Cards Get Trio of Sunday Wins -- MONDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Happy Labor Day, folks. I apologize for the late post this morning. The Cards were busy yesterday, so let's get right into it. 

Field Hockey Blanks Ohio

Justine Sowry's squad followed their big win over Michigan State with another five-goal victory over a green team. This time it was the Bobcats of Ohio University, and this time the Cardinals' defense came away with a clean sheet. Louisville improved to 2-0 on the young season with the win. 

The two teams played tight for the first 25 minutes of the match before Izzy Bianco and Rylie Wollerton connected for Wollerton's fourth goal of the season. After leading the squad in scoring last year, Wollerton is well on her way to setting the benchmark again this year. Like the match Friday, this goal (Bianco to Wollerton connection) came after a penalty corner shot that Bianco saw blocked away and decided to pass it off the next time. Louisville wasted no time scoring a second goal, as Gigi Edwards picked up her first goal of the season with an unassisted number one minute after the opener. Gigi's goal came after a Wollerton shot was saved. 

Ohio recovered in the third to keep the Cards off the board in that quarter, but Louisville's offense was relentless. Opening the final stanza, Louisville scored early to put the game away. Bianco and Wollerton got together for Wollerton's second goal of the game and fifth of the year two minutes into the quarter. Three minutes later, Gracie Potter, architect of so many Louisville goals already, scored her first of the year on an assist from Wollerton. With just under five minutes left in the game, Lauren Masters set the final score with her second goal of the season on an assist from Tyler Everslage. 

Louisville put OU under serious pressure, and their goalie responded pretty well. The Cards had 22 total shots and put 15 on target. Ohio's goalie had ten saves. Louisville took a step back in corner efficiency during this game, as they converted just one of nine. Yikes. Defensively, Ohio had only three shots. Emily Young saved the only one that was on target. Alessia Cicuto saw her first minutes of the season in the final 10 minutes of the game, but she saw no defensive action. 

Louisville is back in action on Saturday in Bloomington, Indiana. They'll face Drexel at 11am on Saturday and take on IU Sunday at 12. 

JUSTINE SOWRY POSTGAME

GIGI EDWARDS POSTGAME

Volleyball Thumps Morehead State

On the podcast this week, I said that if Louisville followed the performance against Auburn with a sweep of Morehead State where all the scores were 25-21, I might be concerned. No worries though: they didn't. Louisville crushed the Eagles with a 25-13, 25-13, 25-17 victory. Dan Meske was able to play a rotated side for much of the match and still take care of business in Louisville's second matchup of the Cardinal Classic. The Cards will wrap up the event against St. Johns today at 3PM. 

Perhaps Auburn was better than we gave them credit for. Either that or Louisville cleaned up a lot of issues on Saturday. Louisville hit .398 in this match and outblocked Morehead State 12-1. The Cards were led by Payton Petersen on offense, who finished with a career-high 12 kills. Cara Cresse and Chloe Chicoine followed her with nine apiece. Hannah Kenny, who I mistakenly referred to as coming in on the libero side in my Saturday write-up, led the team with four aces. Kenny is substituting defensively in the back row for Kalyssa Blackshear. 

Blackshear joined Hannah Sherman near the top of the team in blocks. Sherman had two solos and four assists while Blackshear had four assists. Louisville finished with five solo blocks, as Cresse, Petersen, and Nayelis Cabello each put up their own. Cabello had five kills to go with her 34 assists and finished with two errors. I don't love to see 16 attempts from the setter (which was third on the team), and I hope that Cabello doesn't become too reliant on the dump attack. 

As I mentioned, Meske got to send in plenty of other players in this one. Chicoine played only two sets and Cresse played all three sets but had just 15 attempts. Hannah Sherman did all of her blocking (and killed her only attempt) in just one set. Alanna Bankston got to play in a set and Addison Makun picked up three kills on three attempts and two assisted blocks in the middle for two sets. 

Morehead State kept in close early in the first set, but Louisville was never really in any danger from this team. That's more or less what we expect from Cardinals Volleyball, though, so it's good to see after a clunky opener. Today's match closing the Cardinal Classic could get ugly. St. Johns took a set off Auburn yesterday in a 3-1 loss, but they were swept by Morehead State on Friday. Today's 3PM first serve will air on ACCNX. 

Soccer Wins Tough Match Against Coastal Carolina

It was a beautiful evening for soccer yesterday, and fans that came out to Lynn were treated to a surprisingly thrilling match. Coastal Carolina was committed to not going down as badly as other recent opponents for the Cards and a stellar performance by their goalkeeper, Aris Lamanna, put Louisville fans in an uncomfortable spot. Lamanna finished the match with 10 saves, but her play disrupted more scoring opportunities than that number suggests. In the end, Louisville's pressure was too great and the Cards managed to score a pair in the second half to win 2-0. 

Louisville posted its fourth clean sheet of the season last night, but the match wasn't without its scares. Erynn Floyd was forced into three saves, and one was a glove tip up onto (and over) the crossbar. Floyd was class yesterday, in my opinion. She was decisive on the ball and didn't give up opportunities that she didn't need to. Coastal put on the full-court press late in the second half before Louisville was able to score their second and Floyd is a big reason why the Cards didn't concede.

Swinarski lines up a cross

The Cardinal defense was without Karsyn Cherry, as the senior captain was mysteriously in street clothes yesterday. She wasn't alone. Louisville didn't dress six players last night, and four of those were starters in the opener against Auburn. Joining Cherry on defense was Brooklynn Lee, who is still out after being stricken in the head by a ball in warmups against Vanderbilt two weeks ago. Fina Davy is still out after turning up with a boot last Sunday, but the boot has disappeared, which is encouraging. The final starter missing is Nicole Jodoin, who may have taken a knock on the head against USC Upstate on Thursday. Jodoin's absence was definitely felt in the first half, as Louisville seemed lack direction in the middle of the field on attack. The other two players sidelined were freshmen Taylor Wilson and Ashlyn Huie. Wilson has not played yet this season and Huie has 14 minutes in one match. 

With a slightly shorter bench, and a somewhat surprisingly close match, Louisville was forced into playing some significant minutes. In addition to a complete game from Floyd, which is largely expected, Louisville had five 90 minute warriors on the field last night. All four defenders played 90 minutes, and they were joined by AG Gibson, who filled various roles on the pitch last night. Gibson, by the way, picked up a yellow card in the 14th minute of the match, so earning the full 90 minutes after that showed a lot of trust in the sophomore from Karen Ferguson-Dayes. That's especially true as the game got chippier as it carried on. Both teams finished seven fouls, but it probably could have been double that number. 

After a first half in which Louisville peppered the Coastal defense, I remarked that the Cards could lead 3-4 to nothing without the play of Lamanna in goal. That was a bit in spite of themselves, since they did seem a bit listless up front. At one point Mackenzie Geigle was playing in the center of the field directly in front of AG Gibson? It was unusual and no one seemed particularly comfortable. The Cards finished with nine shots in the first half and six were on target. In retrospect, it wasn't a great situation for the Cards entering the locker room. Even though Coastal had just two shots and one on target, keeping Louisville off the board meant that it was all to play for in the second half. 

Yesterday's goalscorers Morris (l) and Geigle (r)

Fortunately, Louisville put their stamp on the game early in the second half. Taylor Morris got to start the second half for Geigle after having been subbed on in the first, and she and Gibson connected on a well crafted play through the box to the right side. With the keeper working to her left, Morris had plenty of room on the wide side of the goal and was able to find the side netting to give the Cards the lead. That came in the 51st minute and took a bit of pressure off since the game was no longer tied. Coastal did begin to apply more and more offensive pressure as the game wore on though, and they finished with six shots in the second half, forcing two more saves from Floyd. 

Louisville was a bit on the back foot in the latter portions of the second half, but a late goal more or less put the game on ice. A Liza Suydam shot up top was saved over the goal by Lamanna in the 82nd minute, setting up Louisville's fifth corner of the match (they took six overall). Amelia Swinarski stepped up to take it as she is left-footed and can bring an inswinging ball into the box. Geigle's head found the ball on it's way down and although it was tipped by Lamanna to slow it down, a Coastal defender was unable to pull it from over the line, her header managing only to bury the ball deeper into the net. (In all honesty, it was impossible to tell from my angle if the ball was already in or if it was technically an own goal, but it was going in without the defender's intervention anyway). That goal took some of the wind out of CCU's sails, and the Chanticleers didn't get another shot for the remaining eight minutes. 

I don't think Louisville expected quite such a significant fight from the Chants in this one, but, at the end of the day, they'll take a clean sheet and their fourth straight win. The Cards move to 5-1 and have surpassed last season's goal total with 12 games left to play. Louisville has two more games in this homestand before they get conference play started with a bang against FSU in Tallahassee next Thursday. Before that, they'll face Kent State (Thursday) and Dayton (Sunday) at Dr. Mark & Cindy Lynn Stadium. 

Until next time, Go Cards!

WSOC hosts Coastal Carolina -- SUNDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 4-1 KICKIN' CARDS FACE CHANTICLEERS AT LYNN TONIGHT

It has been a good start for Karen Ferguson Dayes and the Louisville women's soccer team, and the "Kickin" Cards look to keep up the scoring frenzy tonight when they bring the Chanticleers from Conway, SC to Bourbon City for a 7:30 p.m. match. 

So, what is a Chanticleer? A rooster, whose name literally comes from the French term "sing clear". The Chanticleers are also a American male classic singing ensemble. Oh, yeah...it's also the nickname for Coastal Carolina sports .

Away in the Manger - The Chanticleers

I doubt this group of Chanticleers that assemble on Floyd Street tonight will do much singing, unless it is the blues, when facing the Cardinals. They are 1-2 on the season and have scored just two goals in three games, against the likes of Richmond, UNCW and Belmont. They are also 0-2 at home. 

Louisville, on the other hand is 4-1 and has only lost to 3-1 Vanderbilt at Vandy. The Cards have 25 goals amassed in their five games and are led by Mackenzie Geigle with four goals. 

Amelia Swinarski has nine assists and that happens to led the nation. 

It should be another Cardinals romp in this battle of birds tonight.

LOUISVILLE FIELD HOCKEY HOSTS OHIO BOBCATS

Justine Sowry has her Field Hockey squad in action early today with a match against the Ohio Bobcats.

The Bobcats come in after a 5-0 loss at Michigan State.

This one on ACCNX. at noon

While I am speaking of Cardinals...boos and hisses to the ACC announcer who called the Louisville squad the Cardinal all night long on the ACC broadcast. . We are not Stanford (The Cardinal).Where do they come up with these guys?...when there are plenty of good announcers locally who could do the broadcasts justice.

Tonight's game goes to the ACC Network Extra, which means online...and maybe we'll get some announcers who know who we are. 

OK, rant over. Enjoy tonight's game and most likely tomorrow off, if you are still in the working class. 

And have a great rest of the Labor Day Weekend. 

(Photos by Jared Anderson) 

CARDINAL COUPLE RADIO HOUR PODCAST

Three of us (Paulie, Daryl and Case) participated in the weekly podcast yesterday. Jared was out taking selfies of himself at Louisville football. 

You can hear the re-broadcast of the podcast on You Tube and many other platforms at Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast. Give us a listen!

paulie

Cards Take Care of Business in Openers -- SATURDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Volleyball Sweeps Auburn

Louisville volleyball brought the Auburn Tigers in as part of the 2025 Cardinal Classic and opened the season with a close but convincing win. It was a great way to get the Dan Meske Era underway, as the Cards dazzled a capacity crowd (including Charitie Luper, Anna DeBeer, and Elena Scott) with a sweep of Auburn, winning all three sets with a matching 25-21 score. 

It was a... less than stellar hitting day for both teams, as Auburn managed to break .100 in just the third set and finished with an .084 hitting percentage for the match. While Louisville had nearly double that (.162), that's not saying a whole lot. The big problem for the Cards was one that Jared mentioned could be an issue for this team: they have a fairly low point of attack. Here's a statement we haven't said about Louisville volleyball after many matches in recent years: the Cards were outblocked. Auburn picked up 11 compared to Louisville's six. That mean's nearly half of Louisville's 23 errors came off the block, and they were very dependent on self inflicted wounds from Auburn, who finished with 22 errors. 

Don't get me wrong, the Cards still got the hammer down on offense. Louisville finished with 45 kills, and 43 of those were assisted. They also had a decent serving day, finishing with five aces and just five errors. Auburn finished with just one ace and three errors, giving the Cards a +2 day at the service line. 

Offensively, and this may shock you, Louisville was paced by Cara Cresse and Chloe Chicoine, who each finished with 11 kills. Where it might actually get surprising is that those two were joined on 11 kills by freshman Kalyssa Blackshear. We have mentioned Blackshear a few times as a player to watch out for on the opposite side. Blackshear's 11 kills came on 22 attempts, and she, like Cresse, had just two errors. Those two paced the team in hitting percentage with a .409 from Blackshear and a .474 from Cresse. 

It looks like Louisville is set to run with one setter, as Nayelis Cabello finished with 31 assists, but Cabello will need to be careful not to depend too much on Chicoine. Blackshear's 22 attack attempts were second on the team in yesterday's match, but it wasn't close: Chicoine took 42 swings. She finished with 11 kills and nine errors. The next highest outside hitter was Payton Petersen, who hit 5/5 on 20 attempts. Ava Utterback was 0/1 on one attempt. Not ideal. Interestingly, we didn't see Alanna Bankston or Reese Robins at the outside or opposite hitter positions, respectively. We also didn't see Molly Wilson spell Cabello in any rotations. 

Defensively, I've already mentioned the blocks, but everyone for Louisville had to hit the floor. The Cards had no solo blocks, so it was good team play at the net, but they finished with 70 digs, making up for those balls that got past the block. Petersen led the way, playing strong out of the back row in full rotation despite not having the best offensive day, as she had 16 digs. Kamden Schrand finished with 15, and Hannah Kenny, who also cycled through as a libero had ten. Cabello showed why she only had 31 of Louisville's 43 assists as she had three block assists and 13 digs. Chicoine wrapped up the high numbers with nine digs, narrowly missing the double-double. Cabello (2), Petersen (2), and Kenny also had the aces for the Cards. 

As you might suspect based on the final scores, Louisville never really ran away with a set, somewhat missing that "boom" we've gotten used to. At the same time, they never really had a scare outside of the second set when they faced a 17-12 deficit. Though they would go on to outscore Auburn 13-4 over the remainder of the set, they had to do it largely through consistent pressure, not seeing a run of more than three points until taking the score from 20-20 to 24-20. 

Meske will surely have plenty to cover with the team regarding the net play, but at the end of the day, it's a sweep of a Power 4 team. The Cards have today off while Auburn and Morehead State play, but they'll be back in action on Sunday against the Eagles. The Cards get St. John's on Labor Day. 

Field Hockey Thumps Michigan State

Louisville field hockey opened their season with a fairly tough matchup against a Big Ten opponent in the Michigan State Spartans. In the run-up to the season, we talked a fair amount about how similar these two teams were last season. This didn't look like it would be a straightforward season opener for the Cards, but Justine Sowry's 2025 squad showed that they have been working on a few things since last year. One of the major hiccups in 2024 was an inability to score. Louisville showed no signs of that being an issue, at least early in the season, as they scored early and often against MSU on their way to a 6-1 victory. 

The Cards scored first, nearly ten minutes into the game, with senior Chloe Cuzzupe picking up her first goal of the season. She was assisted by Gigi Edwards. Two minutes later, Lauren Masters doubled Louisville's advantage with an unassisted goal, which would stand as the final goal of the first quarter. The second was similarly uneventful early, but Louisville earned a penalty corner with six minutes remaining in the half. Gracie Potter took the honors and sent the ball to Annabel Sep, who became Louisville's third goal scorer of the half. The Cards went into the break with a 3-0 lead. 

At halftime, Louisville's returning goal leader, Rylie Wollerton, must have decided that she was disappointed to not have gotten in on the action. Wollerton scored four minutes into the second half on an assist by Luciana Carpenter, who had just entered the game 30 seconds earlier. A minute later, Louisville conceded their second penalty corner of the half. The Michigan State shot attempt was blocked but corners breed corners and the Spartans converted on their next attempt. The onslaught continued, as MSU earned another corner a couple of minutes later, but Emily Young picked up a save to end the threat. 

Louisville returned the favor with five minutes left in the half, as Potter took Louisville's fourth corner attempt of the match. An earlier corner had seen Izzy Bianco have her shot blocked, so she worked the play a little differently this time. Bianco received the corner and touched it off to Wollerton, who fired in her second goal of the quarter. A minute and a half later, she completed her first career collegiate hat trick on an assist by Emily Eaton. The quarter ended 6-1, which was the final score of the game. Michigan State threatened with a pair of shots in the fourth, both saved by Young, and Wollerton missed out on her chance for a fourth by firing a penalty corner shot high. By the end of 60 minutes, I think both teams were ready to close this one out. 

Louisville opens the season with a big win, and they largely dominated Michigan State in every facet. The Cards had more shots in every quarter but the fourth, and even that was only 2-1. Louisville had 13 shots to MSU's six and put nine on frame compared to just four for MSU. Both teams had three saves and five corners, but Louisville converted two of their five while MSU could convert just one. We'd like to see that corner conversion rate move north of 50%, but 40% is a good starting spot. 

JUSTINE SOWRY POSTGAME

RYLIE WOLLERTON POSTGAME

You can see interviews with both Justine Sowry and Rylie Wollerton at the links above. As you might expect, they were pretty excited with the win. Louisville is back in action tomorrow against Ohio University at 1PM. If you don't make it out to Trager, the match will be available on ACC Network Extra. 

Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast

With Louisville football getting their season underway today, we'll be without Jared for the show, but Paulie, Daryl, and I will have plenty of joy and excitement to cover with all the fall sports now in action and rolling. You can check out the show after it posts around 1PM, and be sure to subscribe so that it comes to your feed automatically. 

Cardinal Couple YouTube: Link

Spotify: Link

Apple Podcasts: Link

Google Podcasts: Link

Overcast (free account required): Link

Pocket Casts (free account and app required): Link

RadioPublic: Link

Until next time, Go Cards!

Case

WSOC shuts out SCU 9-0 -- FH opens season -- FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

FRIDAYS WITH DARYL 

Welcome back to the weekend, readers.  Holiday weekend at that!   

WEEKEND!!!!!!!!

I am closing up our Health Science Campus this afternoon for the time being. It was kind of a nice change of scenery sometimes but I'm looking forward to being on the main campus full time.  

Hard to believe just a couple weeks ago we were itching for some Cardinal athletics to talk about and now here we are with a full slate of topics so lets get into it.  Fun Fact, both of the visiting squads from yesterday and today have the Spartans as their mascot

Soccer

Louisville 9 - Upstate South Carolina 0 

The kicking Cards have set a new record for goals scored in a single match as they were able to net 9 goals against an opponent.  

With a 1-0 lead, the visitors made the move to switch goalkeepers in the 29th minute.   The Cards were able to capitalize just before the halftime break to make it 2-0.  Geigle and Jennings were the scorers.  

Amelia Swinarski and AG Gibson both recorded multi-goal games. Swinarski would also add two assists, finishing the night with a team and career-high six points. Mackenzie Geigle recorded her team-leading fourth goal of the season in this game. Emersen Jennings and Swinarski each recorded their first goal of the season. Kiley Peat recorded her first collegiate goal in this game. Liza Suydam would add on to the Cardinals lead with a goal in the 60th minute, assisted by both Swinarski and Nicole Jodoin. Gibson would record her second goal of the afternoon in the 64th minute.

Photo: Jared Anderson

UP NEXT

Louisville vs Coastal Carolina 
Sunday 8/31 at Lynn Stadium 
7:30pm 

Field Hockey

Photo: Jared Anderson

Happy opening weekend of the 2025 season!!

Louisville vs Michigan St. 

Friday 8/29 at Trager Stadium
12 pm  

We've covered the roster often this summer but a few more notes of accolades for the squad to get you hyped for the season.  Louisville is 10-4 in season-opening games under head coach Justine Sowry.  

Izzy Bianco, Lauren Masters and Riley Wollerton were named to the 2025 NFHCA Collegiate Watch List.   Wollerton and Bianco, along with junior forward Lauren Masters, are members of the U.S. Under-21 National Team. The trio recently helped team USA win a silver medal in the Junior Pan American Games in August. 

The Cardinals are 7-9 against the Spartans, 3-3 at home winning the last 5 times the two have met.  The last match resulting in a 4-1 win on the road in East Lansing in 2019.   

I wish I was on Belknap this week so I could pop over to this one!!! 

Make it a great weekend!  There are a lot of opportunities to catch the Cards out on Floyd St this weekend !  Be safe and.....

As Always, 

Go Cards!!

~Daryl 

Soccer Faces USC Upstate -- THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Louisville Homestand Continues

The Louisville women's soccer team will continue their run of matches at home today as they look to move to 4-1 with a match against USC Upstate. Today's match will come at an extremely unique time, likely at least somewhat to do with the upcoming holiday weekend. The Cards will host the Spartans with a kickoff at 3PM. While that wouldn't be terribly strange for a Saturday or Sunday game, today is Thursday. USC Upstate apparently needs to catch an early flight to get back, creating an unusual midweek "getaway day" game. At any rate, Louisville has found itself with some unseasonably mild weather this week, so the mid-afternoon start shouldn't be too terrible with a high of just 79 degrees. 

A quick click of the "history" link on this matchup takes you directly to the general UofL women's soccer history page, indicating that this is the first ever matchup between these two teams. Sounds like a great time for the Cards to add a new team to the list of "teams against whom Louisville has an all-time winning record." The Spartans (who hail from Spartanburg, South Carolina) are 1-2 so far this season. They opened with a 1-0 win over Wofford but followed that victory with 3-0 and 2-1 losses to Davidson and EKU, respectively. Interestingly, despite opening the season in Spartanburg, USC Upstate has yet to play a regular season match at their home stadium as Wofford is also located in Spartanburg. The Spartans played EKU in Lexington last Thursday and had Sunday off, so they probably wouldn't have minded Louisville scheduling their bunny games a bit differently. 

Last season, USC Upstate finished quite strong. The Spartans went 10-5-4 overall with a 5-1-2 record in the Big South Conference. They won the Big South Championship, giving them the automatic qualifier and earning the honor of heading to Chapel Hill to be throttled by the champions-to-be. UNC won that first round game 8-0. The Spartans finished the season ranked 155th in RPI, second in their conference behind the Big South two-seed High Point by four spots. That couldn't have felt great, considering the Spartans had just thumped the Panthers 3-0 in the title game. 

USC Upstate returns 16 players from their 2024 roster, meaning they have plenty of familiarity with one another. Their returners also include their top points earner from last season as well as two of top three goal scorers. Dara Russo is a senior from Miamisburg, Ohio who scored nine goals and tallied five assists last year. While not the most efficient player on the team, her efficiency was considerable. Russo took 56 shots and put 27 of those on target (with 9 in the net). It would be in Louisville's best interest to deny her opportunities in front of goal this afternoon. 

When I asked Coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes about how today's match looked in the post-game on Sunday, she was just as unsure as I was. With a new opponent and not a lot of film available (nor time to watch it), Louisville will be depending mostly on how to do better on their own. There was plenty to take from the last 60 minutes of Sunday's game for that, but it was a successful outing nonetheless. I won't talk down about a 7-2 win. While Louisville is unlikely to have a third straight game with at least seven goals, I would expect them to seek a return to the clean sheet. The match against Wright State saw some defensive breakdowns, even from the starting crew (or most of it) and today is an opportunity to clean that up. 

If you're able, try to head down to campus today. I would imagine Louisville will take all the attendance they can get. If you aren't, you'll be able to catch this one on ACC Network Extra. After today's match, Louisville is back at home on Sunday against Coastal Carolina. The match against the Chanticleers will be the Cards' second straight against a new opponent. 

Until next time, Go Cards!

Case

Five women's athletes named to 2025 UofL Hall of Fame -- WEDNESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 PARTICIPANTS IN WOMEN'S BASKETBALL, VOLLEYBALL, LACROSSE, WOMEN'S SOCCER AND FIELD HOCKEY TO HONORED NOVEMBER 15TH.

The University of Louisville has named the athletes to be inducted to the 2025 Hall of Fame and five of the 10 are women's sports former greats. 

Lola Arslanbekova (Volleyball), Candyce Bingham (WBB), Nikki Boltja (Lacrosse) Christine Exeter (Women's Soccer) and Alyssa Voelmle (Field Hockey) are the five that will be honored on Saturday, November 15th. in the Spirit Room of th KFC YUM! Center. 

Tickets to attend are $75 and may be purchased online through "My Cardinal Account" at GoCards.com...at this link:

2025 Hall of Fame

The event will begin with a reception at 6 p.m., dinner at 7 p.m. and the induction ceremony will follow. 

If you need more information,..send an e-mail to ronee@gocards.com or call 502-852-2015. 

The inductees will also be recognized at the Cardinals' football game against Clemson on Friday Nov. 14th. 

The honorees: 

Arslanbekova played Volleyball at Louisville from 2009-12. She is now married to Michael Roberson and has a daughter. 

Wheeler is the head girls basketball coach at Louisville Butler High School.

Boltja has been an assistant coach at several colleges and universities, including Stetson and Davidson.

Exeter is active with Darby FC and Jamaica 

Alyssa Voelmle works in Philadelphia in the Children's Hospital in the Emergency room as a nurse.

Congratulations to our women's inductees and all 10 going into the "Hall". . 

paulie 

Soccer's Hot Start -- TUESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

15 Goals in Two Matches is a Program Record

Louisville women's soccer seems to have a renewed vigor this season. After four matches (a little over 20% through the season), the Cards sit at 3-1, highlighted by a road win against Auburn and a pair of home wins that had a combined 15 goals. 

There is a 2-0 loss at Vanderbilt this year, but that doesn't seem to be much of a concern as the Commodores are ranked #11 in the Coaches Poll. Auburn typically runs in the middle of the pack in the SEC while Wright State and Detroit Mercy are much lesser quality opponents. Still, Louisville won all three of those matches and blew the latter two out of the water. 

One item to note is the aggressiveness of the offense this year. The Cards have spent less time dribbling and more time focusing on ball movement and spreading out the field. This has allowed for more open shots and more free kick and corner kick opportunities. Having a deeper bench allows for more rotation and fresher legs on the pitch. 11 different players have benefitted from this aggressive approach by scoring a goal. 

A veteran defense has allowed UofL to focus on other aspects of the game such as midfield, an area where Louisville has had its ups and downs in the past. The Cards are currently relying on seniors on defense including keeper Erynn Floyd, centerbacks Karsyn Cherry and Hadley Snyder, and defensive wing Lizzie Sexton. Coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes allows this corps to command the back row while she works on guiding and developing younger players.

USC Upstate is a small step up from the Cards' last two opponents- the Spartans have had a .600+ win percentage the last three seasons- but they have hit a rough patch to start the year. For the Cards, this should still be a fairly winnable match, just maybe not a 6- or 8-goal performance. With this being a 3:00pm match (travel arrangements for USC Upstate), we will not be able to provide any in person coverage for this match, but will still watch and recap the match.

In case you missed it, here is a postgame interview with Coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes following the victory over Wright State.

Photos by Jared

Happy Tuesday and Go Cards!

Jared

WSoc beats Wright St 7-2 -- MONDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 Good morning and good bye to the last week without football.. 

My department is also saying goodbye to a little piece of our space in the downtown area and we are moving back to Belknap 100% of the time.  It's bitter sweet as I got to know a little bit of of the population down there and had a sweet routine some days.    

But I will say that I am greatly inspired when I am on Belknap campus.. and I'm looking forward to this next chapter.  

One of the benefits of being on the main UofL campus is my proximity to the athletics programs.  I just get to cross paths with the athletes themselves more and have better opportunities to pop over for press conferences and midday games.   Such as the women's soccer match on Thursday... with a 3pm first kick.   

Speaking of soccer... the Cards took on a visiting Wright State over at Lynn Stadium yesterday evening.  Let's get into a quick recap.... 

Soccer

Liza Suydam and I waiting for the copy machine to decide to start working

For a second week in a row, UofL scored 6 goals in the first half of a soccer match, in the first 29 minutes of the match to be exact.  The Cardinals welcomed Wright State to the Ville for a Sunday night matchup.  With a week to prepare, the Raiders could not hold off the Louisville offense as two new scorers for UofL, Liza Suydam and Karina Peat contributed 4 of the Cards' 7 total goals on the evening.   UofL had 20 total shots, 12 of them on goal.  Amelia Swinarski had 3 assists in the match. 

Erynn Floyd spent the full 90 minutes in the goal, allowing 2 against the visitors.  Wright State's second goal came from a penalty kick in the 58th minute.

(Photos by Jared)

Catch the post game questions and comments from Case and Jared out on the pitch with KDF! 

Louisville vs USC Upstate post game

UP NEXT

Louisville vs USC Upstate

Thursday 8/28

3 p.m. on ACCNX

As Always, 
Go Cards
~Daryl

Volleyball defeats alumnae 3-1 -- SUNDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 VOLLEYBALL VS. ALUMNAE

(photo from UofL)

Another 2025 UofL sports squad on the women's side has participated in a match against the alums, and in the volleyball version of the "current vs. old" the 2025-26 squad defeated the alums 3 sets to 1. 

The current squad took the first two sets, and the exact score for these...the report is that the currents defeated the alumnae in each... 25-12 in the first and 25-15 in the second match. The alumnae did rally, from reports, to win the third match 25-23. 

The squads requested to play a fourth set, and in was a shortened set that the team defeated the alumnae 15-8.

Reports we were able find indicate that Cara Cresse had a good match for the current squad with seven kills and six blocks. Ava Utterback also had a good match for the current squad with eight kills.

The exhibition was a sell out at the L&N Federal Credit Union facility with slightly over 1000 fans getting to watch the action. 

The alumnae All-Stars were led by Claire Chausee with 10 kills and Aiko Jones getting six kills. 

Anna DeBeer and Sarah Drury Petkovic coached the Alumni All Stars and the roster included Jones, Chausee, Elena Scott, Emily Scott, Charitie Luper, Elle Glock and Jamie Vasilou,  

The season officially starts for Volleyball when they face auburn on Aug. 29th.

Jared's Photos from Saturday below

CARDINAL COUPLE RADIO HOUR PODCAST

There were three of us on the Saturday podcast (Case, Daryl and Paulie) as Jared was taking selfie of himself and eating corn dogs at the Ky. State Fair.

We had a good podcast and you can hear it at the link below:

8/23/25 CCRHP

paulie

Louisville to Honor NCAA Runners-Up at Alumnae Match -- SATURDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Volleyball Hosts Alumnae All-Star Match Today

Louisville volleyball has been announcing the all-stars that are returning for this afternoon's alumnae match throughout the week, and many of the names are those that were rumored last week. In addition to today's match, UofL will be hosting a season-opening "Block Party" at L&N Federal Credit Union Arena, including a ring ceremony for the 2024 runner-up finishers, a team Q&A, an autograph session, and an opportunity for fans to take photos with the runner-up trophy on the court. 

The latest announcement for today's match were the coaching staff for the all-star team. One of those coaches will just be heading across the floor, as Sarah Drury Petkovic moves over from the current staff to take part in leading the group. The other is another one of the all-stars herself, though she is unable to play. Anna DeBeer will join Petkovic at the helm of a stellar alumnae team. 

Though they won't have DeBeer, the all-stars will still have a strong hitting contingent, as Aiko Jones, Claire Chaussee, and Charitie Luper join the team. Louisville's blocking and defense will be put to the test with those three on the attack. On the flip side, Louisville's offense will have to contend with a strong alumnae defense as well. The all-star team will roll with Elena Scott at libero and Emily Scott (no relation) at middle blocker. Emily, if you'll remember, was also a national champion for UofL in the high jump. She finished her volleyball career with 207 kills and 133 blocks, despite playing in just 138 total sets. Also joining the alumnae are Elle Glock at setter and Jamie Vasilou, who primarily served as a serving specialist in her time with the Cards.

Today's match won't be available for streaming, so you'll have to get into the arena to be a part of this one. First serve is scheduled for 2PM and the doors will open at 1PM. I suspect the line is already forming (which may or may not be a joke depending on what time you are reading this). It should be an exciting match and will be Louisville's final competitive tune-up before opening the season on Friday, August 29th against Auburn. 

Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast

We'll have three on board today as Jared takes in the final weekend of the fair. Paulie, Daryl, and I will still have plenty to discuss with the soccer season fully underway and the other two fall sports in their exhibition schedules. You can check out the show after it posts around 1PM, and be sure to subscribe so that it comes to your feed automatically. 

Cardinal Couple YouTube: Link

Spotify: Link

Apple Podcasts: Link

Google Podcasts: Link

Overcast (free account required): Link

Pocket Casts (free account and app required): Link

RadioPublic: Link

Until next time, Go Cards!

Case

FRIDAYS WITH DARYL

Hello readers and welcome back another end of the work week.  Here are some snaps from Floyd Street on the Belknap campus this week.  

The Track Field

Natatorium 

Soccer

Louisville 8  -  Detroit Mercy 0

Photo: Jared Anderson

Do we think the Cards were excited to open the season at Lynn Stadium last night??  Lynn Stadium witnessed 4 goals from the home squad in under 16 minutes of play and 6 goals in the first half.    There were 8 total goals scored for UofL, the first time since 2018 when they faced off against Wright State.. who happens to be the Cards' next opponent.    Actually one of them was an own goal by Detroit Mercy with counted towards the Cards total score none the less.  

Leading the scoring efforts for Louisville was Mackenzie Geigle who put two in the back of the net including the final goal in the final 5 minutes of the match.   Betsy Huckaby, Karsyn Cherry, AG Gibson, Nicole Jodoin and Grace Maddox also contributed to the final stat sheet. 

The Cardinals got the scoring going early with a connection for Jodoin and it was all Cards all night long.  Just when I thought Detriot Mercy were looking tired and gassed,  with 20 min off the clock in the first half, KDF did a 6-man substitution and put some new legs in for some valuable playing time.  At this point, the Titans had made no shot attempts in the match.  And with some fresh legs in the match, Louisville was able to put another level of pressure on the Titans offensively.  At the half, the Cardinals had 18 shots while the Titans had managed just 2.  

Brielle Baker took over in the goal for keeping duties with 20 min left in the match, which prompted many cheers from the sidelines as the senior handed over some responsibility to the freshman.   Erynn Floyd did not have much work to do in this one.   UofL finished 28 shots and 13 of them on goal.   

UP NEXT

Louisville vs Wright State 
Sunday 8/24
7:00pm
ACCNX  

Photo: Jared Anderson

As Always
Go Cards
~Daryl