One-Third Through the Basketball Season
The first third of the regular season for Louisville women's basketball has shown a strong start. A 9-1 record is right about where most of us assumed the Cards would be. Louisville has faced tough competition in Ole Miss, Gonzaga, and Alabama. A healthy Kentucky team could be considered stiff competition too.
The next third of the season features opponents such as UConn, Miami, North Carolina, and an undefeated Washington team. The final third sees the Cards squaring off against NC State, Virginia Tech, North Carolina, and Notre Dame twice, all ranked teams.
So far, Louisville's only hiccup has been a five-point loss to Alabama on a neutral court in Texas. The Cards' shooting percentages that game were low from every aspect and the defense collapsed. Outside of that game, Louisville has been outscoring opponents by 21 points per game.
Scoring has been by committee with seven players currently averaging 7.0 points per game or better. Three Cardinals are scoring in double figures- Kiki Jefferson (12.1 ppg), Olivia Cochran (11.2 ppg), and Sydney Taylor (11.1 ppg). Rebounding has been spread out too. Cochran leads the team with 5.7 rebounds per game while all but one player averages 2.2 rebounds or better.
Louisville's assist-to-turnover ratio could be better as the Cards only have 143 assists on 276 made shots compared to 155 turnovers. However, 155 turnovers doesn't look so bad when the Cards have forced opponents to commit 224 turnovers.
Jeff Walz's crew of mostly new faces is still figuring things out and learning the Walz system, but they're talented and have gelled well. How a team plays together and gets along is one of the biggest key pieces of any successful team, regardless of talent and skill level.
Morehead State visits town this Wednesday at 4:00pm as a part of the women and men doubleheader. The men's team will play at 8:00pm Arkansas State. The game is being promoted as "Barbieheimer" as a recognition to two of the biggest films to come out post-COVID-19- Barbie and Oppenheimer. Paulie and I plan to be in attendance for this one.
A Familiar Face Close to joining Cardinal Couple Temporarily
Cardinal Couple is excited about the great chance of bringing to our site a former writer and radio show host. We can't tell you who...just yet, but this person is a former Louisville media member who transitioned into anohter line of employ several years ago. This writer will be filling in for Paulie, who will be taking a brief hiatus from the site in late December when he has a medical procedure coming up.
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| (The Cardinal Couple writers...kittens in a box/) |
Paulie will be fine but we're giving him a break during that time to let him rest and recover and step away from the stress of the Cardiac Cards and us knucleheads here (as he calls us) from driving him crazy daily.
Happy Tuesday and Go Cards!
Jared
I am surprised at 9-1, but happy. Jefff waalz always say don't eve expect his team to go udefeated, but they are comng together better thn I think even he thought.
ReplyDeletePaulie, so you are finnaly going in for the brain transplant, huh? About time....seriously, hopeyou come through top notch and may it be a smmoth and uncomplicated procedure.
Nick O