Swimming awards, Tennis 'Shines'

THURSDAY at CARDINAL COUPLE:

-Raine Thompson BIG EAST Swimmer of the Week

-Women's Tennis in FGCU Invitational.

-MAIL CALL

Liz Sherwood (pictured right) has drawn the interest of a CARDINAL COUPLE reader. No, she doesn't have any eligibility left...

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Congratulations to sophomore swimmer Raine Thompson for being named BIG EAST swimmer of the Week. Raine had a big day recently in a dual meet against Cincinnati...winning three events. She took the 200-yard butterfly in 2:03:14. Next was the 500-yard freestyle in 4:58:62. She also was a part of the 400 medley relay team that crossed the wire first at 3:45:37...a school record. The Lady Cards splashers are 3-0 in BIG EAST dual meets and head to Lexington next for a Saturday 2 p.m. drowning of the Pool Kats.

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Women's Tennis finished their Invitational part of the season with a strong showing in the FGCU Invitational in Florida with a doubles championship, singles championship and two co-championships. Sarah Miller and Becca Shine combined to win the Flight 3 doubles, knocking off Illinois. Julie Fellerhoff took the Flight 1 singles championship with an impressive match win over Aline Berkerbrock of North Florida. In other singles action, UofL's Amelia Harris and Stefanie Villajuan were co-champs in Flight 8 and 9 singles.

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Mark Beckham has assembled a strong group of players for the 2011 season and comments on the recent Invitational:

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"This was our last individual event before the start of the dual season. I wanted to test the team and see how they would respond to a very strong tournament outside...after being indoors for the past three months. They responded very well...doing better than I expected. This team is as ready as we can be to start the dual season this Friday and I think we are going to do very well this year. ".

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The Cards open dual play against Bowling Green at the Bass-Rudd Tennis Center on Friday at 2 p.m. and Morehead State and West Virginia come to town Sunday.

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FROM THE MAIL CENTER:

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Cardinal Couple:

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We heard Liz Sherwood briefly on the radio during the UofL vs. Connecticut game Saturday. Something was mentioned about her bring a UConn player, I think. Details on her, please?

-William

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Hey, William!

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(And here we thought we were the only ones that were listening on faint 101.7)

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Liz is a graduate assistant for the Lady Cards and Jeff Walz this year. She did play college ball for first UConn and then Vanderbilt. She was on the air with Jim Kelch for the broadcast since neither Paul Sanderford nor A.J. made the trip to Hartford. CARDINAL COUPLE'S Paul got the chance to see her at the start of the season at a UofL practice. She's 6'4", a great help and teacher for UofL's "bigs" and, according to Paul, doesn't smile much. WE watched some YOU TUBE of her and she was a player you didn't want to mess with inside. WE actually did an article here on the site about her when she first came to Louisville. If you go to the bottom of today's post, look at the 'lables' section under the column and click on her name...you can find it in our archives and read it. Thanks for writing!

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YO, C.C...hollar

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Who u got as Big East First team so far this year beside Maya Moore? I got Shoni, Liz from WVU, Hampton at DePaul and Digs up at N.D.

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-ballin' at ballard.

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Thanks for asking, ballin'! If this is who WE think it is, WE'RE glad you are getting some playing time! WE'RE going to agree with Maya, Keishia Hampton and Skylar Diggins. WE'RE putting Georgetown's Sugar Rodgers and Monique Reid in our top five. Keep hustling, superstar! The future belongs to you...you could make this list someday.

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Paul and Sonja:

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We see you two on press row for the UofL women's games and appreciate your coverage here at this site. We miss you in the stands..but are glad you have access to the program. Not sure if you can answer this or not, but we see Kim Pemberton stop by and talk briefly with you near the end of games. Can you tell us what's going on? Thanks.

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Section 115.

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Hey Section 115! We had a lot of fun in the Hall sitting with you all...Kim is stopping by to see if Sonja wants to get in a few minutes at power forward. Just kidding...She asks us and a few others that cover the games...like Howie Lindsey and Jody Demling...which players we would like to ask questions of at the post game press conference. Jody, Howie and Bob Domine usually ask most of the questions...we like Monique Reid's candor and descriptions at the post game pressers, Shoni is very well spoken and has a wry sense of humor, Becky Burke comes up with some great one-liners and the other girls do a great job, too. Our favorite post gamer was after the UK game and Victoria Dunlap and Adia Mathies were on the podium for the Cats. They were so banged and bruised up, that it was like being in a triage unit in the emergency room. Ice packs and wraps everywhere. They were gracious in defeat...but pretty anxious to get off the stage and on the bus to Lexington....

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