Happy Thanksgiving Break for Women's athletics -- FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

FRIDAYS WITH DARYL

Hope everyone had a great holiday as we look ahead to the weekend!  UofL athletics are back in business tomorrow but they enjoy the extra day for a break today so I'll share some of my favorite team pictures from Jared Anderson so far this season! 

Field Hockey

Volleyball

Women's Basketball

Women's Soccer

Looking forward to some more nationally ranked Cardinals volleyball action and safe travels to Colorado for the WBB squad this weekend. 

And... thankful for the opportunity to share Cardinal athletics with friends and fans with you all here every day.   

As Always

Go Cards! 

~Daryl 

End of Week, End of Season - Friday Cardinal Couple

Two Sports Seasons End

Field Hockey and Soccer both saw their seasons end yesterday.

Field Hockey was waiting on results from other competitions in the conference to decide their fate, and the results weren't what was desired in Trager Stadium.

Specifically, the results came down to the Stanford vs Cal game.  UofL was in a tie for last place in the conference with the two California teams, and the conference tournament takes eight out of the nine teams in conference to the conference tournament.  The first tie breaker in standings is the results of the head to head game between two teams.  Louisville had beaten Stanford, but lost to Cal, so needed Cal to win this game, leaving the last place tie between Stanford and Louisville, allowing Louisville to advance with the tie breaker.

Alas, Stanford took the win in the game, 3-1, putting them in, at worst, sole possession of 7th place, but more likely in a tie with Wake Forest for 6th place (2-5 Wake plays 5-2 Virginia later today).  Regardless, that leaves Cal and Louisville tied for 8th.  And with Cal having the tie breaker head-to-head, that leaves Louisville out in the cold for the conference tournament.

                                                           (Use my chair...it's OK!)

With an overall record below .500, Louisville is ineligible for an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament, definitively wrapping the season for the Cards.

On the Soccer side of things, the team played Clemson to a scoreless draw yesterday.  With regular season play in the ACC being wrapped, UofL ends up 12th in the standings, considerably short of the cut to make the ridiculously small six team tournament draw.

The team's overall record of 7-6-5 does, technically, leave them eligible for an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament, but with an RPI ranking of 62, that's not going to happen.

For what it's worth, the Cards showed some strong defense in the game yesterday, with Erynn Floyd recording six saves in the 90 minutes of play.

The offense did put some pressure on Clemson, particularly Mackenzie Geigle who had two shots on goal in the final minutes of the game, but nothing was able to break through.

Both teams will now start looking towards spring exhibition play, with an eye towards development of players and tactics for next season.

Volleyball Gets an Extra Rest Day

The typical volleyball schedule, particularly during conference play, sees games on Friday and Sunday, but this week has been and continues to be a bit different for the Cards.

This week is the week that the Cards play their ACC "travel partner", Notre Dame.  The league office saw fit to schedule travels partners with "home and home" arrangements this year, and to make those home and home exchanges happen in the same week.  In past years, the home and home involved a random extra Wednesday match somewhere in the middle of the conference season, and then a late season match.

The Cards took the opportunity to rest Charitie Luper during the Wednesday match, giving Payton Peterson her first career start, which she took great advantage of with 9 kills, a service ace, a block and a half, and five digs in LNFCU arena.

So Louisville, instead of playing the normal Friday+Sunday schedule this weekend, gets an extra day of rest after the mid-week match, and will head up to South Bend for the second half of the home and home tomorrow at 3pm.

Basketball Teams

Yes, plural.  While the basketball season doesn't get started until Monday, we do have a couple of tidbits on teams of local interest.

The Cardinals are in Paris France, exploring the city of light.  Social media placed them at the Louvre yesterday, where they were certainly sporting bigger smiles than the Mona Lisa.  They'll have the weekend to explore still, though I'm sure they're getting some practice time is as well before their Monday game against UCLA. And they're dining at the Eifel Tower tonight...something that has to be on most people's "if I only could" list...

Perhaps less cool than a trip to Paris, or maybe moreso, depending on your mindset, I ran across much of the Bellarmine Women's Basketball team yesterday while I was early voting at Immanuel UCC church on Taylorsville Road (just down the road, and shorter lines than at Bowman Field yesterday, also the church that our wonderful photographer Jared attends).  They were there, and also apparently had a contingent at Bowman Field, to assist with the voting location in whatever way they could.  They primarily were arrayed at the stairs from the parking lot down to the level where the voting is setup.  There are accessible ramps, but they do take you a bit out of the way, so the Bellarmine folks were assisting folks that were perhaps a bit uncomfortable with the steps to negotiate them.  Good deeds by a good team that we should be proud to have representing our city along with the Cards.

I was informed by Assistant Coach, and UofL alumnae, Mo Reid that Bellarmine also begins their season on Monday night at 6:30 at Knights Hall on the Bellarmine's campus.  Their opponent will be Indiana University SouthEast, which is also, of course, also a Louisville area team.  I also go the chance to be meet Head Coach Chancellor Dugan, which was a pleasure.

-- 

JMcA

Saturday Shuffle - Saturday Cardinal Couple

The Saturday Shuffle

The shuffle is both in your writers here on Cardinal Couple - due to travel arrangement Case and I have swapped days.  Case will be doing tomorrow's write in my place.  But its also for the quick change that at least Jared and I will be doing after today's Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast to get downtown for the Volleyball match.

Golf

Golf is hosting the The Cardinal Cup at the UofL Golf Club out in Simpsonville.  After the first day of play the Cards hold the third spot as a team with a collective nine over par, but two players on the squad, Thienna Hunyh, and Carmen Griffiths, are individually involved in a three way tie for 3rd at one under par.

Beatriz Barrios is competing individually for the Cards, meaning her score doesn't contribute the team's overall score, but perhaps she should be as she's currently in a tie for 7th place after the round.

Yesterday's round was slightly delayed thanks to the last of the (badly needed) rain that came through the Louisville area over the past couple of days, but did get started only slightly delayed and looks to be going off today without any hitch whatsoever.

Field Hockey

Goal keeper Brandelynn Heinbaugh
and the penalty kill squad

The Field Hockey team was also in action yesterday against top ranked Northwestern.  The Wildcats prevailed in the action 2-0, which is disappointing for the Cards, but not unexpected based on rankings and past experiences with Northwestern as they are a fine Field Hockey squad indeed.

The Wildcats scored one goal in the first and third quarters, but were silent in the second and fourth.  Unfortunately, they were able to prevent the Cards from finding the back of the goal the whole game, sealing the win.

Tatum Kroon

Brandelynn Heinbaugh had three saves in goal for the Cards, as did the Northwestern goal keeper, but that was the sum total of the shots on goal for the Cards while NW had seven.  Tatum Kroon came up with the extra couple of defensive saves for the Cards.

It's been a bit of a rough start this season for Field Hockey as they now sport a 2-3 record.  To be fair, however, the schedule laid out for them this year is certainly no cupcake with all three losses coming to top 15 teams.

The squad will be back in action, bringing in Cornell to Trager Stadium, tomorrow at 4pm, with streaming available on ACC Network Extra.

Volleyball

Two teams are in action today, and we'll take them in order of start time.

Volleyball takes on Northern Iowa today at 1:30, downtown at the KFC Yum! Center.

This, notionally, is one of the easier contests the volleyball squad will face in their non-conference slate, with perhaps last weekends opponents ranking higher in the "easier competition" tally.  However, don't dismiss UNI out of hand.

The Cards are 0-3 versus the Panthers all time, with the last meetup being in 2017 in Minneapolis for the first round of the NCAA tournament.  The Panthers swept the Cards in that one.

There is an interesting storyline embedded in this match, however.  Payton Peterson is a freshman with the Cards, starting this fall after a stand-out high school career winning seven state championships in her time at Dike New-Hartford High School, between Volleyball and Basketball.

We've mentioned this feat here in Cardinal Couple before, however what we haven't mentioned is that Payton is one half of a pair of twins.  And her twin, Jadyn, who also wears number 21, is a freshman on the UNI team.  Let's not stop there, however, as their mother, Bobbi Peterson, is the head coach of UNI.  Father Duane Peterson played football at UNI, older sisters Bailey and Sydney, also a pair of twins, played volleyball at UNI, and aunt Michelle Bolte is Director of Operations for the UNI squad.  Quite a family affair, there.

This match is available on ACC Network Extra, but with it being contested at the KFC Yum! Center, tickets are available for this one.

Soccer

Soccer is in action this evening on the road up in Pittsburgh with a 7pm start.

The Cards and Panthers both kick off their ACC slate of games with this one, and both come into the match with similar records.  The Cards are 5-1-2, while Pitt is 6-1-1.

Neither team have been playing top-level teams and with similar records, this could be an interesting and competitive contest.

Look for more hopefully some more in depth analysis of this one from our Soccer guru Case in tomorrow's article.

ACC Network Extra, again, is the coverage for this one.

Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast

(A blast from the past, back in the days of a basement on a hill)

Despite some travel and health issues, the CCRHP crew will have three on the call today.  We will be making an extra effort to end right at noon, rather than dribbling over as we tend to do in order to ensure that Jared and myself have time to make it down to the KFC Yum! Center for Volleyball.

You can catch the live stream at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TAfnxryzLU

 

or it should get uploaded as a podcast this evening at its Spotify home.

 

-- 

JMcA

Duchars. Plumb Named to College Sports Commuicators Award -- MONDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 DUO MAKE ACADEMIC ALL-AMERICAN DISTRICT TEAM

In these days of NIL endorsements and lucrative packages for college athletes, the term "student-athlete" sometimes gets lost by the wayside when discussing those who toil on the athletic fields and courts on the UofL and other campuses. The importantce of academic excellence has not fallen by the wayside, mind you, one still has to maintain the grade-point average to be athletically eligible..but it is somthng that doesn't get mentioned as much as points per game, kills, goals, stops or which corporate sponsor in adorning the player's jersey. .  

So, let's take a look today at two who have exemplified academic success in their time at UofL. Two scholasr from the Cards Field Hockey program continue to "make the grade" and serve as a shining example of how good grades and excellent athletic performance can go hand and hand.

 

Aimee Plumb is a senior forward from Canterbury, Kent, England and has been named named CSC Academic All-District for the third straight year in a row. You can get any better than Amy, she had a 4.0 average and is majoring in Psychology, with minors in Art and Spanish.  A two time NFHCA Academci All-American, She also earned ACC and NFHCA Schola Athlete of the Year awards in 2022-23. 

On the field,  Aimee led the Cards with 18 points, she had a team high eight assists and five goals. We tease abut someone being "Plumb Perfect"  when they've had a good outing or performance, and the tales of the young woman from Cantebury could easlily equal the 24 told in the Tales of Canterbury book.

 

Mia Duchars is also a senior and is from St.Louis Missouri.  She plays defense for UofL and is a biology major. She is a three-time NFHCA National Academic squad selection. Mia is also a two time ACC Academic Team Member. 

She's a two ACC Field Hockey Defensive Player of the Week, and helped the Cards record six shutouts in 2023. Under her defensive guidance, Louisville made the semifinals of the ACC Tournament and quarterfinals of the NCAA Tournament. It's been said that if Duchars was in charge of defending the Golden Arch in St. Louis, nothing would get through it. 

We salute these two excellent "Stick Girls" at UofL .They've stuck to academic excellence, and the Cards keep sticking up winning scores.on the winning side of things.

Plumb and Duchars personify the meaning of a student-athlete. And Chloe Plumb, Aimee's little sister (at least academically-wise) ensures to continue the fine tradition of a "Plumb-er" at Louuisville for a few more seasons...she's a sophomore forward on the Cards roster...

paulie