Volleyball 4 Seed In Question
After the disappointing, but not surprising loss to Pitt Thanksgiving Eve, yesterday's match against Stanford took on added importance for the Cards in their quest to achieve a top 4 seed in the NCAA tournament.
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| Palm trees on campus...must ne nice... |
A win against Stanford would've all but assured that top 4 seeding by most estimations. A loss...and things get interesting.
We live in interesting times, my friend. The Cards did go down to defeat against the Card, 3-1 (25-23, 25-22, 27-29, 27-25), though as you can see, it was a close battle the whole evening.
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| good blocking usually wins games. |
What was the difference? As I've said numerous times, Louisville lives and dies by their blocking, and Stanford outblocked the Cards, admittedly only barely, 12-10. But Louisville really needs to lead in that stat to win matches. I'm tempted to point at service errors as another problem, as Louisville racked up 13 service errors compared to only three aces, but Stanford had 14 against two, so at least we didn't lose ground to the trees in that stat set.
Anna DeBeer led the Louisville squad with 16 kills, and Charitie Luper was right behind at 15. Cara Cresse was the only other of the Cardinals to reach double-digit kills with 10. DeBeer also led in the digs category at 14, just edging out Elena Scott's 13.
When you ask any coach, or commentator, what the "keys to the game" are, they will inevitably include "serve and pass". It's understandable given that those skills are so fundamental to the way the game is played, and frankly Louisville's serve and pass was...well, ok, but not excellent yesterday.
So between "serve and pass" and blocking both being a bit out of kilter, Louisville did well to play Stanford as competitively as they did.
So what are the post-season implications? Well, after the top four or five teams in the rankings being pretty stagnant all season, this weekend gives it a little bit of shakeup right before selection.
In the earlier-in-the-season selection committee look at the top 16, Nebraska was 1, Pitt was 2 (despite the AVCA rankings), Penn State 3, and Louisville 4. After that look, Penn State lost to Wisconsin which resulted in PSU and Louisville flip-flopping in the polls, which again have remained pretty stagnant at the top since then.
However! Penn State beat Nebraska Friday (3-1), so what impact will that have on the rankings/selection? You'd be in good company if you weren't sure.
The committee tends to look heavily at RPI, and while we won't see an official update before selection this evening, there is an unofficial RPI tracker that has the top 5 order as Pitt, Nebraska, Louisville, Stanford, Penn State, so by that measure, Louisville is likely to hang on to a top 4 seed.
We'll find out this evening at 6pm on ESPN with the airing of the Volleyball selection show.
Basketball Gets a Dub
While my eyes were on Volleyball, Jeff Walz's squad was also west of the Mississippi doing battle with Colorado. But from what I hear from others, this is best filed in the, "Well, it's a win" category. The Cards do get the win, 79-71
The Cards shooting in the first quarter was...not great. 33% overall, and not a one of them fell from three point range, and Colorado won the quarter 16-10.
The second quarter, however, is another matter. Sparked by a 10-0 run that was capped off by a Izela Arenas three pointer to tie at 18 and a Merissah Russell pilfer and layup to get into the lead, 20-18. Colorado would get the lead back, briefly on an ensuing three, but then relinquish it for the rest of the quarter and half. They would reach a tie once again before the half, but the Cards won the quarter 25-17 to take a 35-33 lead into the half. The shooting improved to 50% from the field, 33% from three, and a perfect 3-3 from the charity stripe.
The lead would bounce back and forth between the teams numerous times in the 3rd quarter, with the Buffs outscoring the Cards in the end 22-21, leaving UofL clinging to a one point lead, 56-55. The outside shooting, again, disappeared for the Cards, with only one attempt, and that was a miss. The interior shooting was ok, however, tallying 60% of their shots, along with an acceptable 75% in free throws.
The Buffs hit a couple of free throws to open the scoring in the first quarter to get a one point lead, but UofL would say, "enough" and promptly going on a 16-0 run to get a solid lead halfway through the quarter. Colorado woke back up and started exchanging scores with the Cards, and managed to shrink the lead a bit, but they ran out of time.
Nyla Harris, and Jayda Curry led the Cards with 14 points, with Tajianna Roberts just behind at 13. Izela Arenas also reached double digits on 11 points. "TEAM" led the Cards in rebounds with nine (come on stats folk, do better!), but overall it was by committee with no one having (credited) more than four rebounds and everyone credited with a rebound had no less than two.
FRED Report
I always like to introduce new Freds to the FRED Report, so, meet Fred Leslie, an American pilot, scientist specializing in fluid dynamic, Ph.D. (from Purdue studying fluid vortex dynamics), and astronaut that flew on STS-73 as a payload specialist in October/November of 1995.
F - Free Throws
73.9% (17-23) is enough for a letter. Most of the Cardinal Couple crew I believe uses an all-or-nothing criteria for this category, it's either "F" or nothing. I like to add a lower-case "f" level that's 70-75%. So I'm writing it up as "f", but know that others of the CC crew would call this an "F".
R - Rebounding
The Cards lead the board battle 33-25. Eight extra possessions is worthy of a full "R".
E - Effort/Execution
A 12-17 assist to turnover ratio isn't great, though Colorado had 17-25 which is...worse? Maybe? I will give the lower case "e" here, using the impressive 17 steals to push it over the edge.
D - Defense
The aforementioned 17 steals also play a role here, and we can also look to blocked shots (4-2, advantage Cards) in this stat, as well as the overall of what the opponent's overall scoring is held to. 71 is more than I'd like to see us give to a middle-of-the-road opponent, so with the steals being a big positive, and the score being a fairly significant negative, I think I've got to go with the "d".
So overall it's F-R-e-d, and I'm left wondering if I'm grading too easily. I certainly welcome your opinions in the comments, particularly if you were able to get eyes on this game.
Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast
Jared was off braving the cold weather, and cold shoulders of Kentucky fans, photo documenting the impressive beat-em-down that was Louisville football's handling of Kentucky. I find particular join in the palendromicness of the results, with the 41-14 score, and 8-4 vs 4-8 record at the end of the regular season for the two teams.
On topic here, however, Case, Daryl, Paulie, and myself all made the call. Good discussions of basketball and volleyball, of course, including a bit of analysis of what's ahead for the Cards in the volleyball tourney.
Check it out:
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JMcA
