A Pair of Wins - Sunday Cardinal Couple

Soccer Tames the Canes

Maisie Whitsett presumably is in the middle of
that clump of celebration.

Adding to the weekend full of activity in the airport, fairgrounds, UofL corridor, Women's Soccer contributed with a 1-0 win over the visiting Miami Hurricanes.

Louisville had lots of opportunities, but only Maisie Whitsett was able to convert one into an actual score in the second half.  Miami played a very methodical offensive set, that unfortunately just wasn't able to produce much in the way of actual scoring opportunities.  The difference in offensive styles was certainly reflected in the shots stats with Louisville holding a 7-2 advantage in the first half, and extending that further in the second by a margin of 10-1.

Karsyn Cherry with a near miss header on a
corner set piece.

The Whitsett score came in the 63rd minute of play off of a Savina Zamborini cross.  Initially deflected by several Miami players in the box, they never really gained control over it and Whitsett was able to poke her foot into fray and find the lower corner of the goal.

This goal brings Whitsett to three goals on the season, and brings her into a tie with her fellow attacker Karsyn Cherry.  Cherry had an opportunity in the first half off of a cornet set piece, but her header just cleared over the top of the goal.

Next up, the Soccer Cards head south in more conference play, going to Tallahassee to take on Florida State on Thursday.

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Paulie deals with music and planes...(but no trains or EMS vehicles) in the: 

POST GAME INTERVIEWS: 

COACH KAREN FERGUSON DAYES

MAISIE WHITSETT

OLIVIA PRATAPUS

(Photos by Jared Anderson, of course)

What a Difference an "S" Makes

Soccer may have had a late game, with a 7pm start, but Volleyball really had a late match with a 10pm EDT start.  Of course, they were visiting Maples Pavilion and the Stanford Cardinal which made the local start time a more normal 7pm PDT.

A top 10 matchup, this one was, with the 3rd ranked Cardinals heading out west to take on the 9th ranked Stanford Cardinal.  Louisville came away with a 3-1 win (26-24, 27-25, 14-25, 25-13) in front of just shy of 2500 fans.

Claire "Big Game" Chausse lead all scorers with 19 kills.  She did take almost double the number of swings anyone else on the team got, resulting in a good, but not stellar, .310 hitting percentage.  Aiko Jones stepped up and got the second most number of kills for the Cardinals-with-the-s, but was the most efficient on the team hitting .375 on 12 kills.  Add in eight kills for close to a double-double and it's clear Jones had quite a good night.

Amaya Tillman was the only other player close to getting to double digits kills with eight kills and a trio of block assists, but the monster at the net was red-shirt freshman Cara Cresse getting involved in 10 blocks.

The first two sets were, as you can see from the set scores, barn burners, with neither team able to get more than a three point lead at any point in the first two sets.  Very subjectively, from the fifth row of the stands I kept looking up at the scoreboard expecting Louisville to have a four or five point lead and finding Stanford, close, tied, or even with a slight lead of their own.

The wheels fell off for Louisville in the 3rd set.  As UofL's side out percentage dropped a bit, Stanford was able to gradually build to a 9-4, and then 10-5 lead.  Louisville would mount a mini run of three, with Raquel Lázaro at the service line, and Chaussee swinging away on the left, but Stanford shut it down with a 7-0 run, stretching the lead out to 17-8.  Louisville would never be in this set the rest of the way.  We saw appearances by Nena Mbone, and Phekran "PK" Kong in an attempt to shake things up a bit and shake the Cards awake, with little success.

I'm not sure what, if anything, Coach DBK said to the team after the 3rd set, but whatever it is, lets hope she can bottle it because the 4th set saw Louisville come out and just shut down Stanford almost completely.  A 3-0 start grew to a 10-4 lead, then 14-5, 20-10, and finally the 25-13 set score that ended it.

A bit of a scary moment as Anna DeBeer came down hard on the floor and clutched her knee in obvious pain.  After a few moments to get checked out by the Louisville athletic trainer and to get settled, it seems there was no real damage and DeBeer was able to get back up and finish playing the match, though not without favoring that knee slightly.

So all in all, a good win over a good, and well ranked, Stanford team.  Earlier in the week Stanford beat 2nd ranked Nebraska, in Lincoln, no less, so with Louisville getting the job done with Kentucky earlier in the week, and Stanford last night, it's expected that the Cardinals will step up a ranking spot into the number two position.  Any chance to move into the top ranked position will essentially depend on the less than likely prospect of current number one Texas losing to someone.  We'll see, that's why they play the game, right?

Volleyball starts into conference play now with Louisville kicking it off with the southern swing.  Friday evening at Miami, and Sunday afternoon at FSU.  The week after that, they'll be back home welcoming in Clemson and Georgia Tech.

Field Hockey Today

Field Hockey will be in action today at Trager Stadium on Floyd Street against the Fairfield Stags at 2pm.

Louisville will be looking to climb back aboard with the winning horse, and, well, the chances are pretty good.  Fairfield comes into the game at 2-5, with wins over Holy Cross and Lafayette, and losses to Monmouth, Villanova, UAlbany, Drexel, and Miami (OH).  Only Miami was ranked, at 24th, of the Fairfield opponents.

The main offensive threats for the Stags are Agustina Casteluchi with three goals on the season, and Julianna Kratz with a pair.  Kratz looks like she takes more shots (10, vs seven for Casteluchi).  I would expect Payton Rahn to be in goal.  She comes into the game with 14 goals against and 38 saves on the season.

This should be a relatively easy cruise to victory for the Cards after suffering a 3-0 shut out at the hands of UNC on Friday.

The game is at 2pm and is, of course, on ACC Network Extra.

And a few more bonus photos from Jared.

TARHEELS TAKE FIELD HOCKEY CARDS 3-0 -- WSOC TONIGHT ! -- SATURDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 TARHEELS FIELD HOCKEY BLANKS LOUISVILLE

 

Karen Shelton, head coach of the North Carolina Field Hockey squad, is a legend in Field Hockey circles and also happens to be a very nice person. Minutes after her Tar Heel stick swingers shut down the previously undefeated Louisville Cardinals Friday afternoon at Trager Stadium, she took a few minutes to talk with me after the contest. 

This wasn't an "x's and o's" chat or a discussion about the Cards new turf. It was, simply, two old friends who see each other once every couple of years, catching up on life. Not a thing you capture on a camcorder and spread all over the internet.  I did compliment Coach on the win, they earned it. I mentioned I was impressed with the youngsters on the squad. Two  sophomores and a freshman scored for UNC against a Cards defense that rarely gives up more than one goal a game. I teased her a bit that it used to be everyone feared All-American Erin Matson on the squad, but now she's got a posse of youngsters to ride with saddle with her. Erin only got one shot off yesterday, but it didn't matter, her scoring affinity wasn't needed Friday. 

Karen said Justine's Sowry's squad was going to be a good one, they were just a bit young, and she praised the play of Cards goalkeep Sasha Elliott. It's a shame I didn't have our photographer here to get a photo with me and Karen.  But, enough of my Friday delight and joy. The FH Cards fell 3-0 yesterday. Let's look at that.

#2 UNC (7-0) scored in the first, second and fourth quarters  Ashley Sessa drilled a shot in net with 8:11 gone in the contest. 811 is the number you call when you are going to dig on your property. (Can't be disrupting gas, electric, cable and water lines, you know)  The Cards had dug themselves into an early hole and needed offense. The key to scoring, though, is getting shots off. #4 Louisville (6-1) attempted no shots in the first half. It wasn't that the Cards were being overly choosy...UNC has a very strong and disciplined defense and wasn't allowing UofL to shoot. 

With 8:37 gone in the third quarter, the Tar Heels added a second goal. Kennedy Cliggett (another freshman) slid a pass in front of the Cards goal to Lisa Slinkert. Her shot got by Elliott and it was now 2-0 TarHeels. This was the first time this season that an opponent had scored more than one goal against Louisville. For as quiet, offensively, the second quarter was with just one UNC shot -- the third quarter was a festival, with five shots from Louisville and five shots from UNC. 

The feeling of dread for Cardinals fans got a bit stronger at the start of the fourth quarter. Paitlyn Wirth found the goal with just 26 seconds passed. Three goals are almost impossible to overcome with a quarter left, and the Cards didn't...but they never gave up, attempting four shots. 

Louisville has had trouble with converting penalty corners this season and that was the case, again, yesterday. The Cards had six at their disposal (compared to one for the visitors) but couldn't connect on any of them. Sasha Elliott had nine saves for the Cards, UNC split their two goalkeepers time evenly and they combined for three saves. 

Louisville is a very good team and they'll win most, if not all, their remaining games this season. They just ran into a better squad Friday and lost to them. You learn from it and move on. We chose not to do a post game with Justine...I very rarely do a post-game interview with a coach after they've lost, except during tournament time. 

The Cards will look to return to their winning ways Sunday when the Fairfield Stags come to Trager for a 2 p.m. start. 

SOCCER FACES MIAMI TONIGHT

THE Louisville women's soccer squad begins ACC play tonight when they host the Miami Hurricanes at Lynn Stadium. It'll be a 7 p.m. start and available on ACCNX if you can't make it out. 

The Canes are 3-1-2 on the season, suffering their first loss of the season to USF last time out. Alabama and Okla St. are two of their wins this season, so they've knocked off some pretty impressive foes in Coral Gables. 

This will be the first trip for the Canes this season out of the state of Florida for a match. The Canes have scored four goals on the season (allowing three) and four players have a score each. Melissa Dagenais has started all six games in goal for Miami and the Quebec,Canada senior is one of the best in the ACC. 

Louisville has won six of their last seven matches against Miami and has played the last three of those in Coral Gables. 

Go Cards lists "Bob Russell" as the play-by-play announcer for this one tonight. I'm gonna bet big money that it'll be Don Russell instead. I'm pretty sure the retired senior minister of Southeast Christian Church isn't doing any sports-casting these days.  

It's also "Dogs on the Turf" or "Pups on the Pitch" tonight at Lynn. That means I'll get 20 dog pictures and five game photos from Jared for tomorrow's write up. 

NO PODCAST TODAY

The Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast will not air today. The two guys who know how to format it and engineer it are unavailable. Sorry, folks. 

paulie

Epic Ekic....Cards WSOC downs Canes 3-0 -- FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

 EMINA EKIC WITH TWO GOALS IN WSOC WIN

The Louisville women's soccer team started the 2020 season with a bang, blanking the Miami Hurricanes last night in Coral Gables 3-0. All the scoring occurred in the first 20 minutes of the contest and senior midfielder Emina Ekic was involved in all three goals -- scoring two of them and getting one assist. 

The win was somewhat tampered when sophomore forward Corinne Dente fell to the turf just 2-1/2 minutes into the match, clutching her left knee. Dente was assisted off the field and did not return. No word, as of yet, on the Stamford, CT star's extent of injury...but it looked like it might be an ACL

Louisville took a 1-0 lead seven minutes into the match when Ekic found junior Delaney Snyder with a pass into the box and Snyder sent it past Miami goalkeeper Tyler Speaks for a Cardinal goal. 

The Cards got another opportunity with 30 minutes left in the first half when Ekic moved into the box with the ball and fired a shot past Speaks to make it 2-0 Cards.

Louisville added a third goal at the 19-minute mark when Snyder returned the favor to Ekic by setting her up with a pass into the box and Ekic deftly maneuvered the ball past defenders and into the back of the net. 3-0 Cards.

The rest of the first half featured Louisville controlling possession and limiting the Canes to just two shots. 

Louisville head coach Karen Ferguson Dayes went pretty deep into the Louisville bench in the second half, inserting eight off-the-sidelines players into the match, including five freshman. Ferguson-Dayes also started a freshman to begin the game...forward Jessica Camken, a Florida native. 

The Cards outshot Miami 6-3 in the final half, four of those coming from Jessica DeFilippo. Louisville held a 12-5 advantage in shots for the match and the Cards had five shots on goal, compared to Miami's one.

Louisville goalkeep Gabby Kouzelos had a relatively quiet night at the net, but the senior recorded the 24th shutout of her career. She recorded one save, in the second half with about 11 minutes to play. 

Karen Ferguson-Dayes post-game remarks:

"It's always great to open the season with a win in this league. We put together some good moments but there are also plenty of areas that we need to improve on. Every day we will continue to work on getting better." 

Louisville travels to Tallahassee next, to face Florida State in a Sunday, 1 p.m. match. The 'Noles hosted Notre Dame last night, but Irish eyes weren't smiling...ND taking a 5-0 loss to FSU. 

All in all, despite the Dente injury, a very exciting game to watch and impressive showing for the Cards in their 2020 opener. Louisville got very fluid play from their midfielders and Ekic showed why she is an All-ACC selection and potential candidate for All-American.  

Have a fortunate Friday

paulie                                                                                                              xxxxx 

 

Soccer Visits Miami -- KFD Interview -- THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

Interview with Karen Ferguson-Dayes

I was able to catch up with Louisville Women's Soccer head coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes just a few minutes ago and get a few words from her about the game tonight, the team and what to expect. A good conversation with Coach! Click the link below to listen:

Karen Ferguson Dayes Interview

paulie

 Soccer Visits Miami

The moment we have all been waiting for has finally arrived!  Women's sports events at UofL are back!

Kicking off the 2020-2021 school year is women's soccer, who hits the road to take on Miami.  The game is slated for 7:00 p.m., and will be aired on ACC Network Extra, so have those computers or smartphones ready to go.

Louisville, who went 13-5-2 last season, begins their eight-game regular season with a subpar Miami team.  The Hurricanes went 6-9-2 on the year and had a rough time in conference play with a 2-7-1 mark.  They did not qualify for the ACC Tournament or NCAA Tournament.

Miami started their season on Saturday, when they took on Clemson.  To accommodate travel, the teams agreed to meet and play in Jacksonville.  Clemson took the win 4-0 and out-shot the Hurricanes 20-2.

The Miami roster contains just four seniors this year.  Tia Dupont and Michelle Giamportone are midfielders while Morgan Asmussen and Lexi Castellano-Mugica are defenders.

Tyler Speaks is the starting goalkeeper for this year's squad and recorded five saves in the full 90 minutes in their first match.

                                                                     (Emina Ekic) 

For Louisville, six seniors are on the roster.  The ones we talk about most are midfielder Emina Ekic and goalkeeper Gabby Kouzelos.  The other four include midfielders Nadege L'Esperance and Taylor Kerwin, forward Amari Hopkins and goalkeeper Lana Batson.

Ekic was the top scorer last year with eight goals and eight assists.  She has had seven goals the first two seasons each and will look to have another high mark this year.

Kouzelos had an 0.87 goals against average last year, giving her one of the best marks in the country.  In her first three years, Kouzelos has allowed 56 goals in 57 matches, to keep her under the 1.00 mark.

The Cards have dominated the series 4-1-1.  They are 3-0 at home and 1-1-1 on the road.  Last season, Louisville took a 1-0 win at Miami with Ekic's goal at the 5:33 mark of the first half.  The Cards outshot Miami 7-5 in a heavy defensive game.

Make sure to tune in to the game.  We will be grateful to have a game to recap on Saturday on The Cardinal Couple Radio Hour Podcast --  with plenty of other news to talk about as well.

KFD Interview

Unfortunately, the scheduled interview between Paulie and Coach Karen Ferguson-Dayes did not happen yesterday.  In communication with team sports information director Nick Evans, Paulie was asked if it could be re-scheduled for noon today, and Paulie agreed. 

So, Paulie and Coach KFD are scheduled for an interview around lunchtime today and I highly recommend checking back on the site before kickoff to take a listen.  He will post the link at the top of the article to make it easy to find.

Happy Thursday and Go Cards!

Jared

Louisville women's soccer defeats Miami 1-0...Field Hockey and Volleyball tonight! -- Friday Cardinal Couple

DEFENSE HOLDS SOLID IN HURRICANE ATTACK

We don't see weather-based hurricanes in the fair city of Louisville...but the UofL women's soccer squad survived a tough battle against Bassy's Hurricane whirlwind kickers in a 1-0 win over "The U" Thursday night in the Lynn Soccer Stadium. 

Without seeing a final score...one might come to the conclusion that if a team had a 18-7 shot advantage, 9-4 edge on shots on goal and had 11 corner attempts to the opponent's 4...the team with the higher stats (Miami) won.

It's not so in this case, though.

Getting a goal from Alison Price off a Casey Whitfield cross 25:48 with in the first half....Louisville weathered the storm and got the 1-0 win...greatly aided by nine saves from goalie Taylor Bucklin. 

And...Paulie called it in Thursday's CARDINAL COUPLE...even the exact score. My 5% success rate took a definite hit here...

Sound the all-clear over the Belknap Campus...the threat is over. There will probably be a depression settling in over the Miami soccer complex today, though. 

And if Taylor Bucklin had a dream last night about soccer balls flying at her non-stop like hail...it's perfectly understandable.

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#8 FIELD HOCKEY FACES #9 WAKE FOREST

Women's sports action continues on campus tonight when the UofL Field Hockey team hosts ACC opponent Wake Forest at 6 p.m. in Trager Stadium. 

The Demon Deaconesses (or Lady Deacons ?) are 6-2 on the season with overtime losses to Old Dominion and Iowa. They do have a win over Duke in ACC play. 

Last year the teams split...Louisville winning the regular season matchup 2-1 but falling in the ACC Tournament quarterfinals to WFU 2-1.

This should be a good one at the corner of Warnock and Floyd and admission is free. 

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VOLLEYBALL VISITS THE IRISH TONIGHT

No....Anne Kordes and crew aren't on a flight to Dublin or overseas to kiss the blarney stone...but they are in South Bend to take on ACC foe Notre Dame tonight for some wide net action.

It's the ACC opener for Louisville (6-4) against a Notre Dame squad (5-7) that split with Louisville last season. The Cards swept UND at the KFC YUM! Center 3-0 in the first match up but fell 3-2 in South Bend. 

Louisville will look to improve on the errors and serving woes that befell them in the loss to UK on Sunday. The Cards will head back to the KFC YUM! Center after this one to host Miami on Sunday.

paulie
xxxxx