Sunday Cardinal Couple -- Lady Cards 74- 60 over Hoyas

SUNDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

-Cards sour Sugar... Improve to 7-2 in BIG EAST

-Volleyball Banquet at PNC Plaza

30 minutes can be a very long time sometimes. In basketball minutes, it can be an eternity. The University of Louisville women's basketball team held BIG EAST leading scorer Sugar Rodgers scoreless for 30 minutes yesterday afternoon in a 74-60 win over the Georgetown Hoyas in the KFC YUM! Center in front of 10549 fans.

No Sugar tonight in my coffee, no Sugar tonight in my tea...to borrow a phrase from The Guess Who. 

Going 0-7 in the first half and 0-4 in the second half before she connected on a jumper with 10:51 left in the game and Louisville leading 55-40...Rodgers was held to six points on 2-17 shooting by the guard trio of Bria Smith, Jude Schimmel and Shelby Harper.

Pass the Splenda, there wasn't any Sugar in the KFC YUM! Center Saturday afternoon.

Coach Walz's pregame instructions and practices sessions had a very simple theme leading up to this game. Don't allow her to get the ball and guard her more closely than the Army guards the gold in Fort Knox if she does.

It worked. Georgetown shot 33.8% for the game. Sugar 12%.

This one was won for the Cards in the first four minutes of the second half. Leading 33-29 at the break, the Cards sprinted off to a 13-3 run to start second half play and led 46-32 when Sara Hammond scored in the paint with 16:02 left. A Shoni three 30 seconds later made it 49-34 Cards and Georgetown would get no closer than nine the rest of the way.

Keying the run was Shoni, who drilled two threes and had nine points in a two minute stretch.   

Nita Slaughter with a huge effort tonight, 22 points on 6-13 shooting (five of those threes) and a perfect 5-5 from the free throw line. The Cards shot 77.3% from the charity stripe...toss out Cortnee Walton's 3-6 performance and Louisville goes an amazing 14 for 16.

That's the kind of stat that takes you deep into success in tournaments.

Shoni Schimmel with a slow start hitting just one of ten attempts from the field in the first half...but shooters are going to shoot and the junior ended up with 15 points and a team high seven assists. She was nonchalant about it in the post game:  

"My shots weren't falling early so I just started finding people open whose shots were falling. It was a team effort."

With Sugar salted away, sophomore forward Brittany Horne picked up the scoring yoke for the Hoyas in the first half with nine points. When Sugar still wasn't melting in the final half, freshman guard Katie McCormick grabbed the orb and produced 18 second half points for Keith Brown's 13-9 squad. McCormick, returning from a knee injury that had her on the bench for the first 11 games this year, led the Hoyas with 21 for the game. She had scored just 18 points all season. 

 6'6" center Sydney Wilson was the other Georgetown player to hit double digits with 11. She must have missed at least 10 shots from two feet or closer in, though. Does anyone use the box behind the rim on the backboard anymore?

Sara Hammond was the third double digit performer with a double-double...10 points and 11 grabs. Megan Deines added nine, Jude Schimmel seven, Bria Smith four, Cortnee Walton three and Sherrone Vails and Shelby Harper two each.

Louisville outrebounded the Hoyas 48-43. The Cards forced 16 G.U. turnovers while committing 16 of their own. Louisville won the points in the paint battle 28-24.

It wasn't pretty in the early going...Lousville and Georgetown both missing easy shots and only 26 total points had been scored in the first ten minutes. Georgetown actually led the Cards 16-10 with 9:11 left in the first stanza before UofL went on a 9-2 run to take the lead at 19-18 when Slaughter hit her second three of the half with 7:17 showing on the clock.

The Cards never trailed again.

On a afternoon where the roads had been salted several hours earlier because of an overnight snow...the Sugar remained in the cupboard and Louisville gets a sweet win....thanks to some sticky defense and Slaughter and Shoni shooting.

With Howie Lindsey and Jody Demling in attendance, the "Ho and Jo Show" was back and they asked 90% of the post game media questions for Coach Walz. Would hate to get in front of those two boys at a buffet...LINK BELOW.

POST GAME WALZ

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A crowd of over 250 packed the PNC Plaza Saturday night for the 2013 Louisville Volleyball banquet. Sean Moth served as emcee for the event that gave a few a scare when the fire alarms went off shortly after dinner was served.

Fortunately, it was a false alarm and the crowd was later entertained by the affable Anne Kordes' season in review speech and a hilarious video that featured Kordes playing freshman Katie George and George portraying Kordes.

The G.P.A. Award went to Emily Juhl and Cardinal Award was presented to UofL FCA chaplain Chris Morgan. Alumnae of the year went to Kelly Gillooly.

Kordes' keynote address covered her appreciation and association with all the players, staff and backers that have made Cardinal Volleyball the unqualified smash hit it's turned into since she arrived three years ago. She's also quite the comedian...sending the crowd into gales of laughter when she shared personal stories with players, friends and staff.

We want to meet "the Betty's"...

She has a heartfelt and deep relationship with those who make Cardinal Volleyball what it is today and it's easy to see why Julie Herrmann went after her and brought her here from the head coaching job at St. Louis.

Good times. Player Courtney Robison from Sheperdsville, KY. sat at our table with us and the D.S. who transferred her from West Virgina after one season was a friendly and charming host. Later we found out about her lifelong friendship with Katie George. Robison is the team driver and pushing catalyst. She also has two personalities, according to Kordes...so I guess we actually had two players at the table with us.

Our thanks to Louisville Volleyball for allowing us to cover the event and it was a class evening and a lot of fun!

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