Louisville women's basketball -- The Streak Goes On - Friday Cardinal Couple

Sonny and Cher famously sang, "The Beat Goes On", and now the UofL Women's Basketball team could be singing, "The Streak Goes On" as they reach 17-0, the longest win streak in program history, with the 66-60 win over the Duke Blue Devils.

Kelly Dickey, of Real Card Game, who may be one of the most amazing sports statistics gurus I've ever witnessed in action, dug up the best starts in overall Cardinals history.  My beloved Volleyball holds the current crown with a 20-0 start in 2005, 19-0 for Baseball last spring, and a 17-0 start for them in 1957.

Credit to Haley Gorecki for Duke, who had a career night with 25 points, 15 of them from beyond the arc, along with 6 assists for leading the Dookies to making this a close game after a strong start by the Cardinals.  Leaonna Odom also have 14 points in the contribution.  The Cards held Lexie Brown to single digits with 8.  Rebecca Greenwell was in sweats and didn't play.

On the Louisville side, Myisha Hines-Allen got a double-double with 13 points and 10 rebounds, but despite the numbers, didn't have a particularly great outing.  Joining her in double figures were Sam Feuhring and, in a shock to no one, Asia Durr.  They had 12 and 22 respectively.

Beyond the above, nothing on the stat sheet was really all that sparkling.  This was a gritty win, that started off looking great for UofL, but then devolved a bit and allowed the Blue Devils back into a close game at the end.

The 8,101 in attendance did have a moment where they largely held their breath in unison when, approximately 2 minutes into the 2nd quarter, Asia Durr went down with what was a turned, or possibly sprained, ankle.  At the time, it looked bad (though at the time, I also thought it was her knee that she hurt...the perils of sitting in row CC), but she did return back out from the locker room and back into play before the end of the quarter.

Lamont Russell showing that his spider
strength comes naturally. Thanks to Sam
Purcell for the picture.

If Asia Durr dropping to the floor, clearly in pain, was the lowlight of the evening, the highlight may have been when Lamont Russell was called over from the bench by Coach Walz to, I thought, help her hobble off the floor.  In reality, Mr. Russell picked her up and carried her to the locker room with about the same ease that I pick up a piece of paper.  "Mr. Russell, sir" will likely be my form of address to him if I ever get the chance to meet him in person.  For fans who don't know who Russell is, he is the Video Coordinator for the coaching staff, and fulfills some graphic design duties as well.  I have no reason to think he performs those tasks with any less capability that he carried the 5'10" Asia Durr off the court.

Back to the game analysis, while the Cards have been on an extended road trip, including across the Christmas break, apparently they forgot that they wear white when they play at the KFC Yum! Center, as a number of passes went to players in blue.  Credit to Duke for jumping into the passing lanes, but a fair number of the passes were just ill-advised from the get-go.

F-R-E-D-S report

F - Free Throws - No score awarded here.  The Cards went 13-20 from the charity stripe.  A tip of the hat to Sam Fuehring, Arica Carter, and Dana Evans, who all went 2-2, but this is a team award, and an overall 65% doesn't get it done.

R - Rebounding - A lower case "r" gets awarded here.  35 tallys is better than Duke's 29, and is a decent rebounding total, but the margin is a little too close for comfort.  We can chalk a little bit of this up to shots being taken when there are no white shirts anywhere near the basket...perhaps a little more wisdom in shot selection is called for to help this one out.

E - Effort/Execution - One of the more subjective categories.  I'm going to award a lower case "e" on this one as well.  Errant passes being the main culprit prevent the upper case rating.

D - Defense - Holding Duke to 60 is good, forcing 15 turnovers compared to only 9 for the Cards is also good.  I believe that just gets the Cards over the hump to an upper case "D" for this category.

EDITOR'S NOTE: I will remain with the original FRED report in my post-game reports. And, a capital "D" here is just plain wrong, Worldwide. Report to the court for defensive practice. .  ...

We've tried, over the years, at Cardinal Couple to bring some attention to some of the unsung heroes of Cardinals Athletics.  Many of these folks labor out of sight and out of mind of most of the fanbase.  We don't always see their actions, but their impact is there.  In the effort to highlight some of their efforts, I've decided to start awarding an "S" in the F-R-E-D report from time to time, when some aspect of the "S"upport that the team gets warrants particular attention.  The team gets a solid "S" for last night thanks to the help from Mr. Russell,  and Keressa Ackles, the trainer for the Louisville squad, for their efforts in assisting Asia Durr and getting her back out onto the court before the quarter was out.

Final report, "-reDS".  It's always good to get the win, but there's certainly room to clean up the play.

Cardinal Couple Radio Hour

We've back!  The CCRH gang will be back, live, on the airwaves tomorrow at our normal timeslot of 11am on WCHQ, broadcasting from the spiffy new studios on Mellwood Avenue.  We're excited to get back into the swing of things, and we hope you're excited to hear us again.  Check it out on 100.9 FM in the central Louisville area, or streaming via TuneIn anywhere in the world, or if you're inclined, install the WCHQ app and pick up the show that way.  We're not picky.

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JMcA