Guess Who's Back
As we are diving into the heart of summer, we will be doing a lot of checking in on former Cards now playing at the next level of their sports, mostly professionally. Today is certainly no exception.
WNBA
No WNBA play yesterday, so no scores or updates to bring you, but that does mean pretty much the whole league will be hitting the court today.
Asia Durr with the New York Liberty will be hosting the Minnesota Lynx. The Lynx did have Angel McCoughtry on their roster, but bought her out for the season giving her more time to recover from nagging knee troubles. 2 pm tip time.
Emily Engstler joins her Indiana Fever in a road trip to Atlanta to play the Dream. 3pm start.
Dana Evans and Chicago Sky play host to Myisha Hines-Allen and the Washington Mystics at 6pm
TV coverage for these games is all over the place. The Fever may have something on their Facebook page? The Sky/Mystics game seems to be primarily available on Amazon Prime streaming? It sure would be nice to have something nice and consistently available.
US Open
We've been following former Card Lauren Hartlage as she starts to show up in the LPGA. The current event is the US Open at Pine Needles in South Carolina.
A rough day yesterday for Hartlage as she tumbled down the ranks with a +7 round. That puts her 18 strokes away from the lead, in a tie for 53rd place in the event.
Volleyball Nation's League
The Volleyball Nation's League has been playing their first week of play with the first selection of players that, for the US, included former Card Anna Stevenson.
The US squad faced off against Brazil, a country with quite a great tradition in volleyball. Despite that, the US wins this in a 3-0 sweep; 25-21, 25-20, 25-18.
For Stevenson's part, she's playing in her usual middle blocking position paired with Dana Rettke in the other middle rotation. Stevenson got four kills and a pair of blocks against Brazil.
Overall in the VNL, the US has not dropped a set, yet. Their first match in the overall event was against the Dominican Republic, 25-21, 25-17, 25-18. Then after a couple of days off, they swept Canada on Friday; 25-14, 25-22, 25-19, before taking on Brazil yesterday.
The last game of this first week of VNL play for the US is today at 4pm EDT against Japan. These matches have been played in Shreveport, LA.
The VNL is a multi-week event with the teams able to make different roster selections every week. So it's possible that we won't see Stevenson play after this week. The 2nd week of play opens June 7th, so we can check rosters then and see if she made the roster selection for the coming week, at least.
NWSL
Two former Cards are on rosters in the NWSL, of course. Emina Ekic is making some noise with the local club, Racing Louisville FC, as we well know. Gaby Vincent, however, is still making appearances with the Washington Spirit.
Both teams were in action yesterday, but both went down to defeat. Racing lost in a disappointing 3-0 decision against the NC Courage. Ekic came on in the 67th minute for Alex Chidiac.
The Spirit lost 1-0 against the NY/NJ Gotham FC. Vincent was not listed as being available for selection in this one.
Both teams in action next Saturday, though the Spirit do have a mid-week game at Chicago against the Red Stars on Wednesday.
Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast
The CCRHP is also back. Case is ensconced in his new home office, Jared, Paul, and myself were all on the call.
The group spent a fair bit of time discussing the permanent hiring of Josh Heird as Athletic Director at UofL. We also showed some love for Carmyn Greenwood getting the All-American tag in Softball, Kelsi Dahlia joining the Notre Dame Swimming coaching staff, and Lauren Hartlage in golf. We took a quick look at the Women's College World Series, and a swing around the WNBA. We had a quick discussion about the WNBA, the Cards playing in it, a few who are not, and potential expansion of the league and potentially coming to Louisville.
It was a full hour for sure. Check it out at:
JMcA
Hope Ekic continues to be a valuable player.
ReplyDeleteNick O
I have had some concern that her minutes might diminish with the return of the good doc Nadia Nadim. Nadim and Ekic entered the game last night at the same time, however, suggesting they are not directly competing for a spot on the pitch? Ekic does seem to be contributing solidly and she's drawing positive comments from coaches and others. Certainly the marketing side of the house loves her...the "hometown hero" draw is almost certainly a factor in her favor as well.
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