in their final seasons.

The answer is fairly obvious, but not an easy one to come up with. Find better scorers. Giving up 1.47 goals a game did not tank this squad this season, scoring less than a goal a game did. 

Coaching change? Maybe not, but, more experts "in the know" see it as inevitable. On a personal note, I know of few people who work harder with their rosters and game planning than Karen Ferguson Dayes. A legend, like Ferguson-Dayes is, should be allowed the decency and the respect of deciding when to step down. She's piloted this soccer program since 2000. She's had rough seasons before and always came back. I'm confident she will again. 

So, be patient, fall Cardinal women's sports fans in the WSOC and FH sectors. You are under good leadership and things will change for the better. Just remember...scoring=wins.

We'd like your thoughts on it, if you have them. Hit us up in the comments section.

paulie.

Cards WSOC upsets Pitt 3-2 -- Field Hockey and Volleyball today -- FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

CARDS OUTSCORE PANTHERS TO GET FIRST ACC WIN

It was a nice turn of events Thursday night for Louisville women's soccer. They jumped out to a 2-0 lead against a Pitt WSOC squad that had been outscoring opponents 21-7 on the season. Pitt made a run, you almost expected they would, but Louisville held firm in the final minutes and walked off the Lynn  Stadium turf with a "W"

How did Cards head WSOC Coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes and her players feel about the 3-2 win? Hard to say, since the team did not do any post game interviews. 

The win was Louisville's second of the season and one that the Cards never trailed in. A huge "thank you" is due goalkeeper Erryn Floyd, who was making some incredible stops out on the pitch and ended up with six saves. She'll also get my "Player of the Week" award...she was spectacular in holding Virginia to just one goal earlier in the week. Credit Emma Hiscock, Emerson Jennings and Mackenzie Geigle as well, all with their first goals of the season. And, credit a tenacious Cards defense that bent a few times but never completely broke. The 3-4-3 alignment seemed to work, and it definitely had the Panthers confused at times. 

If you saw this one as a "back against the wall" scenario for Louisville coming into the match, you weren't far off. The Cards needed a quality win or two to give them some inspiration and hope going into ACC play. The tie on Sunday against Virginia was a sign of things moving in the right direction. Last night's win added fuel to the fire. 

We, at Cardinal Couple, hear all the speculation and murmurs about it maybe being "time for a change" at UofL in WSOC leadership. I can't subscribe to the theory, though. We did see it as a rebuilding year for Cards WSOC and the rebuild has just taken a bit longer than we figured it might. And, the Cards are doing it without Maya Maxwell, Lizzie Sexton and Autumn Weeks....out with injuries or other unspecified situations. 

A long homestand stretch comes to an end, and...the rigors and uncertainties of the road begin, with a trip to Miami for a Sunday match.  Sebastian the Ibus' squad is at 2-4-3 on the season and took a shellacking at the hands of Clemson (in Coral Gables) 5-0 Thursday night. 

Let's wish the "kickin" Cards" the best of breaks and a few wins over the next four matches. Notre Dame, Florida State and Syracuse all have very, very good squads this season and the Cards defense will get a test in the next four. At least Syracuse and FSU are playing in Lynn. 

253 is a sad number for attendance, though, Cardinal fans. Especially for a free match. Maybe a bunch of would be fans were over at Louder Than Life over at the KEC, but the players do respond to and notice cheering crowds. If Dayton can bring in 2,000 for a home game, you'd think we'd could beat that. Maybe the 8 p.m. start played a role in the low attendance (it was a school night, after all)  but...what the ACC Network wants, it usually gets. 

After Friday's matches the Cards are alone in second place in the conference standing with four points. FSU, UNC and Notre Dame are tied for first with six points and 2-0 records. Overall the Cards are 2-1-4. I'm still not sure if I like this new rule about no overtimes until playoff or tournament season. Sure, it shortens a game up, but...maybe, just, maybe the fans who do show up would like to see a winner. Why not go to Field Hockey's reduced players on the pitch and a shoot-out to settle these ties?  The age-old cry of 90 minutes is enough to settle a contest doesn't appear to be holding water this season. There are 29 "ties" on the combined ACC schedule results so far. That's out of about 120 "results" (win, loss or tie)

I could never be a head soccer coach. The "tie" was something I never grew up with playing basketball and rarely encountered on the gridiron. 

I hope to see you out for WSOC on Oct 5th at Lynn. It's the Noles coming to call. With me, it's usually health-related if I don't show, these days. 

Don't lose those new home uniforms, equipment operations crew...they're on a one-game win streak.

( PHOTOS BY JARED ANDERSON)                                  

                   *****************************************

A doubleheader on Floyd Street awaits you today. Field Hockey starts it off with a 5 p.m. match against JMU over in Trager and Volleyball hosts Syracuse at 7 p.m. in the LNFCU. I hope to see you at Field Hockey and Jared will be dragging his bad back to both events, most likely.

paulie

Louisville Women's Soccer Opens Season -- Softball Adds Transfer -- THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Louisville Women's Soccer Opens Season Against Indiana State

We are finally at the 2023 Louisville sports season! Louisville women's soccer opens the season by welcoming Indiana State to Dr Mark and Cindy Lynn Stadium. The Cards and Sycamores will kick off at 7:30 p.m. and will be aired on ACCNX.

Head coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes kicks off her 24th season with the Cards with 200 career wins that featured six wins last year. She hit the recruiting trail hard in the offseason, bringing in four transfers and five freshmen.

Louisville has a strong international presence with five players coming into the United States to play for Louisville. Malene Nielsen (Juelsminde, Denmark), Alyssa Zalac (Montreal, Canada), Lucy Roberts (Cheshire, England), Viktoria Wik (Roskilde, Denmark), and Fiona Gaißer (Munich, Germany) are the international players for the Cards.

Maya Maxwell

Kentucky players are well represented on the team with five current players hailing from the Bluegrass State. Betsy Huckaby (South Oldham High School, Crestwood), Maya Maxwell (Ballard High School, Louisville), Savina Zamborini (DuPont Manual High School, Louisville), Hadley Snyder (Assumption High School, Louisville), Brooke Dardano (South Oldham High School, Crestwood) all represent Kentucky.

Last season, Indiana State went 2-11-3 with a 2-6-2 record in conference play. They tallied nine goals while surrendering 27 goals. They were shut out nine times.

Paulie and I will be out there tomorrow and hope to see Case or Daryl make an appearance too.

Kiley Goff Joins Softball 

Louisville softball announced the addition of a new catcher. Kiley Goff joins the Cards after being at Maryland the last two years and a year at Purdue before that. With Maryland's head coach stepping down in the offseason, Goff decided to explore her options and Louisville was her perfect landing spot.

Last season, Goff led the Big Ten in runners thrown out with 13 runners gunned down. She recorded a .990 fielding percentage. She also posted strong batting numbers: 42 hits, 42 runs scored, seven doubles, 18 stolen bases, and a .290 batting average.

With the departure of Sarah Gordon, Goss is primed to move into the starting catcher role from day one for her final year of eligibility.

Happy Thursday and Go Cards!

Jared

Getting to Know the Coaches: Women's Soccer -- TUESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Getting to Know the Coaches: Soccer

We continue our journey of getting to know coaches for various women's teams. This edition features the women's soccer coaches.

Karen Ferguson-Dayes, head coach

Coach KFD is one of the longest tenured coaches at Louisville and the longest Louisville women's soccer has had in its history. She took over in 2000 as the eighth head coach in program history.

Ferguson-Dayes is the winningest coach in program history, having over 200 total wins. She is the only coach in program history to lead the Cards to the NCAA Tournament.

Before coming to Louisville, Ferguson-Dayes was an assistant coach at Connecticut for three seasons. The Huskies made it to the Elite Eight or further in all three of those seasons. She was an assistant coach at Boston University for two years before that.

As a player, KFD spent her entire time at Connecticut, making it as far as the Final Four and being named to the All-Tournament team. She also played for the US National Team for two years.

Nick Stirrett, assistant coach

Stirrett joined the Cards during the summer of 2021 and is beginning his third season with Louisville.

He came to Louisville from Oregon State, where he was an assistant coach one year and an associate head coach the following year. The Beavers had one of the biggest improvements in a one-year stretch in NCAA women's soccer history.

Stirrett was at Illinois for three years as an assistant coach prior to Oregon State. He worked with the goalkeepers as well as being their recruiting coordinator.

He was with Penn State as an assistant coach for one season in 2015. The Nittany Lions won the national championship that season.

Before his transition into Division I, Stirrett was the head coach for the men's soccer team at Mount Union for two years. Before that, he was a head coach at Northern Illinois, DePauw, and Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology.

Hunter Norton, assistant coach

Norton has been with Louisville for eight seasons. The most recent six seasons, Norton has been an assistant. He was a volunteer assistant the first two years.

Prior to Louisville, Norton spent all four of his collegiate careers playing for Georgia Southern. He started every game in his career and earned multiple SOCON honors.

Jing Hughley, director of operations

Hughley has been with the Louisville women's soccer program since 2009, being the director of operations for the entirety of that period. She played a program support role for all Louisville sports for four years prior to that.

Hughley was a volleyball player at Louisville and never played soccer in college. She was a setter and earned several Conference USA accolades. The Cards made the NCAA Tournament in all four of her seasons.

Women's soccer has the first event of the 2023 season for Louisville Athletics when they face Miami University in a scrimmage in Oxford on August 6.Their first home event is on August 17.

Happy Tuesday and Go Cards!

Jared

Soccer Schedule -- THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Women's Soccer Schedule Released

Ah, we've reached the point of summer where the fall sports begin to release their respective schedules. Jeff came in yesterday with a breakdown of the volleyball schedule. Field Hockey, too, has released their 2023 opponents. Men's soccer, which we do not cover here, released their schedule this week. Yesterday, women's soccer announced their 2023 slate. You can find the Field Hockey, Volleyball and Women's Soccer schedules on the right hand side of the site. Let's look at WSOC today. 

Unofficially, the Cards start the season in Oxford, Ohio against Miami University in a scrimmage on Sunday, August 6. Streaming options for this seem highly unlikely.

The first official match will come at home against Indiana State on Thursday, August 17 at 7:30 p.m. This one will most likely be on ACC Network Extra. Louisville won the lone match-up between the two in 2016.

The Cards then hit the road to Ohio for a pair of matches against Xavier on Sunday, August 20 at 7:30 p.m. and Dayton on Thursday August 24 at 7:00 p.m. Xavier topped the Cards with a pair of second half goals at Lynn last year while Louisville last played Dayton in the spring of 2021 (COVID-19 season) and took a 1-0 win.

Louisville then has a three-match homestand beginning with Northern Kentucky on Sunday, August 27 at 7:30 p.m. UofL is 3-0 all-time against the Norse, including a 1-0 win last year. Illinois is next on the schedule on Thursday, August 31 with no time listed. The Illini have never lost to Louisville. Central Michigan closes out the homestand on Sunday, September 3 at 7:30 p.m. In their lone meeting, the Chippewas won at Cardinal Park in 2011.

Indiana will host the Cards on Thursday, September 7 at 7:00 p.m. in the Battle of the Border. The two teams battled it out to a 0-0 tie last season in Louisville.

Wyoming closes out the non-conference slate on Sunday, September 10 at 7:30 p.m. at Lynn Stadium. I was not able to locate any record of past meetings between the Cards and Buffaloes.

Virginia kicks off the conference portion of the schedule when they come to town on Saturday, September 16 at 7:00 p.m. The Cavaliers have never lost to the Cards and won 2-0 in Charlottesville last year. Louisville remains home against Pitt on Thursday, September 21 at 8:00 p.m. The Cards fell on the road 1-0 last year but do have a 7-3 all-time advantage in the series.

A late-September road trip is next for Louisville. They begin by visiting Coral Gables to take on Miami on Sunday, September 24 at noon. The Cards took the 1-0 last year and hold a 9-1 advantage in the overall series. A trip to Notre Dame on Saturday, September 30 at 7:00 p.m. is next. The Irish bested the Cards in Louisville last year 2-0.

Louisville opens up October with a pair of home matches. Florida State comes into town on Thursday, October 5 at 7:00 pm. The Seminoles command a 9-0 series lead. Syracuse visits on Sunday, October 8 at 1:00 p.m. Louisville defeated the Orange in 2021 to improve to 8-0 all-time in the series.

The final road trip begins with a visit to Boston College on Saturday, October 14 at at 7:00 p.m. UofL won 1-0 last year to even the series at 4-4. Clemson is the next stop on the tour on Thursday, October 19 at 7:00 p.m. A loss at home last year for the Cards evened the series 2-2-1. Louisville's final road match will come on Sunday, October 22 at 12:30 p.m. against Wake Forest. The Cards won in 2021 and tied the series at 3-3-1, including with three straight.

The Cards close out the regular season at home against Duke on Thursday, October 26 at 6:00 p.m. Louisville has not beaten the Blue Devils, going 0-4-5 all-time against them.

The ACC Tournament will begin on Sunday, October 29. It appears the ACC is sticking with their current format of the top six teams qualifying for the tournament despite there being 14 teams.

Last season, the NCAA rolled out a new rule of no overtime in regular season matches so all matches would conclude after the full 90 minutes of regulation. In terms of speeding up the game, it worked. However, it led to several more draws around the country with less chance of an overtime win.

We plan to provide coverage throughout the season and have hopes to have someone in attendance each home match.

Happy Thursday and Go Cards!

Jared

Guessing the Soccer Starting Lineup -- TUESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

AUDIT NEEDED...

Paulie provided us with our first, and possibly last, Cardinal Couple quiz of the 2022 summer. We've been fortunate enough to have plenty to talk about this summer and now fall sports are just a few days away. 

That didn't stop me from pulling off a perfect score yesterday. As someone who doesn't follow recruiting heavily, the Nyla Harris question was a bit tricky. The visit to South Dakota for volleyball was another one that took me a minute. If you scored in that 40-60 range, I'll gladly take that lunch at the Melting Pot.

JARED BREAKS DOWN LOUISVILLE WSOC

Women's soccer made an appearance with the bonus question. Our friends up I-71 are making a trip to Dr Mark and Cindy Lynn Stadium and it will be the first time we can see the Cards in action, and we have plenty of questions on what this year's team will look like.

Karen Ferguson-Dayes is a defensive minded coach so we have seen plenty of defensive formations in the past. Most commonly, the Cards have run the 4-4-2 formation, opting not to go with the 4-3-3 look that has been popularized in the United States.

What are these numbers I mentioned? These are formations that you have. Up to 11 players can be on the field at a time typically consisting of a goalkeeper plus a mixture of defenders, midfielders, and forwards/attackers.

The goalkeeper is not included in the number scheme as the keeper is assumed to already be there. The first number (usually a four) states the number of defenders. The second number (also most commonly a four) states the number of midfielders. The final number lists the number of forwards.

So who will we see in that starting formation? We'll work our way from the back to the front.

Goalkeeper

This is the first time we've seen an opening at goalkeeper in over half a decade. Olivia Pratapas is the only Louisville letter-winner on the current keepers list. She's still recovering from surgery in the offseason and probably won't be 100% by this weekend. That leaves Erynn Floyd, a true freshman, and Alyssa Zalac, a redshirt freshman, available. Due to the COVID-19 season and a true redshirt season last year, Zalac has seen two full academic years already. Based on her collegiate experience alone, I anticipate her getting the start.

Defense

The most sound position group for Louisville is defense. Sarah Hernandez and Maisie Whitsett have handled the middle of the defense (centerback) together for quite some time and the duo both are in a fifth year option. They should have the two centerback spots locked up tight. The outside corners on defense, sometimes referred to as fullbacks or defensive wingbacks, could potentially provide experience too. Ravin Alexander is a senior and has commanded one of those positions the last two years and should retain it. Brooke Dardano saw plenty of action as the other defensive wing as a freshman and should be a front runner for that position again this year. Louisville runs a style where the defensive wings will play way up on offense.

Midfield

The midfield is a bit trickier and is arguably the toughest position group to play in due to its high demand for cardio training as well as physicality. Midfielders can also have different responsibilities such as defensive midfield, offensive midfield, and sometimes playing a midfielder wing. Anouk Denton was a standout freshman at midfield last year and should hold more of a defensive midfielder position. Hayley Howard spent plenty of time in the midfield and should sit on the defensive side. Morgan Bentley has established herself as another strong midfielder and will play more on the offensive side. Savina Zamborini bounced back and forth as a forward and midfielder. I think she'll pull back and play more of an offensive midfield position this year.

Forward

That brings us to our group of forwards and attackers. Louisville doesn't play much of a style that features a true striker. Brooklynn Rivers would be the closest player we've seen to a striker in the last few years. After a strong back half of the season and several players ahead of her from last season gone, Emma Hiscock should be a frontrunner for a forward position. She was more of a right side attacker last year, but could potentially slide over depending who she's paired with.

I'd love to say Corinne Dente gets the start in the other spot, but after tearing an ACL, she tore her other ACL during the recovery process, which has now been over a year. Still, recovering from ACL tears in both legs at the same time is a tall task to ask. I see Dente playing more of a substitution role. Patricia Ward joins the Cards after four years with Minnesota, where she started 55 matches in her career and subbed in in another 10. Also being a track star in high school, Ward appears to have breakaway speed and has the potential to make an immediate impact on offense.

Note: These are just my guesses at who will get the start for the Cards this year. I haven't seen film or practice highlights on the incoming transfers or freshmen, so some of them could step up and be a bit of a surprise.

I'll also let Case come through to tear apart my thoughts on the formations and relaxed usage of position terminology as he will more than likely be able to provide a much more accurate and in depth prediction and expectation of the season.

Paulie should be at Friday's match in the press box hanging out with the new SID for women's soccer Matt Paras. Matt will also oversee women's basketball. I'll be out on the field with my camera taking selfies and catching the other Cardinal Couple members in the crowd. Both Case and Jeff mentioned that they have plans to be in attendance- women's soccer is free admission after all- this Friday. We haven't heard from Daryl yet on if she will be able to make it, but it would be awesome to have a full house to start the 2022-2023 Louisville sports season!

Happy Tuesday and Go Cards!

Jared

Soccer Opener; FIBA U19 Results; WBB Schedule -- SATURDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Women's Soccer Opens Season with Exhibition vs Ball State

Despite some confusion throughout the week about the nature of this game, it was never in doubt that Louisville would open the season tonight against Ball State. Earlier this week, during fall sports media day, Coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes emphasized that tonight's match would be an exhibition. That was news, as the game had not been listed as such on Louisville's schedule, nor was it called out as an exhibition in Louisville's schedule press release. However, last week's schedule press release from Ball State did call the game an exhibition, indicating that it has been considered one by the two sides for quite some time. That said, all that really does is give the Cards one less game on their regular season schedule. 

For the time being, it may take some of the pressure off of the team which has quite a few questions to answer. We saw what Louisville women's soccer looked like in the spring without Emina Ekic at the helm and it wasn't the prettiest action on the field. The Cards became a bit of a one trick pony on offense with Ekic, a point we've belabored here at Cardinal Couple, so getting an exhibition game to try and figure out what the team formation looks like now that the freshman players have been added to that roster from the spring should be very helpful before the real season opener next Thursday against Western Michigan. 

These two Cardinal teams last faced off in 2016, a forgettable season for Louisville. UofL went 7-7-4 that season, missing out on both the ACC and NCAA tournaments. Ball State was Louisville's seventh of eight non-conference opponents that year and the matchup came in Louisville's sixth straight home match. Louisville dominated the game with 23 shots (11 on frame) compared to just 4 (2) for Ball State. Unfortunately, the Ball State goalkeeper was up to the task, snagging 11 saves. The game was won with a Ball state golden goal in the 108th minute. We don't need to get into a whole discussion about college soccer tie rules (either tie in regulation or play the full overtimes, please), but that game was one of eight that Louisville played in 2016 that went into extra time. 

No one that played in the game for Louisville in 2016 remains on the roster, so it will be a fresh start for this Louisville team. The Cards will hope to get their feet under them as they look to build on the last few years in which they have seen growing success. Things will be hard without Ekic, as we have discussed, but there is a lot of talent on this team. Tonight's game will be the first opportunity to see whether that talent will be able to come together to continue to propel the Louisville women's soccer program forward. The match in Lynn Stadium will begin at 7:30PM. It is free to the public and attendance at soccer matches this season are free. All visitors are subject to the UofL bag policy, but no COVID-19 policies are readily available for information.

USA Thumps Spain in Quarterfinals 

Payton Verhulst didn't get the start yesterday afternoon against Spain, but she did play the second most minutes of any non-starter for Team USA. The Yanks continued their domination of the event with a 98-64 victory over the Spaniards to advance to the semifinals to face Hungary today at 11:30 AM. 

Spain's 64 points were the most scored against USA so far in the tournament, and 34 points has been Team USA's smallest margin of victory. Their next closest game was a 40-point win over Australia in the second game of the group round. Spain also played USA to their two closest quarters so far in the tournament as USA won the second and fourth quarters of yesterday's game by only three and four points, respectively. After a 30-18 victory in the first quarter, though, Team USA was never in danger of yielding the lead. 

As it was against Taiwan, yesterday's victory was a group effort. Six players scored in double figures, with four of five starters accomplishing the feat. Collectively, the team shot 54.1% from the floor, going 40% from three-point land. Verhulst's 13 points were tied with Diamond Johnson as the most by a non-starter and fourth-most on the team. Payton added in five rebounds, an assist, a block, and a steal. She was 5/7 from the floor and 3/4 from beyond the arc. Against a much tougher opponent than the previous game, this performance may be more impressive than the one she gave earlier in the week. Caitlin Clark led the team with 17 points and she (6/6) and Sonia Citron (7/7) were both perfect from the free throw line.

USA and Hungary have played two common opponents in the tournament, as Taiwan was in Hungary's group and Hungary played their Round of 16 game against Italy from the USA's group. Hungary beat Taiwan 99-42, a dominating win but not quite the 129-45 victory that USA put up. The more interesting comparison is the game against Italy. Hungary snuck past Italy in the opening round of the knockout stage 54-48. Team USA opened the tournament with a 96-37 victory over Italy. We'll keep up with this game during the show, and Jeff will cover the results in tomorrow's article.

Women's Basketball Releases Non-Con Schedule

Though we already knew a few games on Louisville's schedule this season due to press releases, the official non-conference schedule was released in full yesterday. Louisville will play six home games, three road games, and two "neutral" games. The Cards get just one exhibition game this season, as they'll host Union College on November 4th. 

I put neutral in quotes, because the second of Louisville's neutral court games is an effective home game for the opposing team. The first, as we know, is the season opener against Arizona in South Dakota. Hardly any concerns about the crowd going one way or the other there. The second, however, is the Hall of Fame Women's Showcase. This game will be a rescheduling of the matchup against UCONN that was scuttled last year due to COVID-19. The game will be played in Uncasville, Connecticut, a mere 45-minute drive from Storrs. That game will round out what is likely to be a tough week for the Cards, as they'll play three games in eight days. Louisville hosts Kentucky on the 12th of December and EKU on the 16th in the Jimmy V Classic before heading to Connecticut for the Clash of the Titans on December 19th. That will be Louisville's final non-conference game on the schedule.

Prior to the Kentucky matchup, Louisville will play six previously unannounced games, along with the ACC-Big Ten Challenge game against Michigan. The season opener will come against Bellarmine on November 16th, meaning we are just outside of three months from the beginning of the college basketball season. The Cards get a short turnaround before hosting a second mid-week game against UT-Martin on November 18th. 

There's no rest for the weary, though, as Louisville will jump straight on a plane for a swing out west. The Cards head to Washington to take on the Huskies on November 20th before going down the coast to Cal Poly on November 23rd. The team will presumably come back to Louisville for Thanksgiving before heading to Fort Collins to play Colorado State on November 28th. 

The first week of December sees Michigan on the 2nd and Belmont on the 5th before the aforementioned tough week against Kentucky, EKU, and Connecticut. Louisville's non-conference schedule includes five NCAA tournament teams and four teams that won at least 20 games last season. In a season where some teams barely played 20 games, that achievement is even more impressive. The Cards could easily face five ranked teams in the non-conference schedule and will have plenty of challenges before getting into ACC play.

Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast

The show is a bit thinner today with Jared and Daryl out for various reasons, but we should have plenty to discuss given all of the news that has come our way this week. We'll cover fall sports media day, the basketball schedule release and look a the season opener for women's soccer. Join us as we bring you the joy and excitement of UofL women's athletics on this week's Cardinal Couple Radio Hour. As always, you can check out the live stream of the show by going to the Cardinal Couple YouTube page and clicking on the live video. Jeff usually creates that about an hour before the show, which officially starts at 11 AM Eastern. If the live time doesn't work for you, there are plenty of playback options, so be sure to check out whichever is best for you!

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Until next time, Go Cards!

-CH-