Teamwork, U.S. Army style

THE LADY CARDS MASTER THE OBSTACLE TRAINING COURSE AT
FORT KNOX. THEY FARED MUCH BETTER THAN THE SGT. HULKA
TROOPS IN THE MOVIE "STRIPES".

THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE:

-WE READ YOUR MAIL

-WATSON WEIGHS IN ON CONDITIONING

It's a slow day for UofL women's sports...with no activities or games planned. So let's take a look at the mailbox and see what you are saying:

Danny L. (Winchester, KY) writes:

"Cardinal Couple. Thanks for the daily updates on UofL women's sports.
I really appreciate Jenny's report on her practice experience and I hope she
has a lot more articles planned for you on her unique and heartfelt observations


You write...we respond

on UofL women's basketball. Can't wait to see Sara Hammond on the court. Watched her play at Rockcastle County for several years and she is a good one! Did Jenny notice if any of the Cards were nursing injuries? Thanks!"

Thanks for writing, Danny. WE agree, Sara has the potential to make quite a mark at UofL and we're glad she made the choice to become a Lady Card. No real injuries to report at this time on any of the Lady Cards...Tia is a bit sore in the hip, Bria hobbling a little bit and Becky with a twisted ankle...but all are practicing and should be OK by the 30th. WE like Jenny's writings, too!

Megan (Philadelphia, PA) says:

"How do you think the loss of Syracuse and Pitt will affect BIG EAST women's basketball? I am a big Temple and Villanova fan but I really admire the job that Jeff Walz has done at UofL and hope they have a great season. CARDINAL COUPLE, you are my BFF!!!"

We'll miss the animated "Q" when Syracuse leaves the BIG EAST

Thank you, Megan...and a big OMG! on the BFF notification. WE recently did a poll on who our readers thought the top three teams in the BIG EAST would be this season and Notre Dame, UConn and Louisville swept the top three spots with a huge majority. Pitt has been a middle of the pack conference performer over the past several years in BIG EAST WBB and they'll probably remain middle of the pack when they migrate to the ACC. Same for Syracuse, although we'll miss Quentin Hillsman's antics on the sidelines. Both schools subscribe to the brutal, bounce 'em around BIG EAST basketball theory and they'll have some successes in the ACC. They aren't of the quality of a Duke, North Carolina or Maryland, though...the perennial powers of the ACC. WE'RE also hearing very good things about the Miami and Florida State women's teams this season...so, the ACC could be very interesting in the future.

Anonymous writes:

"Hey, Cardinal Couple. Tell me what you think of Louisville's chances going to the BIG 12 and how you think they would do there in womens basketball. Like your site. I am a K-State Wildcat fan in all sports."

WE haven't heard a lot about conference expansion lately, so...maybe it's the calm before the storm. Even with Texas A&M leaving the BIG 12..there are a lot of good teams remaining. BAYLOR is a lot of people's #1 preseason pick. OKLAHOMA always turns out tough teams. Same with TEXAS. K-STATE has made the tournament with regularity over the last few years and IOWA STATE draws almost 9,000 for women's home games. Jeff Walz was asked how he felt about conference expansion when he spoke to the Sportsmen's Supper Club...and WE love his answer:

"I don't care. WE just want to play. We want to compete."

If conference expansion does come down and Louisville is invited to the BIG 12...the Cards should be contenders for the top three spots year in and year out. You trade UConn, Notre Dame and Georgetown for Baylor, Oklahoma and Texas. Still very tough basketball...

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(CARDINAL COUPLE special correspondent David Watson checks in with his thoughts on conditioning.)

Let me begin by telling you that my own personal experiences with conditioning were years ago, when I ran Cross Country. Five miles a day, unless it was the day before a meet. Tough, demanding and fatiguing. I also ran track. Didn't run quite the distances but I made a solemn vow to myself that I wouldn't put my body through all that pounding when I graduated from high school. I turned in the track shoes for golf spikes and bowling shoes. Haven't looked back since.

My oldest daughter does the conditioning in the Watson family these days. She's a mid-fielder on her high school field hockey team. A pretty good one, too. She's gotten interest from several colleges - including Ball State, Notre Dame and American University. Her typical day wears me out just writing about it. A typical day for her during school days:

5:30 a.m.  Up for a light breakfast and out for a 2-3 mile run before 6 a.m. She runs with a friend down the street. They dread rainy mornings. Don't we all?

6:15 a.m.  She prepares for school. Before she leaves, she does do arm curls with 20 lb. weights while watching the morning news on TV. 

7:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m.  Classes.

3:00 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. Either practice or a game. They are 5-1 on the season. She has scored three times this year but is used more as a set up - feed player and has eight assists on the season.

6:00 p.m.  She arrives home for dinner with the family. She also works a little bit after dinner with our youngest daughter, who will be a freshman next year in high school, on her field hockey game. Despite what you hear about the calamities of little sister - big sister relationships during the teen years, I can tell you that these two are peas in a pod. Best of friends. They combine forces to make my only son's life a constant drama. When they can drag him off the Internet.

7:30 p.m. - 9 p.m.  Watson Study Hall. My wife and I mandate that the three of them spend 90 minutes each school night doing homework or reading. No internet access or television during this time. No texting, e-mails or Facebook. Usually, they comply.

9 p.m. -10 p.m.  She works the weights. Her friend she runs with has a set of barbells and free weights left over from when her football playing brothers were in high school. They spot each other in lifting. Sometimes, lil' sis tags along.

10 p.m. Either bedtime or catching up on texts or e-mails. Lights out at 11 p.m. for her. The younger ones have a 10 p.m. light out curfew. I have to admit, I'm usually asleep before them.

The conditioning, we hope, will pay off in her getting the chance to participate in college field hockey. It's already turned her into a healthy, athletic young woman brimming with confidence and personality. It has the softball and basketball coaches at school wooing her for her services once field hockey is completed.

IT has her parents very proud. It drives her "kinda" boyfriend crazy. We'll take the trade off.

(David Watson's athletic feats remind us of Paul's football days. He was a guard, end and tackle. He'd sit on the end of the bench, guard the cheerleader's purses and tackle anyone who got near them.)

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Summers gets third in Hammer throw

Senior Jere' Summers finished third in the hammer throw Thursday at the NCAA Championships in Eugene, OR. She was one of three Cardinals to participate in the event. Junior D'Ana McCarty finished 10th and senior Lindsay Cook ended up 11th.
Both Summers and McCarty received All-American honors for their efforts, since they finished in the top ten.

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It's on. With Colorado leaving the Big 12 and joining the Pac 10, get ready for sizeable earthquakes in the conference alignments. Nebraska, Missouri, Texas, Notre Dame are all candidates to fill out forwarding address cards in this rebuild of the college conference landscape.

The Colorado move makes sense from a geographical standpoint. No big stretch to go to Los Angeles or Phoenix for games than it was to hit Columbia, MO or Austin, TX.
The dollars were there, the invitation on the porch step and they took it.

The next moves could be quite interesting. The ripple effect of four or five teams going from their previous alignments to new pastures will affect all the BCS conferences.

I guess Ralphie the Buffalo will need to sport some shades for his L.A. visits and get ready for rainy Seattle down the road. I wonder if he and Bevo text each other?

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Friday Night Racing at Churchill Downs. Post time at 6 p.m. and it's disco theme night. If you go, expect big crowds and a lot of polyester. They're tossing in a happy hour as well from 4-6 p.m. with reduced prices on Budweiser products, frozen drinks and hot dogs.

I'm going to pass on the bell bottoms, flowered shirt and heels with the goldfish in them. It's gonna be 90 degrees out there and shorts, t-shirt and sandals will do just fine.

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Kentucky High School Girls' Softball Tournament begins today in Owensboro, KY. Sixteen teams will go thru the double elimination format over the next two days to determine the state champ. Local schools PRP and Mercy are involved, so best of luck to the Panthers and Jaguars! We'll have a full recap of the first day of action here at CARDINAL COUPLE tomorrow.

Big East meetings: Whistling in the dark?

NOTE TO OUR DEAR READERS AND ALL YOU INTERNET BOTS. CARDINAL COUPLE WILL BE GOING DARK FOR A FEW DAYS. THE HAMSTERS THAT POWER OUR HARD DRIVE ARE HEADED TO THE ANNUAL RODENT AND PREDATOR CONVENTION/GAMES IN TRUCKEE, CA. WE HOPE THEY RETURN...

WE'LL BE BACK (WE PROMISE) BIGGER, STRONGER, STEROID AND CAVITY FREE. IN THE MEANTIME, PLEASE AMUSE YOURSELF BY CHECKING OUT THE SITES WE RECOMMEND OVER ON THE LEFT SIDE OF THE SITE. OR, ORGANIZE YOUR SOCK DRAW. SEE YOU REAL SOON AND DON'T STOP BELIEVING. SOME ONE OUT THERE JUST MIGHT MAKE IT HAPPEN FOR YOU.

PAUL, SONJA, SCOOTER, RODNEY and MAX AND BERTIE..THE WONDER HAMSTERS.

Big East commisioner John Marinatto just might be feeling like General George Custer these days. The Indians are coming...masked as the Big 10...and they've got plenty of arrows (dollars).

Big East athletic directors and coaches headed to Jacksonville early this week to converge and confab on the league and the future. If the circumstances felt eerily similar to the meeting seven years ago when the league was raided by the ACC and Miami, Va.Tech, and Boston College left...consider the future.

The Big East will likely be raided by another war party in the future. This tribe is called the Big 10 and they are considering the scalps of Pittsburgh, Rutgers, UConn, Syracuse and Notre Dame. Although a snatch and grab of all these schools is unlikely, defection by two or more could have the grim reaper walking down the Big East sidewalk.

And, as it is so often anymore...it's all about the Benjamins. The green stuff. The coffer fillers. Member schools in the Big 10 fare much better financially than their Big East associates. The ESPN package is worth a bilion dollars. The Big East...well, not nearly as much.

We deal with women's sports here at CARDINAL COUPLE. A Big East defection will rock the men's basketball and football programs the most. But, consider Big East women's basketball without say...a UConn or Rutgers. Big East softball missing a Notre Dame or the league's tournament champion Syracuse? Track and field and swimming without the strong prescence of the Irish and the Orange? (As far as Pitt goes...don't let the door hit you in the backside on the way out. When's the last time Pitt won anything of consequence except for the Dave Wannstadt lottery?)High on the hill...staring down on what is definitely a pro sports town...Pittsburgh is the only away football tailgate trip I've ever been to where the NFL leather jackets and team jersey logos outnumbered the college team's.

When the battle begins, the Big East will return the favor and go shopping for replacements. It's hard to buy a Camry when you've been driving a Lexus but there are schools that are probably on the addition list.

Depending on the extent of pilfering, these schools would seem to rank as the (3) logical contenders to change affilitations and conference logos.

1) Memphis. The scorned lover back when the Big East expanded last time...the folks down on Beale Street still have an upside this time around. Strong TV market. Successful men's basketball program. A football stadium that can hold 70,000 fans. And Graceland. Ribs and Mud Island. Casinos nearby.

2) East Carolina. They love their football in Greenville and if football is the transmission to the Big East vehicle...you could do a lot worse by adding the Pirates to the drive train. Basketball...well, mediocre basketball teams in the Big East are a dime a dozen (see Rutgers, Seton Hall, South Florida. OK, you get the picture.) Adding another is a moot point at this juncture.

3) Central Florida. Media, media and location. Successes in football and a desire to grow. They are considered by some sources the "Louisville of the late ninties" a university on the verge of exploding into national prominence and growth. Whether they have a Tom Jurich type at the controls flying the athletic department plane is uncertain...but AD's are susceptible to career changes. Ask Wood Selig.

You may differ with these prognosticated picks. The Big 10 may decide schools like Missouri or Bellarmine are more lucrative. Aliens could land tomorrow and return Barack Obama to the mothership. But, something's going to happen down the road and, as usual...he who displays the most marbles usually wins the game. We'll see who the Big 10 adds to their pillage sack.

C. Viv Stringer and Geno Auriemma playing Northwestern and Illinois instead of Louisville and DePaul? It just could happen...