Volleyball returning home

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FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

- Volleyball with homestand

- Field Hockey in BIG EAST TOURNAMENT tonite

- Reynolds to announce Friday

(In response to the e-mails we've had about our wildly popular Breeders Cup picks...we hope to have Friday's selections at the bottom of today's column by 10 a.m. EDT. The chimps are typing as fast as they can.)


( CARDINAL COUPLE Correspondent Jeff McAdams gets us caught up on CARDINAL Volleyball today. Watch the net, practice your set and get ready for the kill! )


Past, Present and Future

Its been a while since Louisville volleyball has played in the friendly confines of either of either of their home floors, but they're about to return for a match this Friday at Cardinal Arena against Villanova, followed by Sunday back downtown against Georgetown.

I figured now was a good time to look back on the past 3 weekends of play, check out current national standings, and look ahead at the rapidly dwindling set of matches still to be played.

St. Johns, Connecticut, Syracuse, Marquette, Cincinnati

The last three weekends have seen the VolleyCards on the road.  My normal dog sitters were on an extended vacation, and I had already been warned that it wasn't wise to let Coco and Timmy dog sit, so I didn't get to make it to any of the matches in the first two weekends.  The last weekend was just a quick jaunt up I-71 which can be done in just a day trip...and my dog sitters were back in any case.

The first trip was a swing through the northeast with visits to St. Johns and Connecticut.  This trip really should've been an easy victory tour, but both St. Johns and UConn gave the Cards some challenges to overcome.  They did prevail, however, and came back with the Ws.

The next weekend brought another of the crazy Big East road trips, with visits to Syracuse and Marquette.  After getting stuck in Detroit overnight on their way back from Pitt when they flew commercial, the Cards decided to charter this one.  This trip included one of the bigger challenges for playing volleyball in the Big East this year, Marquette.

After handling Syracuse without any real discomfort, the Cards really made their presence felt in Milwaukee taking the match 3-1 and playing quite well.  Marquette did stream the match on the Internet, so I did get a bit of a chance to see how this one went.

Finally, the Kordes Krew made their way back into the Ohio Valley with a single match this past weekend at Cincinnati.  Usually Cincinnati is a serious threat in the Big East.  This year...not so much.  They have some good talent on the team, but with a new coach, they just haven't seemed to put it all together.  The Cards got through the sweep pretty quickly and without much drama.  Its good to get the win, but I would've liked to have seen it be a bit more interesting for the ESPNU coverage...though not too interesting, of course.  The outcome was never in much doubt, despite Louisville giving as many points to Cincinnati as they could via service errors.

The Volleyball world, as it currently stands

The top 10 in both the coach's poll and the RPI is graced by the likes of Stanford, Penn State, Nebraska, Texas, and UCLA...no real surprises in any of those.  Some of the others making appearances in one or both are Oregon, Minnesota, Washington, and Hawaii...again, nothing that causes any real jaw drops.

Louisville continues to creep back up the coach's poll, making it up to the number 12 spot in the just released poll.  Some thanks is due to the previous number 11 Florida who dropped their match against previous numer 12 Florida State.  Florida dropped two spots to 13, and FSU joins us in getting bumped up a spot.

In the RPI, we continue to hang on to the number 7 position.  We've been winning consistently, but for the most part, not against any real powerhouse teams, so we haven't been getting much of a bump from the wins.  The win over Marquette probably helped us stay where we are, as well as continued good performance by the likes of Kentucky at 15, Miami(FL) at 16, Purdue at 21, as well as...go Hilltoppers...WKU at 33, and then Illinois at 35.  Marquette checks in at 36.

The RPI, of course, takes into account not only a team's own win-loss record, but the win-loss record of their opponents and even of their opponent's opponents, so our earlier wins over these teams that are all representing well in the RPI, helps out our own ranking.  On the other side of the equation, our only losses are to Penn State, checking in at 2, Texas following closely behind at 4, and lastly Notre Dame, who's coming in at 34, which means that our loses aren't hurting us that much at all.

Let's play "Good news, Bad news, Good news"

For home vs away:

Good news:  The rest of our regular season matches are all at home.

Bad news:  Only one of the matches is at the arena downtown.

Good news:  Cardinal Arena is pretty darn cool, too.

For RPI consideration:

Good news:  There's a pretty good chance we could win out the rest of the regular season.

Bad news:  We won't be playing much of anybody that can help us out much in the RPI.

Good news:  Except Marquette, again.

On TV coverage:

Good news:  We'll be on TV twice.

Bad news:  Versus Georgetown and Cincinnati, neither of which should be terribly competitive.

Good news:  The Cincinnati match is nationally televised (ESPNU) again.

Tournaments

There's a berth already waiting for the Cards in the Big East tournament which will be held at The Al McGuire Center in Milwaukee November 16th through 18th, with Marquette hosting.  Marquette, Notre Dame, and Louisville have already clenched spots in the tournament based on their league records at 10-1.  Louisville currently has the number 1 seed in the tournament based on our overall win-loss percentage due to the Big East tie breaker rules.  Each of those losses in those 10-1 records is against one of the others.  We lost to ND, ND lost to MU, and MU lost to us.  This tie-breaker scenario will change, however, as we play Marquette again, and Marquette also has another match against Notre Dame.  It also would change if any of the three teams lost another conference match.

While its not a tournament, a quirk of volleyball scheduling is that the Cards play another "regular season" match after the Big East tournament, versus whichever team is the champion of the Ohio Valley Conference tournament.  A quick look at OVC standings suggests that we could have a rematch with Morehead State as they are 12-0 in conference play.  Of course, anything can happen tournament time.

And then the big one.  The NCAA tournament selection show will be Sunday November 25th at 4pm ET with the tournament beginning Nov. 29th.  In volleyball, only 16 teams in the tournament of 64 are seeded, with the rest being placed geographically.  The first and second round matches are at non-predetermined sites, almost always at the locations of the 16 seeded teams.  This is why we've played so many of our tournament matches at Purdue in past years.  The 16 seeds typically follow the RPI rankings very closely, so if UofL keeps winning, we'll likely be a host for the first and second rounds of the tournament.  I understand that the athletic department is already making (tentative) plans for the event at The KFC Yum! Center based on the likelihood of UofL being seeded and hosting. 

Third and fourth rounds are at predetermined sites.  This year, the Regionals are at Haas Pavilion in Berkeley, CA;  CenturyLink Center in Omaha, NE;  Gregory Gymnasium in Austin, TX;  and...wait for it...Mackey Arena in West Lafayette, IN.  Geographic principles still apply, so if the Cards advance to Regionals it looks like another road trip to Purdue...I think my Jeep can make the drive on its own, now.

And, of course, we get the honor of hosting the Semifinal matches and the National Championship at the KFC Yum! Center December 13th and 15th...you do have your tickets ordered already, right?

Jeff (white shirt) is also an avid WBB fan!

Incidentally, Kentucky is hosting a Regional in 2013 at Memorial Coliseum, and a 2014 Regional will be back here in the 'ville at The KFC Yum! Center.

This weekend

Villanova and Georgetown come into town to play this weekend.  Villanova is 11-15 (5-6), and Georgetown is 7-17 (1-10).  The GU match is slated to be shown by WHAS.  Realistically, as long as this UofL team doesn't take these matches for granted, neither Villanova nor Georgetown should really pose that much of a threat.  I'll be in my usual seats, come say hi.

( A great article by Jeff today! Go VolleyCards!)


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The BIG EAST Field Hockey Championships are at Trager Stadium on campus this weekend also. #25 Louisville faces off against #5 UConn at 7:30 p.m. The action begins at 5 p.m. with Providence and Syracuse taking the field.

GO CARDS!

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Jordan Reynolds, another target of Jeff Walz on the 2013 recruiting trail, is scheduled to announce Friday where she'll be attending college.

We want her at Louisville, make no mistake about it. She's a hard-slashing combo guard that played with Alexis Montgomery and Mercedes Russell in Oregon AAU Team Concept ball and made a huge name for herself at Central Catholic...as well as on the West Coast. 

Make it the 'Ville, Jordan! Now that we have Coach Walz firmly entrenched as a coach/referee, you'll get the best calls and plenty of free throw opportunities at Louisville.

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FRIDAY BREEDERS CUP SELECTIONS

( Please remember these are for entertainment purposes only and do not necessarily reflect the views of the CARDINAL COUPLE staff. Bill the Goat thought they were tasty, though...and ate them the minute we got them posted on here. GOOD LUCK! )

JUVENILE SPRINT

PAUL                                                      SONJA
Merit Man                                               Merit Man
South Floyd                                             Super Ninety Nine
Super Ninety Nine                                   Sweet Shirley Mae

MARATHON

PAUL                                                       SONJA
Atigun                                                      Eldaafer
Not Abroad                                              Atigun
Jaycito.                                                     Grassy

JUVENILE FILLIES TURF

PAUL                                                        SONJA
Flashy Ways                                             Watsdachances
Spring Venture                                          Spring Venture
Tara from the Cape                                   Sustained

JUVENILE FILLIES

PAUL                                                         SONJA
Executive Privledge                                   Beholder
Kauai Katie                                                Executve Privledge
Beholder                                                     Dreaming of Julia

FILLY & MARE TURF

PAUL                                                          SONJA
The Fugue                                                   Marketing Mix
Marketing Mix                                            Zagura
In Lingerie                                                  The Fugue

LADIES CLASSIC

PAUL                                                           SONJA
Questing                                                       Awesome Feather
Royal Delta                                                  Royal Delta
Grace Hall                                                    My Miss Aurelia

Our buddy J.J. Hysell has done extensive research on today's card and you can see her well-thought out selections over at IN THE MONEY.  Click the box NOV 1 to see them when you get there.  Link below:

IN THE MONEY


GOOD LUCK AND WAGER RESPONSIBLY!

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Recruiting round up

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WEDNESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

-Jenny catches us up on the recruit scenario.

-Despite losing Russell, Cards have done well with 2013 class.

-Cards exhibition game against Eckerd tonight.

Alexis Montgomery, a guard out of Beaverton, OR who was on campus this past weekend, has given her verbal pledge to the Louisville program.  Montgomery is the second 2013 prospect to do so within the last day. 
Attached is a good read, from Oregon Live reporter Jerry Ulmer. Link below: 


Montgomery Chooses Louisville

Montgomery chose Louisville over Seattle University, Hawaii and Virginia Tech.  Montgomery is ranked as the #57 guard in the class and joins #21 Emmonnie Henderson and JUCO stand out Janelle Cannon so far in the class of 2013.

Coach Walz and company are not done yet, either.  Louisville is still in the running for top prospects Imani Wright (Texas) and Jordan Reynolds (Oregon).   Keep it tuned here Cardinal faithful, for all the latest recruiting round up. 

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It is hard not to be a bit disappointed when you come this close to landing the #1 recruit in the nation...to be the final cut on her list.  You have to respect Russell’s decision, though.  She is an incredible player and we look for her to have much success in her collegiate career. 

That being said, Card Nation has much to look forward to!  The Cardinals are preseason ranked #9 in the country; play at an amazing facility known as The KFC YUM! Center, and have a great coaching staff that was in it until the end with the #1 recruit in the nation.   I expect more of these epic recruiting battles in the future.  The Louisville program has proven that it is relevant and can go toe to toe with the top programs in the country.  You win some recruiting battles and you lose some.  When going against the best in the nation, one is bound to lose a few battles. 

Our Cards are loaded with talent and are poised to take the program back to the Final Four as soon as this year.  The coaching staff continues to work to bring in top prospects.  Attendance is growing, and no doubt will continue to grow, and we look to break attendance records this year!

The Cardinal Spirit is alive and well.

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The future remains bright in Louisville!  Card Fans, stand up and support our team!  Your first opportunity to do so happens tonight, at The YUM! Center.  The Cardinals play their one and only exhibition game against Eckerd College at 7:00 p.m.  Admission is free!  Get your trick or treating done early and head down to the YUM Center for more treats!! 

It is always a great day to be a Cardinal!  L1C4, baby!

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( Editor's note. HAPPY HALLOWEEN to all our readers! Stay with CARDINAL COUPLE for Louisville womens sports treats all year long. We won't trick you on the facts and you'll have a spooky good time reading our unmasked reports on the Cards gobblin' up their opponents!)

We leave you today with a great song by the Byrds from 1970 which covers desire, pursuit, defeat and determination to try again. It parallels the pursuit of Ms. Russell.

Enjoy Chestnut Mare. Link below. Keep chasing, Jeff. You're gonna catch more than a few.


Chestnut Mare
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MERCEDES RUSSELL SAYS...

TENNESSEE

The #1 recruit in the 2013 class has spoken...and she said Tennessee.

You win some, you lose some. Louisville got great news yesterday and earlier today about Emmonnie Henderson and Alexis Montgomery committing.  

We kept our hopes high and wish Mercedes the very best in her academic and collegiate basketball career. Not gonna kid you, this one hurts...but the Cardinal Spirit is strong, united and loyal. We'll cheer our hearts out for who is on the court.

A heartfelt thanks to the Louisville players, staff, coaches and fans who did their best to try and make Mercedes a Cardinal.

We go on. Cardinal WBB in the KFC YUM! Center tomorrow night to see a very good UofL WBB team that will be fun to watch and so very talented.

L1C4.

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Emmonnie Henderson is a Cardinal!

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MONDAY CARDINAL COUPLE SPECIAL EDITION

- CARDINAL COUPLE COLUMNIST JENNY O'BRYAN BRINGS US THE RECRUITING NEWS...HENDERSON VERBALS TO LOUISVILLE!

- What is your question?


Emmonnie Henderson is a 6-2 forward from Edwardsville HS Illinois.  She is also a dual sport athlete in shot put and discus, and as of this early evening, a future Louisville Cardinal. 

The now defunct Hoopgurlz rated Henderson at #40 and All Star Girls Report ranks her at #21 in her class.    Henderson was on campus this past weekend, and chose Louisville over her other finalist, powerhouse Tennessee. 

For Cardinal Couple faithful readers, you may remember I wrote about her this past summer after seeing an AAU game.  Henderson will be a huge asset in brutal Big East play.  She is said to be “strong as an ox” and has a sturdy frame.  Her attacking around the basket was powerful and consistent and scouts have been noting her extending her game away from the basket.   Henderson is capable of playing multiple positions on the court and will be a matchup nightmare for opponents. 

Henderson was one of four recruits on campus this weekend, and one of five still considering Louisville.   Alexis Montgomery and Mercedes Russell, both from Oregon, will be announcing their college choice tomorrow.  Jordan Reynolds, also from Oregon, was on campus this weekend.  No timetable has been made available about when she will decide.  Imani Wright, out of Texas, was on campus about a month ago, and is said to be very high on Louisville and deciding between Louisville and Baylor. 

CardNation, it is time to stand up!  Coach Walz is doing great things with this program; top recruits are coming, and choosing Louisville over perennial powerhouses.  As a burgeoning fan base we are on the brink of overtaking the number one spot in fan attendance. 

The future of Louisville Basketball just got a little brighter tonight!  CardNation welcomes Emmonnie Henderson to the best Athletic Department in the country!

( Editor's note...A huge congratulations to Jeff Walz, the University of Louisville basketball staff and players and Cardinal fans for letting it be known that we wanted Emmonnie at Louisville. And a sincere "THANK YOU" and "WELCOME ABOARD!!" to the "Edwardsville Electrifier" -- Emmonnie Henderson! One down and more to come? Stay tuned to CARDINAL COUPLE for the latest and GO CARDS!)

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TUESDAY is Media Day for the WBB team at the KFC YUM! Center. Got a specific question that you'd like asked for one of the players and coaches? Paulie or Timmy the Intern will be glad to pose it!

Please send the question via e-mail to:

cardinalcouple@insightbb.com

It can be anonymous if you want. I need the questions submitted by 10:30 a.m. Tuesday morning.

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Volleyball win, Soccer falls

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MONDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

- Volleyball defeats Cincy in three sets

- Soccer falls in BIG EAST Tournament to USF

- After the recruiting visit: The waiting game

Rucker, Arslanbekova fuel straight set wins

The University of Louisville squad improved to 21-3 and 10-1 in the BIG EAST by knocking off Cincinnati 25-21, 25-13, 25-21 Sunday in Fifth Third Arena. Gwen Rucker and Lola Arslanbekova had 11 kills each in the Cardinal win.

Louisville started slowly in the first game and trailed UC 9-5 before a 5-1 Cardinal run tied the contest at 10-10. Cincinnati was able to regain the lead and Louisville didn't grab their first advantage until 17-16. UC never challenged after that and the Cards outscored the Bearcats to win going away by four.

Maybe a bit deflated by the loss...and definitely punished by the serving of Kaitlynn James, the Bearcats found themselves in a 7-0 hole to begin game two. Louisville pushed that to 13-2 and the only real question left was how many points would the Cards win by. They Cards enjoyed a 22-10 advantage and closed out the second game on a Lola kill to win by 12.

UC did try to make a match of it in the third game...jumping out to a 4-0 lead before the Cards regrouped and tied the contest at 9-9. A brief Bearcat rally gave them a 12-10 edge before the Cards went on a 9-4 rally to put them up 19-16. UofL continued the hot streak and was at set point at 24-18 before settling for the four-point win.

The Cards finally return home after the extended road trip and will face Villanova Friday night in Cardinal Arena at 7 p.m. They'll also host Georgetown Sunday at 2 p.m. in the KFC YUM! Center.

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Louisville Women's Soccer falls in triple overtime to South Florida.

The Cards and the Bulls battled through 110 minutes and two overtimes to a scoreless draw in BIG EAST Tournament action...necessitating a shoot-out third overtime. In the tie-breaker, each team got five penalty kicks to try and score on the opposing goalkeeper. With the scoring at 3-3, USF got the final attempt and USF freshman Olivia Chance sent one past UofL's Chloe Kiefer to break the tie and give USF the win.

The Cards outshot USF 16-13 in regulation and the two overtimes and Kiefer produced seven saves for UofL. Although USF advances to the semi-finals, the game gets recorded officially as a tie.

The Cards (10-4-4) now must wait until Nov.5th. to see if they get a bid to participate in the field of 64 in the NCAA Tournament.

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After one of the most highly anticipated women's basketball recruiting visit weekends in the history of Cardinal womens' hoops, the questions now are:

1) How did the visits go?
2)  When will Coach Walz and the fans know about verbals?
3) What is Louisville's chance of getting all or some of the visitors?

All indicators and reports we've heard indicate that the girls visiting ( Mercedes Russell, Emmonnie Henderson, Alexis Montgomery and Jordan Reynolds) had a great time, got to go to the football game Friday, Coach Walz's birthday party, a haunted house tour, Cardinal basketball scrimmage and many other fun and exciting things. We'll keep an eye on Twitter and Facebook (and we hope you will too) to see what they're saying.

We know that verbals are on the way. We expect Reynolds', Montgomery's and Russell's on or by Tuesday. Henderson may not be far behind. We hope these verbal are in UofL's favor. We also remind you that Imani Wright is still a potential Cardinal. The impact of these five girls, plus already verballed juco Janelle Cannon is huge and would surely give the Cards the #1 recruiting class of 2013.

How will the Cards do? WE have no specific facts, no iron-clad guarantees or insider scoop...but it wouldn't surprise us if Louisville landed all five. The current players on Jeff Walz's squad were very impressed with the visitors and would love to have them join the Cardinal family. 

Even though the coaching staff can't comment about them and the visits...we know that Walz & Company must be very high and sold on each them...otherwise they wouldn't have been here and made the talk of the town.

We know your anxious. We are anticipating big things as well. We've gotten a huge amount of e-mails on the visits and they range from the well-thought out to the ridiculous yet hopeful. We appreciate your thoughts, opinions, comments and predictions.

What it shows us is something we've known for awhile. This is a very passionate, caring and knowledge fan base that wants only the best for UofL sports and love their Lady Cards to death...a fan base that is unmatched in womens' college basketball.

Good things happen to those who wait. Patience is a virtue. WE feel confident UofL will be rewarded very soon.

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Visits the middle part of the recruitment process

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THURSDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

- In recruiting, a visit means your halfway there

Normally, we tend to leave all things bright and beautiful about recruiting to our ace columnist Jenny O'Bryan. She knows it, she follows it and she understands it. And that works well for us. If you've got Eric Clapton available to play the guitar, you hand it to him instead of the guy tending bar.

Today, though. I will talk recruiting. Bear with me.

I had a former college basketball coach give me his take on recruiting once. He broke it down so a sixth-grader could understand it, which worked well for me. I don't think he ever recruited any sixth-graders...but sometimes, you just never know. Anyway, here is the process, according to him.

1) Recognition. You find out about a kid who rarely misses behind the three-point arc. Or is 6'7" in the ninth grade and starting for their high school team. You do your research and, if the prospect looks like one that might fit the needs of your team, you move onto step two, which is...
2) Contact. You let the kid know you're interested. You try and find out if the kid is interested in you. If so, you keep up the contact. You establish contact with the high school coach, the AAU coach, the parents, old Uncle Ben. You watch, you observe. You do more checking, broader-based and comprehensive. Eventually you get to step three which is...

3) Visits. You go see the kid. You invite the kid to see the campus. The NCAA has all kinds of rules and regulations about this. You follow them. Hopefully, you get to step four, which is...
4) Verbal. The kid comes out and says your school is their top choice. It's not official yet, but you're in the driver's seat for step five...
5) Signing. That's when the kid officially signs the letter of intent. A LOI isn't always 100% fool-proof...but it means the kid intends on playing for you.

This weekend, on the University of Louisville campus, step three comes to fruition. In a huge way. Four outstanding girls' high school basketball stars hit the Belknap Campus on recruiting visits. Remember the names. Nothing would please Cardinal WBB fans and Jeff Walz more than to see them move on to step four. For two of them, it's the first visit. For Louisville, it's huge.

This weekend has been talked about on fan boards, in e-mails, general discussions and on multiple web sites for weeks. This weekend is here.

MERCEDES RUSSELL
EMMONNIE HENDERSON
JORDAN REYNOLDS
ALEXIS MONTGOMERY

They're four of the half-dozen or so that Louisville desires. Imani Wright, too. Janelle Cannon already on-board with step four completed.

I have no idea what consists of a recruiting visit in women's college basketball. My best guess is they'll hit the football game versus Cincinnati Friday night. Maybe tailgate with Derty Bird, A-Tayy, Sho and Mo. Probably go see the men's scrimmage Saturday and the women's preliminary warm-ups before that in the KFC YUM! Center.

I'm sure there is "an app" for that amongst the Cardinal coaches, players, staff and impresarios that'll ensure they have a big time. They probably don't need to see me sing "Gimme Three Steps" with Robbie Bartlett's band over at the Parrish House.

Mercedes, Emmonnie, and Jordan did Tennessee last weekend. I didn't hear any verbals. Saving the best for last? We certainly hope so!

Get on the bus!

If I could sit down and talk with each girl, I'd tell them this. Get on the bus and be Cardinal Strong. That Louisville women's basketball fans are not an old, stodgy or antique breed. They're a phenomena that is young and old, fiercely proud of the program, energetic and constantly cheering for players they idolize in the hallmark of college basketball arenas.

They're alive, rapidly growing and sometimes just downright crazy, fanatical, cool, deafening and impassioned....these Cardinal fans. They're amazing. 

I'd tell them that they'd being playing for a coach that cares about them as students as well as athletes and they'd be learning from assistants, staff and trainers that are deeply committed to the concept of Cardinal hoops, personal development, character and success.

I'd tell them about the little girl in Section 114, screaming "Shoni!" at the top of her lungs, the guy up in the stands behind the media table who goes into hysterics every time a foul is called on Bria or Shawnta. I'd tell them about the three little old ladies who never miss a home game and are in their seats the minute after the doors are opened.

I'd tell them about the current Lt. Governor and former mayor who rarely misses a contest and is one of the best referee-baiters in college basketball. 

I'd tell them about the dozens of people who stop me and want to talk Cardinal women's basketball when I attend football games, charitable events, trips to WalMart or even when I'm waiting to order my Big Mac and fries. I'd tell them about the little girl, wide-eyed and grinning from ear-to-ear because Mo knelt down to talk to her, signed her poster and hugged her in the KFC YUM! Center lobby after a game.

I'd tell them about the commitment to excellence that Tom Jurich lives for in the athletic programs each and every day. About the caring professors and academic aides that want to see them succeed. About how Julie Hermann, Louisville's executive, senior, associate athletic director, never misses a home Cardinal women's event and works the crowd with the polished skill of a dignitary or politician.

I'd tell them about the Cardinal Spirit. 

I have a feeling they'll get all that and more this weekend, though. I have a feeling that they're here because they know...and they want to be a part of it.

Enjoy your visit, Mercedes, Emmonnie, Jordan and Alexis. Choose wisely. Choose thoughtfully. 

Choose Louisville. The best college sports town in the nation.

-Paulie
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