The Cardinal Couple Hometown Heroes

Hometown Heroes Team

I've talked about, you've waited for it with baited breath (I hope), it's time.

It's time for the latest Cardinal Couple honorary team.  This time it's the Hometown Heroes.  These are UofL women student athletes that are from Louisville or the immediately surrounding area.  In building this list, I was surprised at some of the women that I, for some reason, thought were from someplace else, but are Louisvillians through and through.

This list is based on the current rosters listed at GoCards.com (with the exception of Volleyball where I was able to make adjustments for the coming year based on my own knowledge).  Listed is the name, along with the high school and specifically where they are from (in the case of individuals listing more specific locations, or if they are from locations outside of Louisville proper, but still in the metro area).

We'll start it off with Cross Country combined with Indoor and Outdoor Track & Field.  Technically this is three separate sports, but there's so much overlap across all of them, it made the most sense to present them together.

Cross Country/Track & Field

Taylor Bradley - Eastern/Louisville

Megan Brooks - Charlestown/Charlestown, IN

Brianne Brown - North Oldham/Prospect

Emily Christman - Silver Creek/Charlestown, IN

Bailey Davis - Assumption/Louisville (two sport)

Hannah Herd - CAL/Simpsonville

Lilli Popovich - CAL/Louisville

Samantha Simms - SHA/Louisville

Abigail Wright - Assumption/Louisville

A nice spread of schools there, plus a couple from across the river, which is a fairly rare thing in the overall list.

Field Hockey

Hailey Netherton - Assumption/Louisville

Katie Walsh - Ballard/Louisville

Unsurprisingly, the Aussie-born (but now American citizen!) Justine Sowry recruits widely, with consequently fewer locals on the team.

Rowing

Mara Louise Atherton - Manual/Louisville

Tiffany Chea - Manual/Louisville

Madeleine Chesney - Manual/Louisville

Emma Crush - Ballard/Prospect

Cynthia Doyle - Western/Louisville

Madelyn Green - KCD/Louisville

Keaton Jesse - Shelby County/Bagdad

Madison Luette - KCD/Louisville

Kylie Noltemeyer - Assumption/Louisville

Katie Nord - Mercy/Louisville

Meredity Price - Manual/Louisville

Hannah Richardson - North Oldham/Prospect

Rachael Schmetzer - SHA/Louisville

Sophie Schulz - CAL/Louisville

Big list, here.  Somewhat due to Rowing just having such a huge roster overall.  Also, they tend to pick up a lot of "novice" rowers from the University population at large, which obviously skews local.  I included Bagdad, in Shelby County, but that was borderline in my mind for being "in the Louisville area".

Soccer

Clare Andres - CAL/Louisville

Shelby Cohen - Oldham County/LaGrange

Hannah Konermann - Mercy/Louisville

Casey Whitfield - Manual/Louisville

Again, a spread of schools, here.  I think I knew Casey was a Manual graduate but it has slipped my mind, so that one was a pleasant surprise to see.

Softball

Michala Riggle - Christian Educational Consortium/Louisville

Jessica Adell - Ballard/Louisville

Morgan Meyer - Mercy/Louisville

Ashley Nikolao - Meade County/Flaherty

Jordan Vorbrink - Mercy/Louisville

Morgan Hart - PRP/Louisville

Sarah Lopesilvery - Oldham County/Simpsonville

Meade County was, again, at the edge of what I would consider "in the Louisville area".  Morgan Meyer is another that I hadn't realized was a hometown one.

Swimming & Diving

Ashley LeClair - SHA/Louisville

Hannah Magnuson - CAL/Louisville

Maggie Patterson - CAL/Louisville

Hannah Magnuson has gotten some attention in the Swimming events, but Arther Albiero is another coach that recruits very broadly and thus only has a fairly small number of locals competing for him.

Tennis

Olivia Boesing - Floyd Central/Floyds Knobs, IN

Tennis has a pretty small roster overall, so only a single local isn't that surprising.  Another of the very few examples from the Sunny Side of Louisville.

Volleyball

Molly Sauer - Assumption/Louisville

Nikki Koval - Mercy/Louisville

This is a relatively low number of hometown folks compared to the past few years.  Katie George is still listed on the site still, but has graduated.  The departure of Maya McClendon also decreased the hometown quotient for Volleyball.  Nikki Koval is not listed on the site, but joined the team in January as a transfer defensive specialist from USF.

Three women's teams at UofL have no locals on them at all: Basketball, Golf, and Lacrosse  Golf, like Tennis, has a very small roster in terms of numbers, so that's not surprising.  Basketball has had some locals in the past, but at Coach Walz ups the quality of recruiting, we're starting to see a wider and wider spread of player hometowns.  Lacrosse is a sport that just isn't all that popular in the Louisville area, although it is definitely a sport that growing in popularity all the time, so look for some locals on this squad in the future.

When you watch UofL sports this coming year, maybe keep some of these names in mind as some hometown heroes to cheer for.

In Other News

Tune in to NBC tonight at 8pm EDT for Day Two of the US Swimming Olympic Team Trials.  UofL's non-hometown-hero-but-we-still-love-her-anyway Kelsi Worrell is seeded second in the 100meter butterfly.  I believe this will be the first event of the telecast.  The top two from the event will join the US Olympic Swimming Team in Rio.  Last night, right before her semi-final swim, NBC had a shot of Kelsi doing the C-A-R-D-S cheer (I believe it was started in the stands and she joined in), while also showing her Cardinal allegiance with her UofL swim cap.

Also, if you, like me, need your volleyball fix.  Janelle Jenkins will be playing tonight at 5pm EDT in Indianapolis at the Girls Junior National Championships event.  This is part of her involvement in USA Volleyball's Collegiate National Team program.  Janelle is part of Team White.  The match will be streamed, though not in very high quality, at usavolleyball.org.  Look for the GJNC event links and it will be the stream for Court 1.  Tess Clark played with Team Red last night, and the two of them will play against each other tomorrow night (Tuesday).  All matches are scheduled for 5pm, but last night's didn't get started until about 6 due to delays in the GJNC matches on that court throughout the day.

- JMcA