A HISTORY OF UOFL WOMEN'S SPORTS -- CHAPTER 10 -- WOMEN'S TENNIS -- FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

WOMEN'S TENNIS

As we enter the final stretch of our History of Louisville Women’s Sports we look at Chapter 10: Tennis. As we have done with the previous week, we will refer to women’s tennis simply as tennis.

Louisville officially traces its tennis program back to 1979. There has been roughly 150 players to walk through the doors since then.

Many players have had successful careers. Kelly Ford and Natalie Laszkowski are tied for the career record in singles wins with 102 each. Meg Peavy has the highest winning percentage with 0.855. The Bass-Rudd Tennis Center is the current home for the Cards. They have the option to play indoors or outdoors with the inside containing six courts and eight courts on the outside. It is considered one of the best collegiate tennis facilities in the country. The Bass-Rudd Tennis Center first opened its doors in 1994 and the Cards have been there since Day One.

Mark Beckham has been head coach since 2007. Beckham played for the UofL men’s team during his college days. Beckham guided the Cards to their first NCAA Championships appearance in program history. Their highest ranking under Beckham is 38th. He led his team to a Regional Runner-Up finish in the 2013 ITA Regional Doubles Championship. Beckham has reached well beyond 100 wins in his career. Beckham was an assistant coach, primarily for the men's team, before he was elevated to the head coaching job for UofL women's tennis. 

Beckham is a Louisville native and played his high school tennis at Eastern High School. 

The 2010-11 season is notable.  He had BIG EAST Freshman of the year Julie Fellerhoff on the roster. He had the highest ranked doubles team in Division I in Fellerhoff and Mandy Brown and the highest ranked singles player in Becca Shine. 

Unfortunately, despite the existing of Louisville Tennis tracing back to 1979 there is very little documentation on anything outside of letter-winners. Nothing is posted about season results or how they fared in the different conferences such as Conference USA, Big East, AAC, or ACC. The history books don’t even reference coaches prior to Mark Beckham.

Admission is free for all tennis matches, indoors and outdoors. There are bleachers at the ends of the courts for easy view of the matches. You can sometimes catch us out watching the matches live and I try to make a match or two a year to get some photos.

Happy Friday and Go Cards!

Jared

Friday Cardinal Couple -- Lacrosse ranked #3 in BIG EAST

FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

- Lacrosse picked to finish third in BIG EAST

- Women's Tennis achieving success


The University of Louisville lacrosse team has been picked to finish third in their final season of the BIG EAST. The BIG EAST Preseason Coaches' Poll has the Cards behind Georgetown and Connecticut. All eight BIG EAST lacrosse coach participated in the voting and were not allowed to vote for their own team or players.

Three Louisville lacrosse players were selected to the All- BIG EAST Preseason team.

MONICA NEGRON was an unanimous selection and was also named the BIG EAST preseason Defensive Player of the year. It's her second season on the squad. She led the BIG EAST in draw controls per game and led the Cards in caused turnovers in 2013. She's a senior.

NIKKI BOLTJA was also a unanimous pick. NB was an All-American selection last year and is the BIG EAST's top returning points earner and goal scorer. She was also an All-BIG EAST selection in 2013 and scored 63 goals in 17 games.
Senior Boltja is the all-time leading goal scorer for UofL.

KAYLIN MORISSETTE makes the All-BIG EAST squad after a successful freshman season where she scored 40 goals and won 66 draw controls. Morissette, from Canada, was part of a highly-heralded freshman class that cracked the Lacrosse starting lineup last year in several positions. 

Coach Kellie Young is understandably proud of the trio:

" THIS IS A WELL-DESERVED HONOR FOR THESE THREE STUDENT-ATHLETES. THEY ARE A PART OF OUR PROGRAM'S CORE, THE WORKER-BEES, PASSIONATE ABOUT THE SPORT AND THEIR TEAM, AND DRIVEN TO SUCCEED."

First up for the Cards is a trip to Duke on Feb. 9th. Coach Young will take 21 letter-winners from last season and a talented incoming class to Durham to battle the #6 Blue Devils. The Cards were 11-6 last season, 8-1 at home but inexplicably left out of the NCAA Tournament.

You can congratulate Nikki, Monica and Kaylin at the Lacrosse Kickoff dinner Saturday night at the PNC Plaza in Papa John's Cardinal Stadium but you need to make that call today.

The University of Louisville women's lacrosse program is hosting its annual Crease Club Banquet and Silent Auction on Feb. 1 at the PNC Club in Papa John's Cardinal Stadium.

Tickets for the event can be purchased for $40 apiece by e-mailing executive director of operations, Patty Norton, dennison@louisville.edu, or calling (502) 852-0100. At 4 p.m., doors to the event open and the auction will begin and dinner will be served at 4:30 p.m. The team opening ceremony takes place at 6:30 p.m. Headlining the banquet is Kelly Berger Rabil, a 2013 World Cup gold medalist for Team USA. She was a member of the U.S. Lacrosse Developmental Team in 2005-06 before moving to the Elite team.

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Louisville women's Tennis travels to Chicago Saturday to face DePaul. The Cards are coming  off a 4-0 sweep of Missouri in the ITA Kickoff Weekend, contested in Gainesville, FL.

Fellerhoff and Shine are doing just fine.

Shine teamed with Manuela Velaquez to win 6-4 in doubles and Fellerhoff took the court with Olivia Boesing to capture a 6-2 victory. The Cards also swept all three singles matches...with Fellerhoff, Shine and Elle Stokes getting wins.

Five matches, four points. I will never understand tennis scoring.

Louisville returns home for Bass-Rudd action beginning Feb. 6th. against Morehead. Evansville visits on Feb. 8th. and Cincinnati comes in on Feb. 9th.

paulie
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