Thursday, April 22, 2021

Tennis Advances in ACC Tournament -- Softball Falls to UK -- THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 Women's Tennis Defeats Boston College in ACC First Round




It was a great day for Louisville women's tennis. The 12-seed Cards handled 13-seed Boston College 4-1 in the opening round of the ACC Tournament.

Louisville took the doubles point to start the match. The duo of Dina Chaika and Tatiana Simova took down Reagan Posorke and Loren Haukova 6-2. Rhea Verma and Andrea Di Palma had a tough battle against Yufei Long and Kylie Wilcox but prevailed 7-5.

The foes then proceeded to the singles portion where each team has six members compete. In this case, only four of those six finished before it was a guaranteed victory for Louisville.

Jelena Vujanic was first to finish as she defeated Maria Ross 6-3, 6-1.




The next singles court to finish was Raven Neely vs Kylie Wilcox. The Eagles got their only point here with a 6-3, 7-5 win. Rhea Verma checked in next as she downed Laura Lopez 6-1, 7-5. Dina Chaika took Reagan Posorke to three sets but claimed the win 6-0, 3-6, 6-0, securing the Louisville victory.

Chelsea Sawyer and Marice Aguiar were in the third set when the match ended. Andrea Di Palma was just about to defeat Yufei Long when the match ended.

Louisville advances to play 5-seed Duke today at 10:00 a.m. The entire tournament is taking place at the Rome Tennis Center in Rome, Ga.


Louisville Falls to Kentucky in Nine Innings




It may have been a bit chilly and the day may have started with snow on the ground, but Louisville and Kentucky were not going to cancel their only other scheduled game. The Cards traveled to Lexington for a 7:00 start time last night to face the #14-ranked Wildcats.

It was Louisville who was first to put a run on the board. Makayla Hurst drove a pitch over the right field wall for the 1-0 lead in the top of the second inning. Kentucky would respond immediately with a home run of their own to even the score.




The Cards did some damage with the bases loaded in the next inning. Taylor Roby hit into a fielder's choice with the out at third, but plated a run for the Cards. Rebecca Chung walked to reload the bases and Hurst hit a high fly ball to the outfield for a sacrifice fly for the 3-1 lead. Kentucky would play small ball before a sac fly brought the score to 3-2.

Celene Funke would make contact and send a fly ball to the outfield as her sac fly sent Charley Butler home and Louisville went up 4-2.

A leadoff double with the addition of a couple other hits and a defensive miscue allowed Kentucky to post two runs in the fifth inning to even the score at 4-4.

Rebecca Chung, the hero from two years ago, lined a ball to the right field gap in the seventh inning to score Carmyn Greenwood and give Louisville a 5-4 edge.




With one out and a runner on second base, Louisville made a pitching change. After 6 1/3 innings, Coach Holly Aprile retired Roby from the circle and called upon graduate transfer Jennifer Leonhardt. A blooper to left field that then spun and bounced away from all Louisville players allowed Kentucky to score a run and even the score at 5-5. Leonhardt would then strike out the next two batters to go into extra innings.

We would see the game go to nine innings. Kentucky would get their first two runners on. A sac fly advanced them to second and third before a sac fly to right field walked it off for Kentucky, 6-5.

Louisville falls to 16-21 on the year. They are 2-15 against ranked opponents this season.




The Cards return home this weekend for a four-game series against #7 Florida State. It will be Senior Weekend. Nine players are listed as grad students or seniors on the roster. A few players have confirmed with me that they will not be returning next year and at least one plans to return. I do not have an exact number on how many will be participating in the Senior Day festivities but an educated guess tells me seven.

With a rainy forecast for Saturday stay tuned for schedule changes. Oh yeah, they're back to selling alcohol at softball games if that entices you to head out to Ulmer Stadium this weekend!


Happy Thursday and Go Cards!
Jared

2 comments:

  1. Congrats to women's tennis. That was a darn tough loss last night for SB. Had to be cold out there. Hope we can beat FSU.

    Curtis "Be Kind" Franklin

    ReplyDelete
  2. Cardinal baserunning gave that game to us. Got to be smart on the base paths, little sisters

    Nice write up.

    C-A-T-S. Cats, cats. CATS !!

    ReplyDelete

Please leave your comments here. We ask you be respectful of other posts, no matter how ridiculous they may seem to you. After all, it is CARDINAL COUPLE.

Any attempts to advertise a product or other website here in the comments section without the prior consent of CARDINAL COUPLE will result in a bill rendered for advertising services and possible legal action. We're serious. No more bots.

Now, have your take...