CARDINAL COUPLE

CARDINAL COUPLE
We report on the joy and excitement of UofL women's sports here. Thanks for checking us out! !
Showing posts with label Syracuse Volleyball. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Syracuse Volleyball. Show all posts

Friday, September 25, 2026

VOLLEYBALL, FIELD HOCKEY IN ACTION ON FRIDAY -- FRIDAY CARDIAL COUPLE

VOLLEYCARDS AT SYRACUSE, FIELD HOCKEY GOES TO CALIFORNIA

#4 LOUISVILLE VOLLEYBALL TO FACE THE ORANGE.


The Louisville vs Syracuse rivalry used to be a "thing" when Leonid Yelin was coaching the Syracuse squad.. And , just because the Orange aren't in the top 25 anymore, Syracuse fans won't stay away and can still be to show up and boo against the Cards when they show up for the game tonight. Bakeer Ganesharatnam is their head coach. He is in his fifth season. You figure out how to pronounce his name, I'll just call him Coach B.

The Cuse is 5-4 on the season and this will be their first ACC game. They opened in a tournament in Illinois and lost to Cincinnati and the Illini. Wins over Howard and Albany followed, though..before losing to Arkansas in four sets. 

Canisius and FDU fell to the Orange before Buffalo swept then in straight sets. 

Kiernan Stamey is the clear kills artist with 117.

It'll be a 6 p.m. start and ACCNX will have the coverage. 

FIELD HOCKEY ON WEST COAST


Justine Sowry's 6-2 and #12 Louisville Field Hockey is ranked #12 and will face the #17 Cal Bears today at 5 p.m.. 

The Bears are 5-1 with just a loss to Michigan State. Louisville enters 6-2.

They show a start time of 5 p.m. Out there, you never know 

Cal's leading scorer is Liz Klompmaker is the leading scorer for Cal with six goals. Cal is coached by co-head coaches Tara and Steve Danielson, husband and wife team in their first year of coaching the Bears

It's another one set for ACCNX. 

paulie

 

Sunday, September 28, 2025

VOLLEYCARDS HOST SYRACUSE TODAY -- SUNDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 9-2 ORANGE COME TO LNFCUA TO FACE CARDS


The unranked Orange travel to Louisville for a 1 p.m. Sunday match against the Louisville Cardinals in the L&N Federal Credit Union Arena. Overall, the Cards are 29-4 over the 'Cuse and in 2024, the Cards won in straight sets over the school that is the home of Jim Brown, numerous sportscasters...Beth Mowins and Mike Tirico, just to name a couple... and where ex-Louisville Volleyball coach Leonid Yelin went after the Cards forced him into retirement. Bakeer Gaineshaatnam is the skipper at SU these days and my guess he's a easier to understand and interview than Yelin was....but hard to spell (I had to check three times and probably still didnt get it right)

The 'Cuse's losses have come to Colgate twice o back-to-back days on September 12-13. They did most recently take down Notre Dame 3-1 in South Bend. 

Gabriella McLaughlin leads the Orange in kills. 

It'll be the second ACC Conference game for the Cards, who knocked off Boston College in straight sets to open the conference slate. After the home stand, UofL will travel to the west coast to face Cal and Stanford. 

Syracuse has no Kentucky or New York player on their roster, but does have imports from Hawaii and Japan...and four volleyballers from California. 


The Cards are led by Payton Petersen's in kills with 141 and the have 552 as a team. Louisville's two losses have come to Texas and Kentucky and the #6 Cards have only gone five sets twice...against those to schools. 

This one will be available on the ACCNX if you can't get over to campus...and if you plan on seeing this one live and in person at the LNFCUA, my guess is you better be in line to get in around 11 a.m....capacity for seating is slightly below 1200 folks. 

I won't go into my usual tirade about needing a larger arena for Louisville volleyball here. But...that spot adjacent to Lynn Stadium would be a nice spot and all it does now is store cars for Ford. I guess the "building" das of Tom Jurich will never return.

We'll recap it Monday here at Cardinal Couple. 

CARDINAL COUPLE RADIO HOUR PODCAST

IT was just Daryl and I on the podcast Saturday, with Case and Jared busy taking care of issues with visitors and family...but we had a great discussion on the current fall sports at UofL and more! 

Give the re-broadcast a listen at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdEIWi80oYU&list=PL1b1cLmDIkuqdZZ6JxJjQnvKVWnHWVOIy&index=1

We apologize for the choppy cut-in and cut-out of the re-broadcast. Gremlins and the absence of Case teamed up for the listening quality.  



paulie



Friday, November 8, 2024

WBB home opener vs Southern Indiana -- Walz presser -- VB at Syracuse FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

FRIDAYS WITH DARYL
























Hello readers, I am back with you this morning! It’s been a wild couple of weeks as I went out of town  but I am back and getting back into the swing of UofL athletics mode.  Actually I did make the trip to Boston College for the Cardinals football game Halloween weekend.  You know, the one they won in comeback fashion.  It was a lot of fun to celebrate my Bachelorette party there with my girls.   





The Cardinals golf program concluded its fall season with a tournament victory at the Robbie Tournament . it is the Cardinals first tournament win since 2021 when they finished tied for first at the Illini Invitational. It is the first solo tournament win since 2019 when they won the Cardinal Cup.  

I myself have also put the golf clubs away for the season.  Till next year!!!  🏌


WBB

Just before Walz met with the media Thursday afternoon the program announced another season opening matchup with a national powerhouse program, UCONN, to be exact in Germany, to open the 2025 season.   Another incredible opportunity for these players to travel the world and play basketball.  







Walz presser - video courtesy to WDRB   Jeff Walz 11/7/24 Press Conference

Highlights include:

-- Walz talked about the game vs UCLA in paris and felt like it was a great college basketball game and was proud of the team, said they took care of the ball and recognized 12 steals as a team. 

-- He also said it was an awesome trip and that this team is great together, mentioned that the hotel was in a great location to get to explore cafes and shops and had fun things planned like dinner halfway up the Eifel tower and a river cruise that were great but also wanted them to experience Paris with the friends and family that also made the trip. They knew they were there for a basketball game, of course,  but was proud of how they all got along abroad.  

-- Jayda Curry's hamstring did come shooting around on Wednesday and non- contact Thursday.  Do not want a season long lingering injury.   

-- Ja'Leah Williams transferring into the program a wonderful thing and how pleasant she has been to have on the squad. 

-- Playing in Germany next season against UConn and how its an opportunity you can't pass up.  It speaks volumes for the program and how we represent ourselves as a program in the communities  


Southern Indiana preview






In their first meeting, the Cards and Screaming Eagles will square off at 7 p.m. ET and it will be streamed on the ACC Network Extra.

The Cardinals are 15-2 all-time in home openers under head coach Jeff Walz. Since the KFC Yum! Center opened in 2010, the Cardinals are 12-2 in openers at the Yum! Center. The Cardinals have won each of their last eight home openers, dating back to the 2015-16 season.



Southern Indiana comes into Friday's matchup with a 1-0 record after a 100-49 opening night victory over Brescia. USI had five players score in double figures and never trailed in the win. The Screaming Eagles are coming off a 2023-24 campaign where they went 25-7 overall, 17-1 in conference play and won the Ohio Valley Conference Tournament. They return all five starters from last year. 

Last year's leading scorer was now senior, Vanessa Shafford with 13.6 ppg. The Screaming Eagles return the top-three scorers from last season including Shafford, and graduate students Meredith Raley (12.2ppg) and Madison Webb (10.8ppg). Shafford was the team's leading rebounder last year with 7.7 per game and Webb had a team-best 3.5 assists per game.


VolleyCards


The volleyball squad is heading northeast for some ACC competition with the Syracuse Orange on Friday night.    The Orange are 13-11 after starting the 2024 season on a 12 match win streak, making it the team's best start since 2010.   

Ava Palm leads the Orange and is tied for #8 in the ACC with 278 kills. She has racked up double-digit kills in 17 of Syracuse's 24 contests. Palm has also stuffed the stat sheet defensively, as her 187 digs lead the Orange.

Palm has recorded six double-doubles this season, including in three of the last four matches. She has posted double-digit kills and digs in all three of those contests, with all six of her double-doubles coming by way of kills and digs.

The outside hitter is also tied for the lead on the Orange in aces with 25....with Skylar George. 



Enjoy this fall weekend!   

As always, 
Go Cards! 
~Daryl 


Sunday, October 11, 2020

A Winning Weekend - Sunday Cardinal Couple

Volleyball Wins


In a match that, in a normal year, would've been Senior Night, the wide net Cards finished off the complete sweep of a good Syracuse squad.  In the CCRH, we all concluded that last night's volleyball match should be closer and more competitive than the Friday night match.  While the results were still a 3 set sweep, the play was much more competitive, and the set scores show it, 25-18, 25-21, 27-25.

Amaya Tillman and Aiko Jones probably
getting a block
The Syracuse squad in L&N Federal Credit Union Arena last night was much more like the Syracuse squad we all expected to see here in Louisville.  The Orange outblocked the Cards 9-7, and held Louisville to just .216 hitting.  Of course, the New Yorkers only hit .136.  The lesson being that just slowing down your opponent's offense isn't enough, you have to generate some offense of your own if you want to win games.

Things started well for the Cards, with a jump out to a 8-2 lead in the first set before the Orange seemed to wake up a little bit.  The two team would largely trade points the rest of the way through this set, but Syracuse would not be able to close the gap.  In the end, a powerful hit by Anna DeBeer would get the Cards the early set lead.

Louisville would play from behind in the 2nd when Syracuse got a 4-0 run early in the set to pull out from a 5-5 tie to 9-5.  More even play in the set would see Syracuse maintain that lead through 16-12 when the Cards would go on a mini run of three to shrink the gap, but not close it.  Finally, the Cards had enough and went on a six point run to take the lead and stretch it out to 22-18, helped in the process by Tori Dilfer's strong serving.  Syracuse could do nothing to close the gap, and Anna Stevenson would close this one out with a bit of an awkward looking, but effective, hit in the middle.

Aiko Jones getting to the hit before the
blockers can close out
The last set was a game of runs.  It started inauspiciously for the Cards with a pair of attack errors, but they quickly composed themselves and took a 6-2 lead including a string of three straight Aiko Jones kills.  The Orange would immediately get three of those back on good serving by the Israeli member of the Syracuse team, Ella Saada.  The Cards offense was playing well, but errors, mostly from the service line, kept them from putting together the next run.  The Cards would push out a slim lead 13-9, but then the Syracuse blocking would be instrumental in an 8-1 run to eliminate a four point Cardinal lead and get out in front at 18-15.  A pair of three point mini runs by the Cards would close down that lead and push the set into needing bonus points, tying it up at 24.  Finally, Aiko Jones would say, enough is enough and with a kill, a joint block with Amaya Tillman, and another kill would put the bow on this one, and send Syracuse back home without a set win in the weekend at all.

From a subjective and stats driven analysis, the same conclusions.  Our passing and digging were better this match.  This has been the weakest link of a pretty strong chain, but the numbers look good, with 16 digs for Libero Alexis Hamilton, and 12 for full-rotation player Claire Chaussee, the rest of the squad was all in the low to mid single digits.  I'd like to see more out of the DSes that are seeing time on the court, mostly Ayden Bartlett who only had a pair, but none from Alexa Hendricks, Mia Stander, and Ceci Rush is a little concerning.  To be fair to this trio though, they are mostly being used as serving specialists right now, so their time on the floor is limited.  Credit Claire Chaussee and Aiko Jones being fully capable of playing full rotations for limiting the role of the DSes.

Freshman Anna DeBeer showing her power
In hitting, Aiko Jones led the team with 17 and a reasonable .270, the newcomer, freshman Anna DeBeer showed her power with 12 on .259.  Perhaps keep an eye out this week for a Freshman of the Week honor?  I haven't looked around the league to see what others have been up to in comparison, but I'll be keeping an eye out.  The other Anna, Stevenson, only had seven kills, but it was an extremely efficient seven on nine attempts and only a single miscue, for .667.  A trio of service aces is a decent showing, but more importantly, keeping the service errors from getting out of control with only five helps.

Louisville will take the next week off, and then finish off the season the week after with perhaps the biggest challenge of this odd-ball season by heading up to Pitt for a pair of matches.

Field Hockey Wins


Wake Forest and Hurricane (well, Tropical Storm by that point) Delta made things interesting in Winston-Salem yesterday in Field Hockey.  The Cards would get the win 2-1 with scores in the 1st and 4th quarters.

A significant discussion point around this one was the impact tropical system Delta would have on the play and the field.  It wasn't clear, even as game time approached, just how much rain would be involved, and based on the comments from the play by play and color people on the telecast, it was looking like they would get away with minimal impacts, right up until the first pass.

But the heavens would open up and a significant amount of water would fall in the 1st half of play.  Normally I would point out that turf fields are routinely sprayed down with water to improve the playing surface for field hockey, so a little bit of rain just means a lower water bill for the hosting team.  However, in this case, there was enough rain in a short period of time to cause ponding on the field and that will have a dramatic impact on passes and part of the game, even altered how injections on penalty corners were attempted by the team to try to avoid water puddles.

The rain would largely stop, or at least slow down to a very light rain, and the field drained well for the 2nd half.

Beyond Delta, Wake Forest would keep things interesting as well, equally the Cards mark for Shots on Goal with 5, keeping Hollyn Barr busy in the cage.  When you broaden to overall shots, the Cards only held a slim edge at 12-10.

The Cards scoring got started late in the 1st quarter with Erica Cooper picking up a cross from Madison Walsh and firing it home. That was Cooper's 2nd goal of the season.  Wake would press their attack in the 2nd quarter, but Barr would get a pair of excellent saves to keep the Demon Deacons off the scoreboard in the first half.

That wouldn't hold in the 3rd quarter, though as Anne van Hoof would get a score four minutes in.  And, yes, van Hoof is indeed from the Netherlands as you might have guessed from her name.  The Cards would press their attack in the later part of the quarter, with eight shots and five penalty corners, but would not be successful in any of them.

The offensive attack would pay off in the opening minute of the 4th quarter, with the injection from Alli Bitting to Meghan Schneider for the stop to present the shot to Emilia Kaczmarczyk who fired it into the cage.  That would also be Kaczmarczyk's 2nd goal of the season.

Meche Pastor lead the team in shots, with 6, but she only put one on frame.  To her credit, however, for much of the game, she was drawing two and three defenders off of other Cardinal players to contain her.

The Cards will face Wake Forest again today at 2pm, again on RSN (so look around at the various Fox Sports Channels, Fox Sports South is a likely candidate).  This match up will not count for the conference record, but will apply to the overall record of the teams, the joys of being in the ACC, the only conference in NCAA DI playing field hockey at all.

Cardinal Couple Radio Hour


Finally, I think it was a winning outing for the Cardinal Couple Radio Hour.  With the normal full house, Case, Jared, Paulie, and myself ran through analysis and results of Volleyball, Field Hockey, and Women's Soccer in our ongoing quest to share the joy and excitement of UofL women's sports.

A fun hour, that we kept pretty close to the hour limit so we could shift our attentions over to the field hockey game starting right after.

If you missed it, of course you can join the fun below, or via the Cardinal Couple Radio Hour podcast which should be available at this point via all your normal podcast outlets and directories.





Friday, October 9, 2020

Top Ten Battle in Volleyball Fri and Sat -- FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 

SYRACUSE VS. LOUISVILLE




It'll be #8 vs #9 over the next two evenings in the L&N Federal Credit Union Arena when the Cards face the Orange. #8 Syracuse comes to Louisville with a 2-2 record, a strong slate played so far for Leonid Yelin's squad, with wins over Pittsburgh and losses to Norte Dame. 

The Cards and Orange split in action against each other in 2019,wth each winning at home. Louisville (2-1) enters the match after sweeping the Eagles 3-0 and 3-1 in their two-day stay in Boston. 

The matches begin tonight with a 6 p.m. start  and the contest will be on the ACC Network. The Saturday match is a 7 p.m. start and moves to ACCNX on-line for viewing.

The Cards will hope to see the "killing" trio of Claire Chaussee, Anna DeBeer and Aiko Jones continue their attack against the Orange. Each student-athlete has over 30 kills this season. 




The role of setter over the next two nights could be an interesting sidebar tonight for the Cards. Tori Dilfer was the starter for the Cards against Notre Dame, but she did not make the trip to Boston and Rachel DeMarcus stepped in and performed the job quite efficiently. Whether Dilfer will be available for the games tonight and tomorrow remains to be seen. No official word on why she did not travel to Boston. 

Polina Shemanova leads the Orange attack with an impressive 57 kills this season. The 6'0" junior outside hitter from St. Petersburg, Russia had 20 kills against Pittsburgh to open the season and will pose a challenge for the Cards front line. 

Syracuse has gone five sets this fall season (once...against Pitt) while the Cards have not.

As we've come to expect from Yelin's squads, seven of the 11 student-athletes on the roster come from overseas...with the Ukraine, Russia, Greece and Israel  represented. 




Yelin was head coach at Louisville from 1996-2010 and had an overall record of 366-112. He took the VolleyCards to four NCAA Regional Semifinals. 

We'll have two Cardinal Couple representatives on site for the match, with Jared serving as the pool photographer and Jeff in the stands reporting.

(Gee, I wonder what we'll talk about on the Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast on Saturday at 11 a.m.)?  


paulie

Sunday, October 28, 2018

Full Sunday on Tap - SUNDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Full Sunday Schedule


The normal trio of women's fall sports are all in action today as we are approaching, or are already started into, post-season play.

Soccer


The women get the post-season underway first.  They are playing Virginia in Charlottesville in the quarterfinals (also first round) of the ACC tournament.  This is the first appearance in the ACC tournament for the Cards.  Of course, UofL has only been in the ACC for a handful of years, now, but it speaks to the quality of this year's team to even make an appearance in the conference tournament of one of the best women's soccer conferences in the country.

It also speaks to the quality of the conference that the last regular season game of decided for the Cards between a 3rd seed in the tournament, or the 6th seed that we ended up with.  Yes, the conference standings were that bunched up near the top.  Virginia ended up with that 3rd seed, and the two will tangle today at 1 p.m..

If the Cards advance, they'll move to Cary, NC where the rest of the tournament will be played.  The potential opponents for that one are Florida State and Duke.

UVA did claim the regular season victory over the Cardinals this season, in a 1-0 Thursday night matchup on October 4th.  The Cards did have several good shots during the game but were unable to keep them on-frame and slip by the UVA GK.

Field Hockey


Justine Sowry's squad wraps up their regular season today with a non-conference matchup at Kent State.  This one is a noon start.  There is a streaming URL listed for this one:

It does not appear to require any subscription.

Kent State is a decent mid-major team.  They 7-10 overall, 5-1 in the MAC, but don't let that record fool you, 6 of those 7 loses were to teams that were top 25 ranked.

This one faces off at noon.

Despite the overall regular season being concluded, the regular season conference play has all been completed, so the ACC tournament seedings are already known.  Louisville will be going into the tournament as a 3 seed, playing 6 seed Wake Forest.  Wake Forest took the regular season tilt 4-2.  Potential 2nd round opponents are Syracuse and Duke.  Both of these matches gave us plenty of drama, including some bonus field hockey.  The match against Syracuse was a victory for the Cards, the game winning coming with 23 seconds left on the clock in 2nd sudden-victory overtime period.  The match against Duke was a barn-burner, completing both 7v7 overtime periods, and going into an extended shoot-out to decide.

Volleyball


Unlike field hockey and soccer, volleyball still has several weeks of regular season play.  Part of this is because the ACC doesn't have a post-season tournament, so there's an extra week of regular season play.

Today, the wide netters will be facing the Syracuse Orange.  Former Cardinals head coach Leonid Yelin is at the helm of Syracuse these days, so he will be visiting a familiar location in Cardinal Arena for the 1 p.m. start.  This will be on ACC Network Extra.

Syracuse sits at 8-3 in conference, which puts them in roughly the top quarter of the conference.  Overall they're 12-7.  Notable loses are to BYU, Southern Cal, Marquette, and Pitt, all ranked teams (BYU is still undefeated and sits as the #1 team in the country).  They also lost in a sweep to Notre Dame Friday, so they're coming in to Cardinal Arena off a loss, which is never ideal.

Syracuse, courtesy of Yelin, is a very "at the net" sort of team.  Expect their emphasis of play to be at the net with blocking and hitting.  There is a single player listed on their roster as a DS, everyone else is listed as a hitter (middle, rightside, outside), or setter.  Also, as typical for Yelin, there's a strong international aspect to this team, with players from the Ukraine, Israel, Greece, Yelin's native Uzbekistan, Canada, and Russia.

I imagine UofL's goal in this match will be to be strong in defense (both blocking and digging), stay in system, and get good swings on the ball, with the intent of putting Syracuse out of system so they can't bring their offense to bear.

-- 
JMcA

Saturday, October 3, 2015

Volleyball and Field Hockey...SATURDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Volleyball Blocks Syracuse


In a Friday night matchup filled with familiar faces, Syracuse got the lion's share of the blocks, but Louisville came away with the victory in four sets (25-12, 22-25, 25-16, 25-18). The evening honored former members of the UofL program from alumnae players,

Syracuse, coached by former Louisville skipper Leonid Yelin, came in prepared to put a lot of blocks at the net...and they did, winning the blocking category 13-7.5 (in volleyball stats, if three players go up for a block, they each get credited with "half" of a block meaning the total can come out with some number "and a half", which is weird, but it's the way it work in Volleyball). But a game isn't decided with just blocking, and UofL did lot's of other things right to come away with the win.

Notably, The Cards were able to run a really quick offense and get the ball to the hitters before The 'Cuse could get their blocks up in place. With a defense completely designed around good blocking, the rest of the defense was easy pickings for The Cards offense committee.

The match started out with some ugly early service errors by the Cards, but once the early match jitters and the worst of the service errors were over, the Cards settled in ran the score out to a relatively easy win. In a rough second set, with some sloppy passing slowing down the pace of the offense, Syracuse was able to get their blocking engaged and stop the Louisville attack.


After the set break, UofL got their passing back on target and was able to get the offensive pace back up to the speed they wanted. Once they got back to beating out the blocks, they got a couple of relatively easy wins to close out the match.

Erin Fairs tallied the most kills with 16 on 35 swings, for an acceptable .229 percentage. Joining her in double-digit kills was Janelle Jenkins with 12 on 40 tries, for .200, which is relatively error free hitting. Tess Clark also got a dozen on 20 attempts, and with only three miscues, that gives her a whopping .450 percentage. The other side of our middle power duo showed what efficiency is like as well, with eight out of 15 for Maggie DeJong for .400.


We did see the return of Maya McClendon to the floor, after not seeing any playing time in the past two matches. Her role was limited, but she did get a few swings out of the back row for a very efficient .400 on a, notably mistake free, 5 attempts. Molly Sauer continues to patrol the back row with a level of play beyond what is normally expected from a freshman, getting 29 digs, and claiming two service aces.

This one was streamed on ESPN3, so if you missed it, you can go catch an on-demand replay. The VolleyCards will be back in action Sunday against Boston College.

Duke Rains on Field Hockey's Day


Field Hockey headed southeast to play against Duke on Tobacco Road. The dominant player may have been Hurricane Joaquin, soaking the playing field. The rains may have given the UofL squad some challenges, as Duke got an early goal and kept that lead into halftime.

The Cards held a 3-1 advantage on penalty corners, but this is a Louisville squad that has not been able to capitalize on penalty corners very well all year resulting in a 5-3 shot advantage for Duke at halftime.

The same basic pattern continued in the second half, with Duke getting the only score, and outshooting the Cards 6-4, but UofL getting more penalty corners 5-3.

UofL takes the loss against another former coach in Pam Bustin, and returns to play Sunday against UMass.

RADIO TODAY

The CARDINAL COUPLE RADIO HOUR airs today at 11 a.m. on WCHQ 100.9 FM locally and streaming live on the Internet at www.crescenthillradio.com

We have a great show planned for you today with recaps and discussions on volleyball, field hockey and soccer. We'll also put out the Worldwide Quiz for you and we invite you to see if you can beat my steamed colleague. 

jmca

Saturday, October 20, 2012

Soccer, Volleyball post Friday Wins

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SATURDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

- Soccer nips Cincy in double overtime

- Volleyball sweeps in Syracuse

Whitfield's goal leads Cards to 2-1 win

It took 106 minutes, but Louisville avoided a tie with the Cincinnati Bearcats and clinched the #3 seed in the upcoming BIG EAST Tournament with a hard-fought win last night in Cardinal Park. 

"Rivalry games always bring out the best in teams and tonight was no different. You have to credit Cincy for the way they competed tonight. Our team continued to fight and persevere throughout the game and it paid off in the end."  - Louisville head soccer coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes.

The Bearcats opened the scoring in the 16th minute of the first half, Liz Miller getting her first goal of the season, off a header which floated past Louisville goalie Chloe Kiefer. That lead held as the teams went to intermission and deep into the second half. 

In the 70th minute of play, Charlyn Corral sent a free kick following a UC penalty over the Cincinnati defenders and safely into the net to record her eighth score of the season. 

Neither team could produce in the first O.T., but with just four minutes remaining in the final overtime, Casey Whitfield followed up on a missed shot attempt by Corral and scored her fourth goal of the year...tapping it in to end the contest. 

Chloe Kiefer had seven saves for Louisville (10-4-3, 5-3-3) and the Cards attempted a record 37 shots in the contest.

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Lola and Gwen spark Volleyball win

We've typed the name Lola Arslanbekova, it seems a thousand times here at CARDINAL COUPLE and she gets the kudos again today for her 18 kill effort against the Orange yesterday in Syracuse. Gwen Rucker also stepped up big for UofL with six kills and five blocks in the 25-23, 25-12, 25-18 three-set win for the Cards.

Ex-Cards coach now head man
at Syracuse
Louisville (19-3, 8-1) jumped out to an early 12-6 advantage in game one but a strong rally by the Leonid Yelin coached Syracuse team tied the game at 21-21. The Cards rolled off the next three points, though...getting a service ace from Katie George in the process...to get to set point and held on to get the two-point win.

The Cards roared out to another early lead in the second game and were never seriously challenged by Syracuse...up 17-8 and finishing the game on a 8-4 run.

Syracuse tried to rally after the break and did managed to take the Cards to a 15-15 tie. After a Anne Kordes timeout, the Cards regrouped and grabbed 10 of the final 13 points to produce the victory.

The Cards continue the road trip Sunday with a crucial match against the Marquette Golden Eagles. MU is 17-3 on the year and sits atop the BIG EAST standings with a perfect 7-0 record...heading into this weekend's action.

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Sean and Sam with Charlie
Finally, congratulations to Sean Thompson and his lovely bride Samantha Schaefer for tying the knot last night at St. Joseph Catholic Church!

I've watched the (then) little guy grow up and become a great young man who is now married to a sweet and caring girl in Samantha. The reception was at the Mellwood Arts Center and a total blast...which is why the ol' CARDINAL COUPLE is a little late this morning...celebrate good times, c'mon! Woo-hoo!
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