Friday Cardinal Couple --Slaughter, Schimmel, Softball, Golf and more today!

FRIDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

-Shoni, Nita gain BIG EAST awards

-Softball hosts Red and Black Classic

-Wiley BIG EAST golfer of the week

-BIG EAST WBB Tournament starts today!

-Walz ready for BIG EAST Tournament


Boy, oh boy have we got a lotta stuff for you today in the Friday edition of Cardinal Couple! Grab a seat, hold on and fasten your seat belts....off we go!

Shoni 1st team BIG EAST, Nita second team

Louisville WBB's Shoni Schimmel and Nita Slaughter have been honored for their excellent play this season...Shoni named to the First Team All-BIG EAST squad and Nita Slaughter to the Second Team. Shoni was first team also last year and Nita is on the second squad for the first time.

Shoni leads the Cards in scoring (13.7 ppg) and in assists (3.7). She's also second in free throw percentage (80%). The shifty Schimmel was BIG EAST Player of the Week for her performance against South Florida earlier this season, scoring a career-high 38 points. She was on the pre-season All-BIG EAST first team and also is on the Wade Watch mid-season list.

Nita is third in scoring for the Lady Cards (10.2 ppg) and second in rebounding (5.1 rpg). She's also the leading three-point percentage shooter for Louisville (36.2%). Nita was named BIG EAST Player of the Week on Jan. 28th. and has scored in double figures 16 out of her 18 games.

The BIG EAST Tournament begins today at 4 p.m. and Louisville has their first game at noon Sunday.

(Thanks to Louisville women's basketball assistant S.I.D. Kim Pemberton for the information)

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Softball swings into action today with the Red and Black Classic at Ulmer Stadium. Sandy Pearsall's squad gets four games in three days...Michigan today at 4 p.m., Miami of Ohio Saturday at 2:30 p.m.,Austin Peay Saturday at 5 p.m. and Illinois State Sunday at 3 p.m.

The #13 Cards are offering a few promos, too...to game attendees. Free softball shirts for the first 150 fans Friday, Trading Card #1 giveaway for the first 150 fans Saturday and team autographs after Sunday's contest.

Full schedule of the Red and Black Classic below:

FRIDAY MARCH 8

11 a.m.      Miami (OH) vs Austin Peay
1:30 p.m.   Miami (OH) vs Michigan
4 p.m.        LOUISVILLE vs Michigan

SATURDAY MARCH 9

9:30 a.m.   Illinois State vs Michigan
12 p.m.      Illinois State vs, Austin Peay
2:30 p.m.   LOUISVILLE vs. Miami (OH)
5 p.m.        LOUISVILLE vs. Austin Peay

SUNDAY  MARCH 10

10 a.m.      Miami (OH) vs Austin Peay
12:30 p.m. Miami (OH) vs Illinois State
3 p.m.        LOUISVILLE vs. Illinois State.


Nice of the Classic planners to schedule the Sunday game after the UofL WBB game. Plenty of time to hop in the ol' jalopy and catch softball after the Cards win in the quarterfinals in the BIG EAST Tournament.

Louisville (16-3) also plays WKU on Tuesday, March 12th. at Ulmer.

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CandIce Wiley, a senior starter for UofL women's golf has been named BIG EAST Golfer of the Week! She finished tied for 12th in the Sir Pizza Terrapin Challenge last week. It was her first Top 20 finish of the season.

UofL ended up sixth in the tournament, Wiley leading the way for the Cards with a 223 score. A season low 71 for her in Round 1 with back-to-back 76's in rounds 2 and 3.

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Finally, the BIG EAST Tournament gets underway today at 4 p.m. First game is #13 seed Cincinnati against #12 seed Seton Hall. Pitt and Marquette follow at 6 p.m. and Providence and Georgetown play in the nightcap at 8 p.m.

All are available at no cost on BIGEAST.tv online.

Coach Walz spoke to members of the media Thursday at Cardinal Arena and has a healthy respect for any of the three opponents the Cards might face on Sunday. Walz is happy that the Cards are hosting the first two rounds of the NCAA Tournament and urges you to buy your NCAA Tickets to see Louisville play in the KFC YUM! Center.

He also says that Louisville will have to play perfect to defeat Notre Dame if the two match up in the semi-finals. Monique Reid will be available for action and the Cards are leaving out early this morning to fly to Hartford, stopping off in Baltimore to pick up a few fans...(his sly way of telling us that they're on Southwest and not a charter flight.)

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You have until noon to get your picks in for the CARDINAL COUPLE Pick 'Em Contest. As promised, another staff member's picks. Our basketball guru Jenny O'Bryan sees it this way:

Friday:
Seton Hall, Marquette and Georgetown win
Saturday:
St John's, USF, DePaul and Villanova advance
Sunday:
Louisville, Notre Dame, UCONN and Syracuse triumph
Monday:
Notre Dame and UCONN continue
Tuesday:
UCONN takes the Tournament Title.

You can enter at cardinalcouple@insightbb.com or by leaving your picks in the comments section. Make sure and leave your name and a way to reach you if you win. I got one anonymous pick already....fortunately, it has Syracuse winning it all and that, folks...just isn't going to happen.

$25 Chili's Gift Card to the winner!

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Thursday Cardinal Couple

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Thursday Cardinal Couple - The "Spring Sports? Its Snowing!" Edition

Another Lacrosse Win

Coming off their first loss of the season in Denver, Kellie Young's young Lacrosse team came out Wednesday afternoon ready to make a statement.  While not ideal weather for a field sport, the cold, with a bit of snow on the ground, didn't chill the first half attack of the Cardinals.

Louisville Lacrosse team got out to a strong lead in the first half of the game against Vanderbilt with scoring by committee.  Seven different sources of scoring for Louisville led to the 9-4 halftime lead. Nikki Boltja found the back of the net twice, as did Katie Oliverio.  Also scoring for Louisville in the first half were Colleen O'Malley, Erika Eipp, Kaylin Morissette, Jamie Redding, and...uhm...Vanderbilt.

Vanderbilt made a statement in the second half, but it wasn't enough to completely close the gap.  Carly Linthicum scored 4 of her 5 goals in the second half, including 3 in under 8 minutes, helping to narrow the 5 point halftime margin to 3, but Cardinals Nikki Boltja and Kaylin Morissette both scored twice to hold on to the win for a final score of 13-10.

Another win, over another quality opponent.  If you didn't get a chance to get out to the Lacrosse Stadium, you're going to have to wait a while.  The Cardinals don't return to play a game on Floyd St. until early April, though hopefully that means the weather will be nicer.  In the meantime, they have road games against Presbyterian (in Georgia), Detroit, and Drexel.  The road trip continues with the beginning of conference play against Loyola Maryland...yes, that is a Big East team in Lacrosse...and Georgetown, before finally returning home for a April 5th game against Notre Dame with a 5pm first draw.

National Honors

Several National honors were bestowed on Cardinal Womens Athletes this week, both athletic and academic.

Softball

Katie Keller (2B) picked up the Louisville Slugger/NFCA (National Fast-pitch Coaches Association) Player of the Week spot.  The Cards have had two players pick up this award previously Tori Collins (4/17/2012) and Chelsea Bemis (4/27/2010).

Katie breaks new ground by being named the USA Softball National Collegiate Player of the Week, an honor never before bestowed on a Cardinal.

The softball team will be back in action on Floyd street in beautiful Ulmer Stadium this weekend.  First pitch for UofL will be against a frequent opponent, Michigan, on Friday at 4pm.  Miami (Ohio) and Austin Peay will be the Saturday matchups with 2:30pm and 5pm starts, with a 3pm Sunday start against Illinois State.  The weather looks to be fantastic, particularly as the weekend progresses, for a trip out to Ulmer to cheer on the 13th ranked Softball team.

Congratulations to Katie, and good luck to the whole team this weekend.

Field Hockey

UofL Field Hockey was named to the 2012 Gladiator by SGI/National Field Hockey Coaches Association Nation Academic Team Award list...boy that's a mouthful.  This list is for teams that achieve a team GPA of 3.0 or above.

Contributing to that, were the seven players named to the NFHCA National Academic squad.  This squad is players that have earned a 3.30 or higher GPA through the first semester of the 2012-13 school year.  The seven are: Elisa Garcia, Natasha Leickly, Becca Maddock, Mallory Mason, Paige Monsen, Kelsey Rosenmeier, and Kendall Weedling.

Congratulations to the Field Hockey team for representing the University and community so well, even in the off season.

The Signing News Continues

This is a marathon, not a sprint; but I'm going to throw you a bit of a curve-ball by starting with...

Volleyball

Alex Wilharm has joined the Volleyball coaching staff as an assistant coach to Anne Kordes.  If you've been to a volleyball match in the past couple of years, you've seen Alex; he's the (very) red-headed guy who looks like he's about 17, but in reality is in his mid-20's.  Alex has been serving as the volunteer assistant coach for the past two years, but now joins the coaching staff officially.  He joins Lee Maes and replaces Melissa Stark Bean.  Melissa has been up front about only filling the assistant coaches position temporarily (due to the late departure of Dani Busboom to become an assistant coach at her alma mater Nebraska) until Kordes could find a longer term replacement.

Kordes has, in the past, spoken about wanting to hire an older more established coach to help bring a bit of a different perspective to the staff, but apparently decided that it was worth hiring Alex, and lowering the age of an already youthful staff, in order to retain his immense talent and drive.

I've had the opportunity to speak with Alex several times and he is a genuinely nice guy and very enjoyable to talk to.  He knows the game of volleyball very well...far better than his youth would suggest...and is clearly an immensely hard worker.  This is another great hire for the UofL Athletic Department and UofL Volleyball.

Field Hockey

Justine Sowry has clearly been spending a lot of time in the Camden, NJ area in the past couple of years.  Field Hockey has announced their 5th (of 6) signing of the year in Elina Pereira from Shawnee High School in Medford, NJ.  Previous announcements included 2 from Eastern Regional High School in Vorhees, NJ about 10 miles down the road.

Elina is a goalkeeper and is expected to compete for the starting position this fall.  Welcome, Elina.

Cardinal Couple Radio Hour

Jeff pleads his point on the CARDINAL
COUPLE Radio Hour

I had a lot of fun with Paulie and Jenny on Crescent Hill Radio on Saturday, and am really looking forward to doing it again this week.  No doubt we'll give some time to the Big East Women's Basketball tournament...we'll have the results of the first round in to talk about and analyze.  We'll also have the Michigan Softball game to talk about.  Be sure to tune in to http://www.crescenthillradio.com Saturday at 11am ET.  Paulie's flights of fancy are worth the price of admission alone.

Paulie insists Rutgers is in
New Jersey on the show...

Editor's Note: And it was a great show...Jeff and Jenny providing the perfect Moe and Larry compliment to my Curly/Three Stooges ramblings. Despite a nagging back pain that has me less than my usual chipper self, I'm hoping to creep down to the Belknap Campus early this afternoon to also get some audio for the show from Coach Jeff Walz and a few players about the upcoming BIG EAST Tournament, random thoughts on the season, the aspect of nuclear war with North Korea and dental hygiene in the 21st. century.

I'd also like to remind you of the CARDINAL COUPLE BIG EAST WOMEN'S TOURNAMENT PICK 'EM going on currently. It's free to enter, a $25 Chili's Gift Card to the winner and great fun and fellowship as you try to pick the 14 games that await us beginning Friday. You can leave your picks in the comments section of this column, e-mail them to cardinalcouple@insightbb.com or call our customer service number and one of our talented chimps will write them down and post them on the "big board" for study, pie-throwing and ridicule.

Sonja smiles, knowing she will win the 'Pick Em'

WE promised staff picks to be presented and although the majority of the staff HAS NOT submitted their picks yet (notorious slackers and underachievers that they are...) Sonja has charged out of the defensive secondary, stole a wicket and charged toward the net with hers.

WE have had a very good response so far for the contest, with 32 entries as of 7:00 a.m. Thursday morning. Even the staff chimps at CARDINAL COUPLE have gotten together an entry and Timmy the Intern is trying to get his smuggled out of a Mexican jail to us. Bill the Goat also came up with an entry, but promptly ate it. Join us, won't you?

--Paulie "Where's the Aleve?" Sykes

SONJA'S SELECTIONS?
HERE THEY ARE!

ROUND 1 : Seton Hall, Marquette, Georgetown
ROUND 2 : St. John's, South Florida, DePaul, Villanova
ROUND 3 : Louisville, Notre Dame, Connecticut, Syracuse
ROUND 4 : Notre Dame, Connecticut
ROUND 5:  Notre Dame

 

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Lacrosse only action on Wednesday

WEDNESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

It’s a quiet day in the ‘Ville.  After a disappointing loss at Syracuse Monday night, the basketball Cards returns home for some rest, classes and practice before heading to Hartford for the Big East Tournament. 

In the meantime, the fields were quiet on Tuesday, too.  Next up for Louisville Women’s Athletics is lacrosse.  Lacrosse hopes to return to their winning ways as they take to the field on Wednesday at 1:00 p.m. at U of L Lacrosse Stadium. 

The Cardinals had a brief encounter with national rankings last week checking in at #20.  After the first loss on the season against Denver, the Cards fell out of the rankings this week, but are still receiving votes.  Denver, the lone loss for the Cards, also unranked, received votes in this week’s poll.

The Cardinals return home to face Vanderbilt.  Vanderbilt is 1-5 on the season with two top 10 losses to Duke and last years Champions, Northwestern.  Vanderbilt leads the series against the Cards, 2-1, with their most recent win over the Cards coming last season in a close match where the Cardinals fell 15-12.

 Looking to redeem that loss, no doubt, the Cardinals will need to put their 6^th ranked defense to work.  The Commodores are ranked 10^th in overall goals and have two senior standouts in attacker Carly Linthicum and goalkeeper Chelsea Pasfield.
 

The two are ranked 2^nd and 1^st, respectively, in their specialty on the field.  Cardinals will have their work cut out for them. 

If you are like me and are working during the match today, you can watch for free online at CardsTV at www.gocards.com.  The game will also be broadcast statewide on WHAS Channel 11.2, Insight 432, or Comcast 207.

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Don't forget to try your luck in the Cardinal Couple BIG EAST WBB Pick 'Em Tournament contest we are having. Entries by Friday noon. $25 Chili's gift card to the winner. You can leave them in a comments section or e-mail them directly to cardinalcouple@insightbb.com Be sure to add your name and a way to contact you if you win.


Former CARDINAL COUPLE columnist David Watson is in. His winners are below

DAY 1.  Seton Hall, Marquette, Providence,
DAY 2.  Seton Hall, USF, Marquette, Villanova
DAY 3.  Seton Hall, Notre Dame. UConn, Villanova
DAY 4.  Notre Dame, Villanova
DAY 5.  Notre Dame.



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Tuesday Cardinal Couple -- Cards WBB falls at Syracuse 68-57

TUESDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

-Cards "siesta" proves deadly in 11 point loss

-BIG EAST Tournament Pairings

-CARDINAL COUPLE BIG EAST Tournament Pick 'Em

Louisville women's basketball team didn't play too badly for 32 minutes against Syracuse Monday night. It was the eight-minute nap that they took offensively that was the downfall in the 68-57 loss to the Orange in Syracuse, NY.

441 fans in attendance for a matchup between two top-25 teams. Disgraceful. They should send Syracuse to the Horizon Conference instead of the ACC in women's hoops...

A Jude Schimmel steal and layup had the Cards ahead 38-37 with 14:56 to go in the game. Louisville didn't score again until a Bria Smith steal made it 53-40 Syracuse with 6:33 to go.

A 16-0 Syracuse run..where the Orange got points from five different players...and set a lead that the Cards couldn't overcome.

Louisville did try to fight back. The Cards responded with a 18-7 run over a 5:30 stretch to climb back with four at 60-56 after a off-balance, falling down Shoni Schimmel three at the 1:07 mark. Syracuse made the best out of their free throws the rest of the way to end the game on a 8-1 run.

The Cards came out hot to start the game, going on a 8-0 run after Brittany Sykes gave the Cuse the early 3-0 lead. Nita Slaughter's second three of the game put UofL ahead 8-3 at the 15:48 mark. Louisville still lead 14-11 after a Sherrone Vails jumper at the 8:51 mark. Syracuse briefly grabbed a 24-23 lead with 2:39 left in the first half...but the Cards got two Shoni threes in the final 1:25 of the first half...the final one with three seconds remaining...to give Louisville a 29-27 lead at the half.

Shoni and Sara Hammond had eight points in the first twenty, Slaughter added six, Jude with five and Sherrone Vails two for the Cards in the first half. Syracuse out-rebounded Louisville 19-17 but had 12 turnovers.

Syracuse started the second half on a 7-2 run and led 34-31 on a Sykes layup...but Jude drilled a three to tie it with 17:25 left. Jude steal and layup gave Louisville their final lead at 38-37.

Then, the rim closed for the Cards.

Shoni led all scorers with 19 points, Jude added 12 and Slaughter and Hammond ended with eight each. Smith and Denies finished with four each and Vails two points. Shelby Harper and Cortnee Walton played but did not score. Monique Reid was available but Coach Walz chose not to use her...feeling the extra rest before the BIG EAST Tournament would do her good.

Louisville lost the rebounding battle 47-34 and Syracuse enjoyed a 18-8 advantage with points-in-the-paint. Freshman Brittany Sykes and senior Kayla Alexander had 16 points each for Quentin Hillsman's Orange.

Bonita Spence...Paulie's favorite referee in the whole wide world...actually didn't do a horrible job...she only missed about a dozen calls instead of her normal 20-25. Harper and Hammond getting creamed by 'thug-girl' Kayla Alexander in the final minute...and the resulting "no calls" were moronic by Spencer. Especially the swinging of the elbows by Alexander at Hammond's face. Control your dogs, Quentin. I hope Alexander dislocates those elbows the next time she tries to get "street" in a game already decided.

Uncalled for and very poor sportsmanship.

With the win, Syracuse gets the #3 seed in the BIG EAST Tournament. Louisville gets #4 and will play next at noon on Sunday against either Cincinnati, Seton Hall or St. John's in the quarterfinals.

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Norte Dame is the #1 seed in the BIG EAST Tournament defeating UConn in three overtimes last night 97-88.

First round match ups on Friday:

Cincy plays Seton Hall
Pitt plays Marquette
Providence plays Georgetown

Second round on Saturday

#5 seed St. John gets the Cincy/Seton Hall winner
Rutgers and DePaul play each other on Saturday
Villanova gets the winner of the Pitt/Marquette game
South Florida gets the Providence/Georgetown winner.

Sunday action

Louisville against Cincy, Seton Hall or St. John's
Notre Dame against Rutgers or DePaul
UConn faces Pitt, Marquette or Villanova
Syracuse draws Georgetown, Providence or South Florida.

The semi finals will be played Monday night and finals Tuesday night at the XL Center in Hartford.

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CARDINAL COUPLE once again proudly presents the BIG EAST Tournament Pick 'Em Contest. At stake, a $25 CHILI'S gift card to the winner! 14 games in all, pick the winner for each and take the prize.

Here's Bill the Goat's bracket as an example.

SETON HALL over Cincy. PITT over Marquette. GEORGETOWN over Providence in first day action.

SETON HALL over St. John's. RUTGERS over DePaul.
VILLANOVA over Pitt . SOUTH FLORIDA over Georgetown in the second day of games.

LOUISVILLE over Seton Hall. NORTE DAME over Rutgers.
CONNECTICUT over Villanova. SOUTH FLORIDA over Syracuse in the quarterfinals.

LOUISVILLE over Notre Dame. CONNECTICUT over South Florida in the semifinals.

LOUISVILLE defeats Connecticut in the finals.

Another way is:

Seton Hall, Pitt, Georgetown
Seton Hall, Rutgers, Villanova, South Florida
Louisville, Notre Dame, Connecticut, South Florida
Louisville, Connecticut
Louisville


14 games played, 14 winners picked. (No one said Bill knows anything about basketball...BTW.)

Send your picks to cardinalcouple@insightbb.com or you can leave them in the comments section of any of the articles this week.

-- Entries close at noon Friday. Be sure to give us a name and e-mail or phone # to contact you by...if you win.

We'll try to find a decent bracket set up and post it Tuesday or Wednesday. Good luck and may the best prognosticator win!

Download the BIG EAST Women's Tournament Bracket at:

www.bigeast.org/wbb

-Paulie





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Monday Cardinal Couple -- Softball fells LSU , Hoops ends regular season tonight

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MONDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

- LeCoq closes door on Tigers

- Syracuse vs. Louisville in WBB tonight


The start was shaky for the #15 Louisville softball team Sunday in the Citrus Classic but the end result successful as the Cards defeat #11 LSU 6-2.

Starter Caralisa Connell was having "one of those afternoons" ...loading the bags with three straight walks in the second inning. A wild pitch made it 2-0 LSU and a fourth base on balls loaded the bases again with two outs.

Exit Connell, enter Rachel LeCoq. End LSU threat with a strike out.

Louisville responded in the top of the third against LSU pitcher Rachelle Fico. Katie Keller singled and reached home on a Alicja Wolny double. Maggie Ruckenbrod's base hit plated Wolny and the Cards had tied the game.

UofL took the lead in the fifth inning, Keller scoring after receiving a base on balls and scoring on a Ruckenbrod fielders' choice.

The Cardinals increased the lead to 5-2 with a couple of runs in the sixth. Hannan Kiyohara singled and scored with two outs on a Jennifer Esteban hit. Esteban got greeted at home as well when Keller delivered a single.

Maggie Ruckenbrod delivered an insurance run in the final inning with a bomber over the left field fence to make it 6-2...her first home run of the season.

LeCoq (7-1) with the clutch relief performance...holding LSU to just three hits and no runs in 5.1 innings. The Cards produced 11 hits total.

"This was a great day for Louisville softball. I thought our team did a tremendous job and really came ready to play. A big key to our win was Rachel LeCoq shutting down LSU. I also thought we had great offense throughout the game." said Sandy Pearsall after the triumph.

Jordan Trimble has been sick and did not play. Jasmine Smithson-Willett has been battling a stress fracture but saw limited action. Hoping two of my favorite players on the team can get back to full time participation soon.

Louisville returns to Ulmer Stadium for the Red and Black Classic March 8-10. A good group of opponents coming in to play...Michigan, Miami (OH), Austin Peay and Illinois State.

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After a triple overtime loss Saturday to Villanova, no one could blame the Syracuse women's basketball team for looking for a little redemption tonight against Louisville. Although an NCAA bid appears to be a certain thing for the #22 Orange, who are 22-6 overall and 10-5 in the BIG EAST, the chance for a "double bye" in the upcoming BIG EAST Tournament hinges on a win over Louisville tonight.

Quentin Hillsman isn't a confident man.

" I worry about it every day. I'd be worried if we beat Villanova because we've been on both ends. We're not in that room with that little S-curve thing they talk about...Hopefully we come out Monday and have some legs left after this and win this Louisville game."

The Orange have an RPI of 46 and could fall no further than 6th with a loss to Louisville. The prevailing sentiment is that the NCAA will take eight BIG EAST teams...
(Connecticut, Notre Dame, Louisville, St. John's, Syracuse, South Florida, DePaul and Villanova.)...but a 'Cuse win would guarantee a nicer seeding...since SU has lost their last three games.

Louisville is guaranteed a top four finish and double bye in the BIG EAST Tournament regardless of how they do...they own the tie-breaker over St. John's if they end up at 11-5 in conference each.

The players that the Cards have to worry about? It begins in the paint with Kayla Alexander, the 6'5" do-it-all center. She and forward Carmen Tyson-Thomas had 22 points and 11 rebounds each against 'Nova Saturday.

Head Coach Quentin Hillsman will be active on the
sidelines tonight.

Guards Brittany Sykes and LaShay Taft are big-time ballers that will challenge the Cards. Elashier Hall a talented player who scores well in the 'Cuse offensive set. Rachel Coffey a great shooter who is also tough defensively.

Louisville has their work cut out for them. The Cards will need to go toe-to-toe with the aggressive, physical, chip-on-their-shoulder Orange and if Louisville can get the three-ball working (Laura Sweeney from Villanova blasted the 'Cuse from the deep Saturday) the Cards chances for success go up dramatically.

Game time 9 p.m. on the CBSSN network.

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Sunday Cardinal Couple - Softball takes two. Lacrosse takes a loss

SUNDAY CARDINAL COUPLE

-Softball downs Longwood, Ga Tech in Citrus.

-Lacrosse falls in Mile High City

-UofL women's swimmer "three peat"

-With a little help, WBB earns double bye


#15 Cardinal softball won both outings Saturday in the Citrus Classic in chilly Orlando...breaking Longwood 9-1 and stinging the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets 6-3 on ESPN 3.

LOUISVILLE 9 - LONGWOOD 1

Six innings was all it took to win the first game on Saturday, Louisville getting a strong pitching performance from Rachel Le Coq and the Cards bats producing 11 hits.

Longwood took the early lead 1-0 after one inning but Louisville responded with two runs in the second frame. Maggie Ruckenbrod singled and scored on Hannah Kiyohara's three-bagger. Kiyohara got greeted at home when Chrisanna Roberts singled. Roberts has been playing center field a lot lately...not sure what's going on with Jordan Trimble, but we do have a call in to Louisville Softball Sports Information.

The Cards made in 6-0 in the fifth. Kayla Soles' double brought home Katie Keller and Jennifer Esteban and Ruckenbrod doubled later in the inning to score Soles and Alicja Wolny.

The Cards added the final three runs in the sixth. Esteban drilled a double that got Kiyohara and Keller back to the dugout and Esteban made it 9-1 when she scored on a Longwood error.

LeCoq gave up just one run on five hits, Caralisa Connell pitched the final 1.2 innings for the Cards allowing just one hit and fanning three.

LOUISVILLE 6 - GEORGIA TECH 3

UofL got a huge performance from Alicja Wolny in the battle against the Yellow Jackets with two home runs and Whitney Arion added a third round-tripper. Carl Connell went the distance in the circle for Sandy Pearsall and the Cards improved to 15-3 on the season with the win over the future ACC opponent.

Louisville used four hits in the first inning to sprint out to a 3-0 advantage. Keller scored after doubling and Esteban reached the plate on a Ruckenbrod single. Soles put the Cards up by three...scoring on an Arion single.

The Cards went up 4-1 when Arion took one out over the right-center field barrier. Wolny increased the Cardinal advantage to 5-1 with her first homer in the top of the fifth to right field and she made it 6-2 in the top of the seventh with her second "touch 'em all"...a massive blast over the center field fence.

Connell (9-2) gave up three runs, on seven hits and stuck out nine G.T. batters.

Louisville ends their stay in Mouseville with a matinee versus LSU today.

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Four goals each from Nikki Boltja and Katie Oliverio went enough Saturday in the Peter Barton Lacrosse Stadium in Denver, Colorado...Louisville Lacrosse losing for the first time this season....as the Denver Pioneers take a 19-13 win.

Defense not as efficient as in the first three games of the year for Coach Young...and the Cards had 13 first half turnovers...trailing 8-5 at the intermission. Denver scored the first three goals of the match and got a score with just 26 seconds remaining to go up by three.

After three straight Pioneer scores to start the final half , the Cards rallied to cut the lead to 11-8, Nikki Boltja leading the charge with two goals. Denver responded with their own run, though, and pushed their advantage to 15-8. Louisville did outscore the Pioneers 5-4 the rest of the way...but it wasn't enough to produce a win.

Lacrosse returns home for a Wednesday, March 6th draw against Vanderbilt. Game time is 1 p.m.

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Congratulations to the Louisville women's swimming and diving squad, who captured their third straight BIG EAST Conference title in Indianapolis yesterday...defeating Notre Dame and the eight other BIG EAST schools involved in the swimming championships.

Coming up big for Louisville was Kelsi Worrell, who won the 100-free...barely defeating teammate Breann McDowell. The Cards also won the 400-free relay with Worrell, McDowell, Krissie Brandenburg and Grite Apanaviciute combining to set a new BIG EAST record in the process.

Hannan Gadd came in second in women's platform diving for Louisville.

Great job, splashers! Best of luck in the NCAA...

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Louisville WBB got some huge help Saturday from Villanova and Seton Hall...the VU Wildcats knocking off Syracuse in three overtimes 77-75 and SHU downing St. John's 61-50.

What it means is that the Cards are assured of a double bye in the BIG EAST Conference, regardless of the outcome Monday night in Syracuse between the Orange and the Ville.

A win against the Quentin Hillsman coached Syracuse team would keep Louisville in third place in the final conference regular season standings. A loss would drop them into a tie with Syracuse for third but they would still own the tie-breaker of St. John, if the Red Storm wins Monday.

A little pressure off now, the Cards can go up to the Dome and take care of business against the tough 'Cuse team. We'll preview it tomorrow here at the 'Couple!

WE discussed how impressed we were with the Seton Hall bunch after their appearance here Wednesday during our CARDINAL COUPLE Radio Show on Saturday. They were probably listening and went out and proved us right yesterday. Pirates rock, anyway and I'm having Jenny and Jeff wear eye-patches and say 'ARRRGGGGHHHH!!!" a lot on this upcoming Saturday's broadcast.
 
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Finally, thanks to Jenny O'Bryan and Jeff McAdams for co-hosting the inaugrual broadcast of The Cardinal Couple Hour on Crescent Hill Radio Saturday with me.

WE had a fun time, didn't mess up too much on 'live radio' and discussed a lot of Louisville women's athletic topics.

Miss it, did you? Not to worry, the broadcast is hanging out up there somewhere on a sound cloud and you can find it at:

http://www.crescenthillradio.com


Just go to the site and click on the ARCHIVES link. We're there waiting for you.

Paulie

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Saturday Cardinal Couple -- Softball goes 1-1 in Orlando

SATURDAY CARDINAL COUPLE


- Softball falls 2-0 to Texas, defeats Temple 8-0

- Lacrosse with a Rocky Mountain "High" in Denver

-Women's swimming/diving #1 after Day 3 of Big East Tournament

-CARDINAL COUPLE on the air.


The softball Cards got the bats rolling against Temple but ran into a strong pitching performance from Texas' Blaire Luna in Day 1 of the 2013 Citrus Classic in Orlando, FL. Friday.

TEXAS 2 - CARDS 0

Scoreless after two innings, the Longhorns strung together three singles in the third to go up 1-0 on Louisville. They added a run in the fifth on a two-out walk and Louisville fielding error.

Luna held the Cards bat at bay...keeping them hitless until seventh inning. Katie Keller smashed a two-out double and Alicja Wolny reached first on a hit-by-pitch to give the Cards a shot in the inning but Luna got her 13th strike out of the day to end the rally and the game.

Caralisa Connell took the loss (8-2) two runs, one earned and seven hits allowed.

CARDS 8 - Temple 0

Louisville struck early in the second game of the day for them with two runs in the first inning. Keller singled and scored on Alicja Wolny's double (she didn't get hit by a pitch!). Wolny made it home on a Hannah Kiyohara single.

The Cards added three more runs in the fourth. Singles by Jennifer Esteban, Keller and Katelyn Mann scored Esteban and a error got Keller to the plate. Taner Fowler's base hit sent Mann home to make it 5-0 UofL.

UofL added three runs in the fifth to end the game. Kiyohara led off with a single, Whitney Arion walked and Chrisanna Roberts got hit by a pitch to load the bases full of Cards. Kiyohara scored when Keller got hit by a pitch (stop the violence!) Mann singled home Arion and a based-loaded walk to Wolny forced home Roberts (although she probably went willingly) to make it 8-0 and end the game.

Rachel LeCoq with the win (5-1) allowing four hits.

Cards get Ga. Tech tomorrow on ESPN3 at 12:15 p.m. Tune it in after listening to CARDINAL COUPLE from 11-noon on CRESCENT HILL RADIO 

It'll be their second game of the day...they start Saturday versus Longwood University.

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Lacrosse is on their first road trip of the season, the LAX crew in Denver to play the Nuggets...oops, scratch that...the Pioneers of the University of Denver. First meeting between the two schools, Denver is 2-1 on the season, Louisville 3-0 and in the top 20 at 20 in the WLA rankings.

Louisville has outscored their opponents by an average of +9.67 a game in their three wins and Nikki Boltja leads the team with 11 goals.

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Louisville women's swimming and diving in first place after Day 3 of the BIG EAST Tournament...a narrow lead over Notre Dame. Cards the defending BIG EAST Tournament champs.

More info at www.gocards.com

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Finally, tomorrow morning is the first broadcast of the Cardinal Couple Radio show...11 a.m. to noon E.S.T. on Crescent Hill Radio.

You can listen on line at www.crescenthillradio.com . Click the link to listen on the left hand side of the site.

We'll cover ladies hoops, softball, lacrosse and have a live human sacrifice at 11:37...just kidding about the sacrifice!

Staff communists columnists Jenny O'Bryan and Jeff McAdams are slated to appear with Paulie and we expect it to be a great time!

Join us, won't you?

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