Gameday for WBB
OK, let's get right into it...
UConn.
UofL.
Albany, New York.
Noon.
ESPN.
It's the Elite 8 round, and the Cards and Huskies are playing for a Final Four berth. This isn't news to anyone that's a regular here at Cardinal Couple, of course.
Walz's squad beat UConn for the first time in his tenure earlier in the regular season. That win, along with their loss before that to Baylor, established that this is a beatable UConn team. Let's be very clear, though, that they, of course, are still a very good team, one of the best in the NCAA. The change that is happening in women's basketball is that they are no longer clearly THE best, merely among the best. Notre Dame, Baylor, UConn, UofL, Mississippi State...and probably a few more, if you're in a generous mood, can all be classified into that grouping.
Have the rest improved? Or has UConn not kept up it's previous level of excellence?
Yes. Frankly both of these things have been a trend. UConn isn't the same quality team that they used to be...the mediocrity of the AAC, has taken its toll on the Huskies recruiting, I suspect. That's unfortunate for UConn, but it is the state of things.
On the other side of the equation, let's look at the UofL squads from 2013 and today. Shoni Schimmel? Unquestionably a spectacular player, an offensive juggernaut, and dropped some spectacular dimes. I'll take Asia Durr, though and sacrifice some of the flash, but none of the potency, and add in excellent defense. What about bigs and power forwards? Sheronne Vails, Cortnee Walton, and Sara Hammond? All excellent players, but if you line the 2013 versions of them up against Sam Fuerhing, Biona Dunham, and Kylee Shook? I'll put my money on the 2019 edition.
Women's basketball is growing and getting better year after year...sometimes it's good to stop and take a look back. We honor the past players who helped grow the game, and the Louisville program, and set it on a trajectory for current success, and I think most of them, if they took a good hard look at it, would acknowledge that today's players are better than they were then. I suspect most of them would be happy for that fact as well. (Now, if we can just get the officiating to measure up to the level of the play, we'd be in even better shape.)
So the matchup today. You know the characters: Geno Auriemma, with Chris Daily ever at his side. The marquee players for UConn: Crystal Dangerfield, Napheesa Collier, and Katie Lou Samuelson. We even know the TV folks that'll be covering it and their tendencies: Adam Amin, Kara Lawson, Rebecca Lobo, and Holly Rowe. The crowd will be a predominantly UConn crowd, because you know, heaven forbid the NCAA make UConn ever travel any more than the absolute minimum.
We'll know the outcome in a few hours. Will the Cards or the Huskies be Tampa bound? Either way, a very worthy team will be ending their season today.
Softball
Despite the focus on March Madness, there are other women's sporting events going on for UofL. Softball is tied in their series against #19/20/24 Virginia Tech. As Case covered yesterday, they did take the game Friday with a 2-run late inning triple by Celene Funke. The tables turned yesterday, however, with Virginia Tech getting the run-rule victory after 4 1/2 innings, 10-1. The sole run for the Cards was a solo home run shot to left by Kyra Snyder.
Which way does this one go? We'll find out today at 1pm. As with most ACC matchups, you can catch this one on the ACC Network Extra on ESPNs streaming platform.
Where's Jared?
We make light of Jared seemingly being in multiple places at once as he gets some of the great pictures that you see here on Cardinal Couple. We're glad he's a part of what we do. I believe his plans for today are to catch some of Women's Tennis Senior Day celebrations and play. They'll be honoring Aleksandra "Ola" Mally, and Sena Suswam before their matchup with Boston College at 10am.
After that, will he head over to charge up on some TeeterPower at the Louisville Lacrosse Stadium? Perhaps. With Delaware coming to play, the Cards will have a tough non-conference matchup to continue to build their skills. They get started at noon and can also be watched on the ACC Network Extra.
Cardinal Couple Radio Hour
Another full house at the magnificent WCHQ studios on Mellwood. Paulie, Case, Jared, Daryl, and myself, along with a fathead of Jeff Walz's head, were all on the air yesterday.
Obviously we dove into the basketball topic rather heavily, but we also shared a bit about the Volleyball spring match against Kentucky, Softball's successful Friday effort at Virginia Tech, and I got to love on a dog as Pumpkin made a late appearance in the studio as well.
As usual, we had fun and we hope you did, too. The Facebook Live stream is available at:
https://ift.tt/2TQCDsQ
Next week, I'll certainly not be in studio as I plan to check out more volleyball spring play, this time in the morning at OVVC for the KIVA Collegiate Showcase (I think that's the name they give this event every year). Meanwhile, hopefully Paulie and Daryl will be in Tampa covering women's basketball. There will be a show as Monk, and probably Pumpkin again, will be there for the engineering duties, and Case and Jared have committed to being there to carry on without us. There may be phone calls for those of us not in studio. Tune in to find out.
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JMcA
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