Cats vs. Cards in SB tonight -- Pastor Named ACC FH Co-Player of Week -- Balogun? -- WEDNESDAY CARDINAL CPUPLE

 

CATS AND CARDS IN SOFTBALL TONIGHT AT ULMER

The Louisville and Kentucky softball squads go to battle tonight in Ulmer Stadium at 7 p.m. this evening. It'll be shown on ACCNX and a limited free walk-up tickets wiil be made available for those who want to attend. The berm, of course, is open --we've heard about some restrictions and distancing policies being implemented out there as well. 

Of note, in pregame ceremonies, the Cards will honor 2020 senior Caitlin Ferguson. The former Cards shortstop will go through her delayed senior Night honors at 6:45 p.m. Caitlin played in 175 games in her time at Louisville, scoring 89 runs and driving in 94. She started at short all four years she played at Louisville, and was on the 2017 ACC All-Freshmen team and 2018 All-Southeastern Regional second team.  

The Cards are 13-15 coming into tonight's contest and have won three of their last four games. Louisville rediscovered the bats at Pittsburgh and exploded for 29 runs in the four game series against Panther pitching. A big part of that has been from Carrmyn Greenwood, who leads the team with a .437 batting average....which is second-highest in the ACC.  Taylor Roby has been hitting the ball well also and leads UofL with 29 runs-batted-in. She's also pounded nine home runs this season, tops on the squad.  

Makayla Hurst is currently on a seven-game hitting streak for Louisville. 

Looking at the Cats, they come in as the #10 ranked team in the USA Today/NFCA poll. 

UK has built a 27-6 record and most recently took one out of three at Tennessee.  UK has seven players averaging .300 or better at the plate and Kayla Kowalik carries an impressive .482 average. Erin Coffel is the long ball threat for the Wildcats -- she's sent 14 Spaldings over the fence this season.

Louisville won the last time these two met 8-7. Taylor Roby belted a one-out single in the bottom of the seventh inning that scored Celene Funke for the "W". 

PASTOR NAMED ACC CO-PLAYER OF THE WEEK

Mercedes "Meche" Pastor has been named the ACC Co-Player Of the Week.

It's the fourth time she's gotten the honor in the 2020-21 Field Hockey season. Pastor was responsible for the only goal -- in overtime -- in Louisville's 1-0 win over Syracuse on Sunday at Trager Stadium. 

Pastor leads the Cards in goals scored this season with 11 and has knocked in five game winners for the 12-4 Cards. 

Also, Louisville Field Hockey has moved up a couple of spots to #3 in the NFHCA rankings this week, behind North Carolina and Iowa. The ACC continues their strong showing in the rankings, with four of the top 10 and seven of the top 20 in the weekly rankings.  

Louisville Field Hockey takes to the road nest -- to play #15 Duke on Saturday 

BALOGUN

Elizabeth came to Louisville as a 
transfer from Ga.Tech with Liz Dixon

At the time of this article (early Wednesday morning) there has been no official UofL WBB announcement on whether Elizabeth Balogun has entered the transfer portal or not. Balogun has released nothing on social media, either. 

I know that several sites and publications are reporting she's in the transfer portal. That might be. I also remember several sites reporting Jeff Walz was leaving Louisville last year. Give me the, facts, just the facts, as Joe Friday used to say...

I've received a lot of inquiries about this from our readers and have made inquiries within the program to get a confirmation or denial of the Balogun transfer/portal status but have received nothing official yet from Louisville WBB. . 

A source close to the program indicated to me that she would "most likely be leaving" but we deal with the facts and official statements when it comes to player movement here at Cardinal Couple, so we won't come out and confirm her status until we hear something from her or Walz or the program. 

Balogun was 24-75 from the floor in the 2020-21 season for Louisville (a 32% rate from the floor) and appeared in 29 games for the Cards, starting 16 of them.

Balogun led Louisville in blocks with 43 for the season and had a season high of 14 points twice -- against Miami (FL) and Clemson. 

When, and if,  further and official information becomes available on her future, we'll bring it to you here at Cardinal Couple. 

                                         *******************

(On a personal note, I received my second COVID 19 vaccination on Tuesday. i used the drive-thru operation UofL is running off Brook Street downtown and have received the Pfizer doses.  No side effects except a slightly sore left arm and I went to bed early last night -- that might have been because I was tired of watching UK Baseball pound Louisville pitching on TV) If an old fart like me can go through it, you can too.) 

I've never been one for flu shots, but, I would encourage you to get this shot. The more people that get vaccinated, the less cases there will be. If you want to talk to me about the procedure, feel free to shoot me an e-mail at:  

cardinalcouple@twc.com 

It doesn't hurt, and that was especially important to me, because I HATE needles,  so go get the shots. 

Have a Wonderful Wednesday!

paulie