feb. 16 issue: louisville sports report

VOLUME XVI • NUMBER 26FEBRUARY 16, 2012

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E D I T O R I A L S T A F F

GENERAL MANAGER - Jack Coffee

SENIOR WRITER AND EDITOR - Russ Brown

OPERATIONS MANAGER - Howie Lindsey

ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES - Mickey Clark, Betty Olsen and Blanche Kitchen

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS - Gail Kamenish, Dave Klotz, Shelley Feller,

Howie Lindsey and Chuck Feist

CONTRIBUTING COLUMNISTS - Matt Willinger, Jeff Wafford,

Jason Puckett and Rick Cushing

GRAPHIC DESIGNER - Scott Stortz

COPY EDITOR - Rick Cushing

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VOLUME XVI, NUMBER 26 • FEBRUARY 16, 2012

CSPACOLLEGESPORTS

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COVER PHOTO BY GAIL KAMENISH

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WHAT ’S INSIDE :

6 LOUISVILLE BASKETBALL: BY THE NUMBERS By Howie Lindsey6 WEST VIRGINIA, SYRACUSE BOX SCORES8 CARDS HAVE MESSAGE BOARDS SINGING A HAPPY TUNE By Jack Coffee9 BREAKING DOWN THE BLUE DEMONS By Rick Cushing10 THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY By Howie Lindsey12 NEW COACH LOOKING FORWARD TO RECRUITING By Howie Lindsey14, 24 CARDINAL KIDS PHOTO GALLERY

15 LOCAL GRID PROSPECTS IN EARLY RANKINGS By Jeff Wafford16 BIG EAST FOOTBALL STANDINGS By Rick Cushing16 A TRIBUTE TO BERNARD TRAGER By Howie Lindsey18 SPRING SPORTS SCHEDULES AND RESULTS20 MEN’S AND WOMEN’S BASKETBALL SCHEDULES21 COMEBACK NOT ENOUGH VS. NO. 3 UCONN By Howie Lindsey22 CARDINAL STARS OF THE WEEK By Howie Lindsey

13 PLAY FASTER! PLAY FASTER!New offensive coordinator Shawn Watson wants to see Louisville play at a faster tempo for the 2012 season. “What I like to do is play to our talent, and we have a unique skill set here at quarterback,” Watson said.

5 ‘CRUSHED’ CARDS LOOK TO FUTURELouisville fought to the fi nal seconds during a 52-51 loss to No. 2 Syracuse Monday night, but coach Rick Pitino wasn’t happy: “There are no moral victories. We’re crushed with this loss, absolutely crushed.” The Cardinals hit the road next.

19 BURKE’S BIG GAMESenior shooter Becky Burke had been in a slump, missing nine of her last 10 three-point shots going into Saturday’s game against Syracuse. She broke out of her slump in a big way, setting a school record with eight threes.

17 NO EXCUSES FOR BOUNCE-BACK CARDSAfter a disappointing 2011 season that saw Louisville play a number of freshmen and go 32-29, coach Dan McDonnell is looking to get back to Louisville’s winning ways. “We have defi nitely grown up,” senior pitcher Derek Self said.

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7 BLACKSHEAR COULD HAVE BIG IMPACTFreshman Wayne Blackshear scored 13 points, hitting 3 of 5 threes in his debut at West Virginia Saturday. “I was always going to play him, I just didn’t want (Coach Huggins) to prepare for him,” Pitino said.

4 SOFTBALL OFF TO RIP-ROARIN’ STARTWith the help of three wins and a school record for strikeouts by senior Tori Collins, Louisville softball got off to a hot start, winning all fi ve games it played at the Florida International Combat Classic last weekend.

It was White Out Night as the Cardinals played No. 2 Syracuse Monday night. - photo by Howie Lindsey


LOUISVILLE SOFTBALL

By Rick CushingA young University of Louisville softball

team traveled to Miami, Fla., to start its sea-son in the Florida International Combat Clas-sic last weekend. The No. 24 Cards played fi ve games and won them all, capped by a 2-0 victory over Massachusetts on Sunday in which senior Tori Collins pitched a three-hitter and struck out a career-high 13.

The Cards mustered just fi ve hits off UM-ass ace Sara Plourde, but they bunched three of those hits in the top of the sixth inning to snap a scoreless tie. Junior Jennifer Esteban sent a fl y ball into shallow center fi eld that fell in for a one-out double. One out later, sophomore Jordan Trimble stroked an RBI single, and she scored on a double by sopho-more Taner Fowler to make it 2-0.

UMass threatened in the seventh, putting runners on fi rst and second with one out when the game ended because of a two-hour “drop” time that had been established for the Sunday games due to travel arrange-ments.

Collins improved to 3-0, and Esteban was 2 for 3 with two doubles. Plourde (2-2), who fanned 12 and retired 13 straight batters in one stretch, took the loss for UMass (3-2).

“I was really pleased with our fi rst week-end,” said coach Sandy Pearsall. “We played well offensively and showed a lot of power. Our pitchers also gave us some very good in-nings. Tori Collins had a great weekend. The team played through a little bit of adversity and handled that well. I’m really proud of them and hopefully we can take this mo-mentum into a tough tournament at East Carolina next weekend.”

CARDS WIN TWO ON FRIDAYUofL started the Combat Classic on Friday

with a 4-1 victory over Michigan State in a game that featured a lightning delay. Collins struck out nine and Fowler went 3 for 3 with a home run.

The Cards jumped to a 1-0 lead in the bot-tom of the fi rst when Esteban led off with a bunt single and stole second. Sophomore Katie Keller’s fl yout sent her to third, and she scored on Trimble’s groundout.

After a 30-minute lightning delay, the Spartans tied it in the third on two singles sandwiched around a sacrifi ce bunt.

Fowler’s two-out, two-run home run gave the Cards a 3-1 lead in the fourth. Freshman Kayla Soles reached on a fi elder’s choice to set up Fowler’s shot over the left fi eld fence.

The Cards extended their lead to 4-1 in the fi fth when Trimble drew a one-out walk, took second on an infi eld single by junior Al-icja Wolny, moved to third on a wild pitch and scored on a sacrifi ce fl y by sophomore Maggie Ruckenbrod.

Collins worked a complete game six-hitter. The Cards tallied eight hits, with Wolny go-ing 2 for 3.

CARDS BEAT ILLINOIS 8-3The Cards thumped Illinois 8-3 in the sec-

ond game Friday night as Collins got her sec-ond victory of the day with 2 1/3 innings of one-hit relief. Fowler and Ruckenbrod hom-ered.

Illinois scored a run in the fi rst, but the Cards answered in the top of the second when Ruckenbrod drew a leadoff walk and Fowler followed with a two-run shot over the left fi eld wall.

Louisville added to the lead in the fourth

when sophomore Hannah Kiyohara connect-ed on a two-out single and scored on senior Kristin Austin’s triple down the left fi eld line. The Fighting Illini tied it at 3 in the fi fth on a bunt single, four walks and a wild pitch. At that point Collins relieved sophomore Caralisa Connell with the bases loaded and recorded the third out.

The Cards exploded for fi ve runs in the sixth. They quickly regained the lead when junior Katelyn Mann smacked a leadoff triple to right fi eld and came home on an error to make it 4-3. Austin was safe on an infi eld single and moved to second when Esteban reached on an error. Trimble’s RBI single plat-ed Austin, and Ruckenbrod followed with a three-run shot over the fence in left center to make it 8-3.

Sophomore Chelsea Leonard started for UofL and worked three innings, allowing one run and two hits. Connell allowed two hits and two runs with four walks and the wild pitch in 1 2/3 innings. Collins allowed one hit and fanned three. Austin, Fowler and Ki-yohara each had two hits as the Cards had nine in all.

CARDS PREVAIL IN A SQUEAKERRuckenbrod blasted two home runs and

Mann registered her fi rst career homer as UofL edged UAB 5-4 Saturday morning. Leonard (1-0) picked up the win, holding the Blazers scoreless and striking out two in 2 1/3 innings of relief.

The Blazers scored two runs in the top of the fi rst, but the Cards tied it in the bottom of the second on a single by Fowler and two-run homer by Mann, then took a 3-2 lead in the third on Ruckenbrod’s two-out solo shot to straightaway center.

The Blazers regained the lead with two runs in the fi fth, but Leonard came on with the bases loaded and recorded a strikeout to put out the fi re.

Louisville jumped right back on top on Ruckenbrod’s two-run homer in the home half of the fi fth. Keller led off the inning with a single, and one out later Ruckenbrod hom-ered over the left fi eld fence for her second home run of the day and third of the sea-son.

Ruckenbrod was 2 for 3 with two homers, three RBIs and two runs, and Fowler was 2 for 3 with a run.

LOUISVILLE BEATS FIUConnell made up for her poor outing on

Friday, allowing two runs and two hits while striking out fi ve in 5 1/3 innings as the Cards beat host Florida International 4-2 Saturday night.

The Cards scored a run in the fi rst on an RBI single by Trimble, then added two runs in the second. Freshman Whitney Arion and Kiyohara delivered back-to-back doubles to make it 2-0, and Trimble’s RBI single made it 3-0.

The Golden Panthers scored single runs in the second and third to close within 3-2, but the Cardinals added an insurance run in the sixth on Austin’s RBI single to make it 4-2.

Kiyohara was 2 for 3 with a run and an RBI, Austin was 2 for 3 with an RBI, and Este-ban and Trimble each went 2 for 4.

EAST CAROLINA TOURNEY UP NEXTUofL (5-0) will travel to Greenville, N.C,.

for the East Carolina Pirate Clash Friday through Sunday.

PEARSALL’S CARDS OFF TO A RIP-ROARIN’ STARTSenior Tori Collins was named Big East Pitcher of the Week Monday after she won three games over the weekend with a 1.72 ERA. She worked two complete games, including a three-hit shutout with a career-high 13 strikeouts in a 2-0 victory over Massachusetts on Sunday, capping UofL’s 5-0 start to the season. In 20 1/3 innings she allowed fi ve runs and 15 hits with 30 strikeouts. “Tori Collins had a great weekend,” said coach Sandy Pearsall.- photo by Howie Lindsey

NO NAME HT POS B/T CL HOMETOWN/PREVIOUS SCHOOL

1 Tesha Paysen 5-3 OF R/R SR Hodgenville, Ky./LaRue County

3 Jordan Trimble 5-3 UT/RHP R/R R-SO Louisville, Ky./DuPont Manual

4 Jennifer Esteban 5-1 OF L/R JR Brea, Calif./Olinda

6 Alicja Wolny 5-9 1B L/L JR El Dorado Hills, Calif./Oak Ridge

7 Katelyn Mann 5-3 3B R/R JR Rancho Cucamonga, Calif./Los Osos

8 Maggie Ruckenbrod 5-7 C R/R SO St. Louis, Mo./Oakville

10 Chelsea Leonard 5-8 RHP L/R R-SO Lexington, N.C./Central Davidson

11 Taner Fowler 5-5 C/1B/3B R/R SO Morganfi eld, Ky./Union County

12 Kristin Austin 5-5 OF L/R SR Hartsburg, Mo./Southern Boone Co.

13 Caralisa Connell 5-8 RHP R/R SO Murfreesboro, Tenn./Siegel

14 Kayla Soles 5-4 INF R/R FR New Egypt, N.J./New Egypt

17 Kirsten Straley 5-3 OF L/R FR Hebron, Ky./Conner

19 Trista Cox 5-6 UT R/R FR Indianapolis, Ind./Roncalli

20 Whitney Arion 5-3 SS/3B/OF R/R FR Delphi, Ind./Delphi

21 Chrisanna Roberts 5-1 OF R/R JR Louisville, Ky./Presentation

22 Katie Keller 5-2 2B R/R SO Livermore, Calif./Livermore

23 Chelsea Jordan 5-6 OF L/R JR New Albany, Ind./New Albany

24 Hannah Kiyohara 5-6 INF/OF R/R SO Auburn, Wash./Thomas Jefferson

25 Tori Collins 5-10 LHP L/L SR Lafayette, Ind./McCutcheon

2 0 1 2 S O F T B A L L R O S T E R


RECRUITING NOTEBOOK10 AMAZING AND MEMORABLE MOMENTS OF THE 2009-2010 SEASONLOUISVILLE BASKETBALL

By Russ BrownLouisville’s basketball players head for

the Windy City this weekend trying to put perhaps their most disappointing loss of the season behind them and focus on fi nishing strong and earning a double bye in the Big East Conference Tournament.

Five regular-season games remain, start-ing with a trip to DePaul (11-13, 2-10) Sat-urday as the No. 19/18 Cardinals (20-6, 8-5) try to repeat a 76-59 victory on Jan. 14 in the KFC Yum! Center.

UofL will have to wait a while longer to get another chance for its fi rst victory over a team in the upper echelon of the Big East and its fi rst win against a current member of the top 25 after letting an opportunity slip away Monday night.

The Cards surged from an eight-point defi cit into a fi ve-point lead in the fi nal min-utes but couldn’t close the deal and fell to No. 2 Syracuse 52-51 in front of 22,738 homecourt fans. The Orange improved to 26-1, 13-1.

This is one the players feel defi nitely got away.

“No moral victory here,” senior guard Chris Smith said. “We should have won the game. Point blank. People did not have the right focus at the free-throw line, and our shots weren’t falling. We can be as good as anyone on a given day. We have to re-group and bounce back strong. Tomorrow is a new day.”

UofL saw two streaks come to an end -- its overall six-game winning streak and its seven-game ownership of Syracuse.

Junior point guard Peyton Siva said the Cards blew a chance to make a statement

with a win over a quality team.“Defi nitely,” he said. “We tried, we just

came up a point short, but we play them again. This was a tough one. We’ve got to continue to go. We’ve got a lot more games left. We’ve got to continue to try and make a run and get on a winning streak. We did it before, we can do it again.”

The loss knocked UofL into sixth place in the conference, two games in the loss col-umn out of second. After DePaul, the Cards will travel to Cincinnati (16-8, 6-5) Feb. 23, then host Pittsburgh (15-11, 4-9) and South Florida (15-10, 8-4) before ending the regu-lar season with a rematch against Syracuse on March 3 in the Carrier Dome.

“It was a defensive battle, and they came up with the plays at the end,” UofL coach Rick Pitino said. “There are no moral victo-ries. We are crushed with this loss, absolutely crushed. We didn’t get the job done when we should have. The only thing that will erase this loss is to beat them up there.

“Both teams were struggling with the other team’s defense, and we made some really bad mental plays and took ourselves out of dribble penetration. We have handled their zone really well the past couple of years because we had multiple guys dribble pen-etrate. Tonight we only had one able to do it, and then he took himself out of the game.”

Pitino was referring to Siva, who scored eight of Louisville’s fi rst 13 points and also had an assist but picked up his second and third fouls within 24 seconds, went to the bench at the 6:51 mark of the fi rst half and didn’t return until 13:33 was left in the game.

He didn’t score again.“They were dumb fouls. Stupid,” Siva said

disgustedly.Freshman forward Chane Behanan, whose

ferocious rebounding sparked UofL’s late rally, certainly didn’t use the term “moral victory,” but he did say the Cards can take heart from the fact that they went toe-to-toe with the No. 1 RPI team in the country and had them on the ropes before letting it slip away.

“You give your all and you lose, it hurts, especially a close one,” said Behanan, who fi nished with 16 points, nine rebounds and two steals. “I just feel so sorry because we worked so hard. We had them, yes, we had them and should have beat them. But it’s basketball. Look at the Lakers, they’ve got a good team and they’re losing like crazy. It’s what happens.

“You’ve got to come out, compete, have fun. We can look back on this game and see how capable we are because we just matched up with the No. 2 team in the country and took them to the wire.

“Knowing that’s the No. 2 team in the country, they’ve got a lot of pros ... we’ve just got to look toward the future.”

It was an ugly game that could be looked at in two different ways -- either two teams

that were offensively challenged or two clubs playing tenacious 2-3 zone defenses. Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim chose the latter option.

“You can either give the defenses credit or say it was a bad offensive game,” he said. “We’re going to look on the bright side and say it was good defense.”

Well, maybe. But he might get an argu-ment from those who had to sit through numerous clanked shots and UofL’s crooked free-throw shooting.

Syracuse missed 14 of its 15 three-point shots and shot just 34.4 percent overall, while the Cards shot 34.7 percent and hit just 12 of 21 free throws (57.1 percent). Two other areas stand out when analyzing the loss -- the Orange outscored UofL 38-24 in the paint, and their bench overwhelmed the Cards’ subs 26-5.

But it was the poor free-throw shooting that irked Pitino the most.

“What it comes down to, it is very simple: We didn’t make free throws,” he said. “That is what is so bothersome to me. Not that we didn’t lose to a good basketball team, but shooting 12 for 21 with the amount of time we spend on it is inexcusable.”

Said Siva: “I don’t know.... I know every-

body on this team can make free throws, butthat’s what beat us tonight.”

Siva was one of the main transgressors, making just 1 of 4 free throws.

The Cards’ offensive problems were mag-nifi ed at the end when they failed to score ontheir last fi ve possessions. Their fi nal pointscame on a tip-in by Behanan with 3:38 re-maining, giving them a 51-46 lead and send-ing the crowd into a frenzy.

They could sense the upset and the con-tinuation of Pitino’s rule over Boeheim. ButUofL’s last fi ve possessions went like this:missed layup, missed three-point shot, turn-over, missed layup, turnover.

Syracuse wasn’t much better. Its decisive points turned out to be a Fab Melo basketunderneath with 2:11 left for the fi nal score.

“I thought we showed great perserver-ance when they came back and took thelead,” Boeheim said. “This is a tough placeto play, and you lose a lead like that and godown fi ve at that stage -- it’s very tough. Itcame down to us just making a couple ofplays at the end.”

ORANGE SMOTHERS KURICUnlike past games when Kyle Kuric has

burned Syracuse’s zone, the Orange con-tained the Cards’ leading scorer this time.Kuric hit just 1 of 8 shots, the one a three-pointer early in the second half, and didn’tget to the free-throw line. His three pointswere a season low and 10 points below hisaverage. Kuric had scored a game-high 23points in last year’s 73-69 victory over the Or-ange and, of course, everyone remembers his22-point outburst in the fi nal game in Free-dom Hall when the Cards beat then-No. 1Syracuse 78-68.

“We were going to play Kuric the whole game,” Boeheim said. “He’s averaging about30 against us for his career. He’s not all-BigEast against us, he’s All-American.”

Not this time.THIN LINE BETWEEN WINS, LOSSESSyracuse has now won three of its last

fi ve games by three points or less, one inovertime, and Boeheim had some interest-ing thoughts on what could happen to histeam and other top-10 clubs during MarchMadness.

“We’ve had tough games, and that will help us,” he said. “The problem I see incollege basketball is, you’re going to get inthese kinds of games in the tournament -- Idon’t care who you are -- and you’ve got tobe ready to be able to make those plays atthe end of the game. If Louisville makes oneplay at the end, we lose. In the tournament,you go home.

“That’s college basketball, and it’s going to be a play or two one way or another that’sgoing to keep you going or not. There’s al-most no way anymore that teams are goingto be able to get through this tournament,maybe a game or two at the most, withoutbeing tested. You could have fi ve of thesegames in a row and win all fi ve, and the sixthgame you could have the same game andyou lose.

“It’s interesting to watch college basket-ball. I don’t have much of a life; I watch allthese games. Last year it was clear, there wasno doubt in my mind that Kansas and OhioState were the two best teams in the country,and neither got to the Final Four.”

‘CRUSHED’ CARDS LOOK TO FUTURE AFTER LOSS TO ‘CUSE

Syracuse’s defense keyed on stoppping Kyle Kuric, and it worked. The Orange held Kuric to 1-of-8 shooting for just three points. He had seven rebounds, and a turnover in 35 minutes. - photo by Gail Kamenish

B A C K - T O - B A C K R O A D G A M E S N E X T A T D E P A U L , C I N C I N N A T I


LOUISVILLE BASKETBALL

20 Louisville freshman Wayne Black-shear turned 20 Saturday. His birthday present? Playing for the

fi rst time this season and playing for 20 minutes. He scored 13 points, hitting 5 of 9 shots, includ-ing 3 of 5 from three-point range, grabbed four rebounds and had Louisville fans buzzing.

25 Blackshear, No. 25 in your pro-grams (No. 1 in some fans’ hearts), joined the UofL lineup

in the Cardinals’ 25th game. Odd coincidence, right? The McDonald’s All-American from Chicago beat out UK’s Anthony Davis for Illinois Mr. Bas-ketball last year but had been sidelined by two shoulder surgeries.

22 Louisville capitalized big time on West Virginia turnovers Satur-day. Typically, coaches set a goal

of matching their opponent’s number of turnovers with their own points off turnovers. The Cardinals scored 22 points off 11 Mountaineers turnovers Saturday, exactly doubling most coaches’ goal.

12,375 There were 1 2 , 3 7 5 fans at the

UofL women’s basketball game Saturday at the KFC Yum! Center. That is 1,121 more fans than attended the Louisville-West Virginia game in Morgantown Saturday. The Mountaineers drew just 11,254 to their 14,000-seat arena for the

game (which was a sellout, but snowy weather conditions held the crowd down). The Louisville women are out-drawing WVU’s men for the sea-son as well, 10,473 to 9,902.

18 Louisville and Syracuse met for the 18th time Monday night. The Car-dinals held a 13-4 advantage in

the series coming into Monday night’s game and had won the last seven meetings, including 73-69 last season. The Cardinals beat then-No. 1 Syracuse in the fi nal game at Freedom Hall in 2010 and also beat the Orange in the 2009 Big East Tournament title game in Madison Square Garden.

9.4 Louisville averages 9.4 steals per game, which is second-best in the Big East and fi fth

in the nation. And when Louisville’s opponent’s don’t get the ball stolen, they are averaging just 37.2 percent shooting. Prior to Monday night’s game, UofL held seven of its previous 12 oppo-nents under 40 percent shooting, including hold-ing UConn to 35.1 percent accuracy last Monday.

20 With the win over West Virginia Saturday, Louisville secured its 20th win of the season. The

Cardinals have won at least 20 games for 10 straight seasons under coach Rick Pitino. He is sixth among active coaches with 20 20-win sea-sons, 15th all time.

BY THE NUMBERS

SYRACUSE, 52 TOTAL 3-POINT REBOUNDS## PLAYER P FGM-FGA FGM-FGA FTM-FTA OFF-DEF TOT PF TP A TO BLK STL MIN 25 CHRISTMAS, RA. F 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 32 JOSEPH, KRIS F 2-5 0-3 3-3 1-5 6 4 7 1 2 1 2 25 51 MELO, FAB C 4-7 0-0 3-3 2-4 6 2 11 0 0 1 2 37 11 JARDINE, SCOOP G 0-8 0-1 0-0 2-3 5 2 0 5 2 0 1 26 20 TRICHE, BRANDON G 4-11 0-3 0-0 3-2 5 3 8 2 1 0 1 23 03 WAITERS, DION - 3-10 1-4 0-1 2-3 5 1 7 3 1 0 1 31 05 FAIR, C.J. - 5-12 0-0 3-4 2-3 5 2 13 0 2 0 1 35 12 KEITA, BAYE - 1-1 0-0 0-0 1-0 1 3 2 0 0 0 0 3 43 SOUTHERLAND, J. - 2-7 0-4 0-0 3-1 4 1 4 1 0 1 4 18 TM TEAM - - - - 0-0 0 - - - - - - - TOTALS.............. - 21-61 1-15 9-11 16-21 37 18 52 12 8 3 12 200 34.4% 6.7% 81.8%

LOUISVILLE, 51 TOTAL 3-POINT REBOUNDS## PLAYER P FGM-FGA FGM-FGA FTM-FTA OFF-DEF TOT PF TP A TO BLK STL MIN 14 KURIC, Kyle f 1-8 1-6 0-0 2-5 7 2 3 0 1 0 0 35 24 BEHANAN, Chane f 7-8 0-0 2-5 6-3 9 1 16 1 0 0 2 29 10 DIENG, Gorgui c 2-9 0-0 5-6 3-7 10 2 9 3 5 4 0 40 03 SIVA, Peyton g 3-5 1-2 1-4 0-2 2 3 8 4 5 0 1 27 05 SMITH, Chris g 3-11 3-7 1-2 2-4 6 4 10 0 0 0 0 34 01 NUNEZ, Angel - 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0+ 02 SMITH, Russ - 0-4 0-2 3-4 3-0 3 1 3 1 4 0 0 10 21 SWOPSHIRE, Jared - 1-2 0-0 0-0 0-2 2 0 2 0 1 0 0 10 22 JUSTICE, Elisha - 0-1 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 9 25 BLACKSHEAR, W. - 0-1 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 6 TM TEAM - - - - 0-1 1 - - - - - - - Totals.............. - 17-49 5-19 12-21 16-24 40 15 51 10 16 4 3 200 34.7% 26.3% 57.1%

LOUISVILLE, 77 TOTAL 3-POINT REBOUNDS## PLAYER P FGM-FGA FGM-FGA FTM-FTA OFF-DEF TOT PF TP A TO BLK STL MIN 14 KURIC, KYLE F 5-10 4-8 3-4 0-1 1 2 17 1 0 0 1 25 24 BEHANAN, CHANE F 1-4 0-0 2-2 3-3 6 1 4 1 2 0 1 28 10 DIENG, GORGUI C 1-4 0-0 0-0 4-2 6 4 2 1 1 0 1 26 03 SIVA, PEYTON G 4-9 0-1 2-2 0-2 2 4 10 5 3 0 0 32 05 SMITH, CHRIS G 4-10 3-5 2-2 0-1 1 3 13 1 1 0 1 27 02 SMITH, RUSS - 6-12 0-2 4-4 0-4 4 3 16 2 0 0 1 16 12 PRICE, ZACH - 0-0 0-0 0-1 1-0 1 3 0 0 0 1 0 6 21 SWOPSHIRE, JARED - 1-3 0-1 0-0 1-2 3 3 2 1 0 0 0 20 25 BLACKSHEAR, WAYNE - 5-9 3-5 0-0 1-3 4 0 13 0 1 1 1 20 TM TEAM - - - - 3-1 4 - - - - - - - TOTALS - 27-61 10-22 13-15 13-19 32 23 77 12 8 2 6 200 44.3% 45.5% 86.7%

WEST VIRGINIA, 74 TOTAL 3-POINT REBOUNDS## PLAYER P FGM-FGA FGM-FGA FTM-FTA OFF-DEF TOT PF TP A TO BLK STL MIN 05 JONES, Kevin f 7-13 3-5 5-7 5-6 11 0 22 4 0 0 1 40 13 KILICLI, Deniz c 7-8 0-0 3-5 3-2 5 5 17 0 4 0 0 22 04 HINDS, Jabarie g 3-8 1-4 0-0 0-2 2 2 7 6 1 0 3 38 14 BROWNE, Gary g 1-3 0-1 2-2 1-4 5 3 4 2 2 0 0 29 25 BRYANT, Darryl g 3-17 2-10 5-7 2-5 7 2 13 1 2 0 2 40 01 RUTLEDGE, Dominique - 2-4 0-0 2-4 3-2 5 4 6 0 2 2 0 19 12 BROWN, Aaron - 1-2 1-2 0-0 0-0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 6 32 WILLIAMSON, Paul - 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0+ 55 MILES, Keaton - 1-1 0-0 0-2 1-0 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 6 TM TEAM - - - - 2-1 3 - - - - - - - Totals - 25-56 7-22 17-27 17-22 39 16 74 13 11 2 6 200 44.6% 31.8% 63.0%

BOX SCORE: SYRACUSE 51, LOUISVILLE 51BOX SCORE: LOUISVILLE, 77 VS. WEST VIRGINIA, 74

Sophomore center Gorgui Dieng hasn’t been scoring as much lately, but his shot-blocking ability is having a great effect on the opposition. Here he pulled down a rebound against Rutgers, a game in which he had seven blocks.- photo by Gail Kamenish



By Russ BrownRick Pitino played it coy with the media,

and even Wayne Blackshear claims he didn’t know he would fi nally make his season debut against West Virginia last Saturday until short-ly before the noon tipoff in Morgantown.

During his pre-game press conference Fri-day afternoon, Pitino was asked about Black-shear’s progress.

“It’s not going real well,” he replied. “It’s a slow process. I learned from the Kevin Ware

situation when you don’t play at all. He’s been at it now for about two weeks. It’s a slow process trying to get him in shape. He’s physically healthy, which is good. I was hoping by the DePaul game (Satur-day), but getting him in shape has proven more diffi cult than with other

players, so we’ll just play it day by day.”Not quite true, of course. After the WVU

game Pitino acknowledged he didn’t answer the question honestly because he didn’t want to tip off Mountaineers coach Bob Huggins, but even if Huggins knew that Blackshear would play it’s diffi cult to understand how he could have prepared -- especially in such a short time -- for a player he had never seen.

That won’t be the case with opponents from now on, naturally, because judging by his performance in the 77-74 victory over West Virginia, Blackshear is going to be a major factor for UofL down the stretch and in the postseason.

The 6-foot-5 freshman came off the bench to score 13 points on 5-of-9 shooting and also grabbed four rebounds while celebrat-ing his 20th birthday.

Explaining his statement the previous day about the Chicago native’s availability, Pitino said: “I was always going to play him, I just didn’t want Huggs to prepare for him. I knew in today’s world of the Internet that every-body would have all the information. We just didn’t want any preparation on him going into the game.”

Pitino added that the original plan was to play Blackshear for the fi rst time when UofL meets DePaul in Chicago Saturday, “but I didn’t want to play him the fi rst time the day he goes home. I wanted to get him ready be-fore that.”

Blackshear was as surprised as everyone else that he played 20 minutes -- or even at all -- saying he didn’t fi nd out until warmups Saturday morning.

“It was kind of up in the air if I was going to play or not,” he said. “I’ve been having real good practices, so I think Coach went off that.”

Blackshear was scoreless in an Oct. 26 ex-hibition game against Pikeville, then suffered a torn right labrum in practice two days later. He had surgery Nov. 1 and was cleared to begin practice Jan. 12. But ever since then Pitino had talked about how out of shape Blackshear was and how it would take him longer than expected to work his way onto the court.

Asked if he was 100 percent yet, Blacks-hear said: “I’m getting there. Another couple of weeks. I’m still getting into basketball shape right now.”

He certainly didn’t waste any time making

his presence felt when he entered the game for the fi rst time midway through the fi rst half, immediately swishing a three-pointer from the right corner. Later in the half he added a backdoor layup, a 10-foot fl oater in the lane and another trey from the left of the key.

“I was known as a scorer, so my fi rst thing was to shoot and that’s what I did,” he said. “I came in and played my game like I always do. I’ve been working hard and I came out strong.”

Blackshear said he believes his versatility will be a valuable asset for the Cards.

“I give us a little bit of different stuff,” he said. “I came in and played the two, played the three, knocked down some shots. I can spread the fl oor, and I think that helps us out a lot.”

“He’s playing well. He’s a good talent,” teammate Kyle Kuric said. “We’re lucky to have him.”

Blackshear, who was playing his fi rst game in nearly a year, gives Pitino a much-needed deeper bench. With Gorgui Dieng and Pey-ton Siva limited by foul trouble, UofL also got signifi cant help from substitutes Russ Smith and Jared Swopshire. Russ scored 16 points, with four rebounds and two assists in 16 minutes, while Swopshire had two points, three rebounds and played solid defense in 20 minutes.

“Wayne has really helped our practices tremendously, made them very competitive,” Pitino said. “Today was the fi rst time we’ve substituted and didn’t lose anything. Peyton gets in foul trouble, Russ plays terrifi c, Swop and Chane Behanan played very well togeth-er, and then of course Wayne coming in gave

us a big lift.“I thought we had fresh bodies, and

we’ve played a lot of games where we were the tired team because guys were playing 37-38 minutes. Now they know they’re going to get a break. They don’t have to rest on the court because there’s a substitute coming in. We thought we had our legs all the way to the end.”

Even though Blackshear is inexperienced and coming off a long layoff, Pitino believes the heralded swingman will pick things up faster than most because of his court savvy and natural instincts.

“The one thing that’s evident when Wayne came back is he really knows how to play the game,” Pitino said. “He still doesn’t understand a lot of what we’re running and he makes some mistakes, but the one thing I always noticed about him is he really under-stands the game of basketball, and his men-tal capabilities on the fl oor are terrifi c. He’s going to make mistakes; this is the fi rst time he’s been put in and has to pay attention to scouting, but he’ll get it quickly because he has a very high basketball IQ.

“I was real impressed with the way Wayne shot the ball. He has sort of the type of shot Chris Smith has -- low trajectory, but a very good touch.”

KURIC MAKES AMENDSPitino was so unhappy with Kuric, the

Cards’ leading scorer, that he benched the senior forward at the start of the second half, starting Blackshear instead. But Kuric made amends for his shortcoming in the fi nal min-utes.

Kuric hit a game-tying three-pointer dur-ing an 11-0 run that propelled UofL into a

75-71 lead with 1:19 remaining, then madewhat could have been a game-saving steal.

With UofL clinging to a 75-74 lead and West Virginia working for a game-winningshot, Kuric stepped in front of Kevin Jonesand stole a pass from freshman guard GaryBrowne with 5.5 seconds left. He was imme-diately fouled and hit two free throws for thefi nal margin.

“Everybody was matching up,” Kuric said. “I was on the wing and I saw Jones open onthe block. I kind of looked at the point guard(Browne) and noticed he was just about tothrow it, so I just went for it and interceptedit.”

“It was a bad pass,” Huggins said. “It’s the end of the game. They’re not going to foulyou. Get the ball to the basket.”

Said Pitino: “That was a big-time play, and we had to have it because they were goingto go inside.”

As for his pressure-packed free throws with the capacity crowd of 11,254 scream-ing, Kuric admitted that it wasn’t easy.

“Especially up one with a few seconds left, the whole stadium’s being as loud asthey can be,” he said. “I just stayed calm,took a couple of deep breaths and relied onmy form to hit them.”

Kuric, who leads UofL in free-throw shoot-ing at 81 percent, fi nished with a team-high17 points. He had only one rebound, but Pi-tino wasn’t complaining.

“I was upset at Kyle because he’s not re-bounding, and that’s why I sat him to startthe second half,” Pitino said. “He’s got to getin there and get some rebounds ... but I’mnot going to hold it against him after thatending.”

RUSS BROWNRUSS BROWN

S U R P R I S I N G D E B U T H E L P S U O F L E D G E W V U

BLACKSHEAR SHOWS HE CAN MAKE A BIG IMPACT REST OF WAY

Freshman McDonald’s All-American Wayne Blackshear fi nally took the court for a Louisville Saturday against West Virginia. It was Louisville’s 25th game of the season, but Blackshear’s

fi rst after he had surgery on both shoulders. Blackshear had 13 points and four rebounds.


WOMEN’S BASKETBALLCOFFEE BREAK

Ah, internet message boards -- the 21st Century’s answer to the town square, Lloyd’s Barber Shop, the pot-bellied stove at the general store and the benches in front of the small-town court house. The only difference is that on the message boards you can comment in anonymity and say anything without recourse. Foolish statements can be criticized or even corrected, but who cares because no one knows who you are anyway. It’s like we all gathered at the town square and wore masks and disguised our voices.

Don’t get me wrong, I like the message boards. I can communicate my ideas to a lot of people with a simple fi nger to the “enter” button and get immediate response. That helps

me expose what I think is a good idea to some potential critics to see how far off base I am. I know who the Negative Nellys and Positive Petes are, so that helps me temper the degree of change I have in my opinion. I also know who the thoughtful posters are and value their opinions and often use their ideas as I write. Overall, I fi nd the information disseminated on the boards benefi cial to me as I gather knowledge, especially on Cardinal-Sports.com and UofL athletics.

But there is a dark side to message boards that I fi nd disturbing and destructive to the cause of congenial discourse. The intensity of disagree-ment often is harmful to intelligent back-and-forth communication be-

cause some people fi nd it necessary not only to disagree but to denigrate those with whom they are disagreeing. Because most people are unknown when they post, it adds to the intemperate words that often are used. Anonymity also allows some to make statements that are untrue or at best gossip that is unsubstantiated.

The latter seems to be the case of a message-board subject that was recently bandied about: that the excessive injuries on the men’s basketball team are the result of too much hard practice and time on the treadmill. It doesn’t matter whether the situation is true or false, if it is stated on a message board it becomes fact and is repeated often. Recently, I at-tended practice and was surprised that the team did very few laps and ran no steps because there are none in the men’s practice facility in the Yum! Center. My high school coach would have been appalled at the small number of end line-to-end line runs by the players. According to the trainer, players, assistant coaches and head coach Rick Pitino, the team suffered from a lack of adequate practice time rather than too much. Based on the recent improvement of the team, I am inclined to agree.

The message-board criticism of Pitino doesn’t stop at the “ferocity” of his practices. There was constant chatter recently about why Pitino should be replaced and who should replace him. While the Cards were losing fi ve of seven games, some fans were roasting Pitino on a daily basis. There were numerous explanations: practices too hard; poor recruiting; player re-bellion (especially after Providence); no on-fl oor leadership; tired players; etc. It didn’t matter that the number of injuries was delaying the development of the team, as Pitino kept saying. Many wanted his head and would only be satisfi ed with his departure.

Names of replacements started to fl y: Butler’s Brad Stevens, Florida’s Billy Donovan, even Richard Pitino. It didn’t matter that Stevens is 14-12 this season and fi fth in the Horizon League, or that Donovan took Florida to the NIT two of the last four years coming out of a weak basketball conference, or that Richard Pitino has never been a head coach. Facts didn’t matter, posters just wanted Rick Pitino’s head.

But the same message boards that two weeks ago were crying for change now are singing the praises of Rick Pitino and the Car-dinals. In a recent thread that asked, “Why are Cards playing better?” there were 27 re-sponses, and all of them had positive things to say about Pitino and his players. Fans now seem to understand the impact that injuries had on the development of this team.

As one recent poster pointed out, in the fi ve losses suffered by the Cards they were outscored by 53 at the foul line. In fi ve recent wins they outscored the opponents in each game at the foul line.

These Cards have bounced back from their recent slump, to the delight of most on the message boards. And there’s another headline that should please all Cards fans -- “Cards’ Men’s Basketball Academic Performance at All-Time High.” Seems to me there are a lot of good things happening lately with UofL basketball that deserve celebration.

Only President’s Award Winner in Greater Louisville 10 out of 11 years!

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JACK COFFEEJACK COFFEE

Senior co-captain Chris Smith has upped his productivity in recent weeks. Against Rutgers he got eight points and 13 rebounds with six assists, against UConn 16 points and six rebounds, against West Virginia 13 points and three rebounds, and against Syracuse 10 points and six rebounds. - photo by Gail Kamenish

Cards have message boards

singing a happy tune lately

YEAR SEASON NON-CONF 2011-2012 31 102010-2011 16 592009-2010 23 952008-2009 18 342007-2008 9 122006-2007 33 722005-2006 33 222004-2005 23 42003-2004 33 142002-2003 47 42001-2002 53 632000-2001 62 1511999-2000 26 481998-1999 32 501997-1998 37 52

LOUISVILLE BASKETBALL’SPOWER RATINGS

STRENGTH OF SCHEDULE


GAMEDAY PREVIEW - DEPAUL

BREAKING DOWN THE BLUE DEMONSBy Rick CushingThe Blue Demons played the Cardinals

fi ve weeks ago, with UofL prevailing 76-59 at the KFC Yum! Center on Jan.14. Since then, the teams have been going in oppo-site directions. Through last Sunday, DeP-aul is 1-6 since that fi rst meeting, while UofL is 6-1. Overall, DePaul is 11-13, 2-10 in the Big East. UofL is 20-5, 8-4.

This is an improved DePaul team, however, and the Blue De-mons already have doubled their number of victories in Big East play from last season. They also have played several good teams competitively before losing. In their last three games they led Cincinnati in the second half before falling 74-66 at UC; they led visiting Marquette by nine at the half before falling 89-76; and they were tied with host Notre Dame at the half and trailed by just four points in the fi nal minutes before losing 84-76.

So the Blue Demons can’t be taken lightly.Oliver Purnell, who took over at DePaul last season, has res-

urrected all three programs he coached previously – Old Domin-ion, Dayton and Clemson – and he seems to have DePaul headed in the right direction. He has two talented sophomores – 6-8 forward Cleveland Melvin and 6-3 guard Brandon Young – and just needs another good recruiting class to turn the corner. As it is, another victory or two in Big East play would be a signifi cant step for a team that was 0-18, 1-17 and 1-17 in league play the previous three seasons.

DePaul will play at Connecticut Wednesday before entertain-ing UofL Saturday afternoon.

GUARDSYoung is following up a promising debut season (fi rst-team

All-Big East freshman) with an outstanding sophomore season. He is second on the team in scoring at 14.9 ppg, leads in assists at 4.8 per game and in steals at 1.5 per game. His assist-to-turnover ratio (2.83-to-1) ranks 13th in the country. He’s shoot-ing 43 percent overall but just 27.3 percent from beyond the arc. He is a good free-throw shooter at 74.7 percent. In DePaul’s fi rst meeting with UofL he was the Blue Demons’ only double-fi gure scorer with 14 points but made just 5 of 16 shots and had just one assist.

Jeremiah Kelly, a 6-0 senior, is third on the team in scoring at 8.8 ppg and second in assists at 3.91 a game. He’s shooting 41 percent overall, 37.8 percent on treys. He had eight points and a team-high four assists in the fi rst meeting.

DePaul began the season with a two-guard lineup but has been starting three guards ever since its fi rst game with UofL. Charles McKinney, a 6-3 freshman, is that third guard. He is averaging 4.0 ppg and shooting 43.5 percent overall but just 26.3 percent on treys. In the fi rst meeting he had eight points, fi ve rebounds and three steals and hit 4 of 5 shots. He is a poor free-throw shooter at 48.6 percent and a little careless with the ball (33 assists, 31 turnovers).

The top backcourt sub is 5-11 junior Worrel Clahar (6.4 ppg, sixth on the team), who’s shooting 51.4 percent overall, 51.9 percent on treys and 80 percent on free throws. He’s also a good defensive player and had two steals in the fi rst meeting to go along with nine points on 3-of-5 shooting, 3 of 3 on treys.

BIG MENMelvin, who was the Big East Freshman of the Year last sea-

son, leads the team in scoring (18.1 ppg), rebounding (6.8 rpg) and blocks (1.13 per game). He’s shooting 45.3 percent overall but just 22.2 percent on treys (12 of 54). He has 15 assists and 56 turnovers. In the fi rst meeting he got just eight points and two rebounds and made six turnovers.

The starting center is 6-10 senior Krys Faber (4.3 ppg, 5.0 rpg), who’s shooting 55.7 percent but stays close to the basket (he hasn’t tried a three-point shot all season). He is a good free-throw shooter, however, at 83.9 percent.

The top frontcourt subs are 6-6 sophomore Moses Morgan (8.3 ppg, fourth on the team, 2.5 rpg) and 6-4 freshman Jamee Crockett (8.0 ppg, 2.2 rpg). Morgan is shooting just 35 percent overall but 37 percent on treys. Crockett is shooting 46.8 percent overall, 41.7 percent on treys. Morgan had eight points and six rebounds in the fi rst meeting, Crockett just two points and two rebounds.

The backup center is 6-10 freshman Derrell Robertson Jr. (0.8 ppg, 1.4 rpg), who is a good shot blocker (0.9 a game despite playing just 8.7 minutes a game).

Another frontcourt sub is 6-9 sophomore Donnavan Kirk (3.0 ppg, 3.2 rpg).

STARSMelvin and Young share the honor. TEAM STRENGTHSAfter years of watching a plodding, walk-it-up offense, De-

Paul fans were aching for a return to an exciting offense (re-member the teams led by Mark Aguirre, Tyrone Corbin Rod Strick-land, Dave Corzine and Dallas Comegys in the 70s and 80s?). Purcell vowed to deliver excitement and has, with the current team pressing and running and averaging 74.6 ppg, 47th in the country. DePaul also is averaging 8.2 steals a game, 41st in the country.

TEAM WEAKNESSESThe defense hasn’t caught up to the offense. DePaul is sur-

rendering 75.7 ppg, 321st in the country, and opponents are shooting 48.2 percent, 327th in the country (out of 333 teams!).

COACH’S RESUMEPurcell is in his 32nd season and is 412-315 overall. He is

in his second season at DePaul and is 18-37 there. But the Blue Demons won just seven games last season and already have won 11 this season.

ALL-TIME SERIESUofL and DePaul have met 57 times in a series that dates to

1957, with the Cards holding a 36-21 advantage. They have won the past eight meetings and 21 of the past 23.

NO NAME POS HT WT EXP (L) HOMETOWN (SCHOOL) 5 BELCASTER, JOE G 6-2 163 JR (2V) BERWYN, IL (MORTON HS)25 BROOKS, MACARI G 6-2 190 FR (HS) MATTESON, IL (RICH SOUTH HS)0 CLAHAR, WORREL G 5-11 179 JR (2V) BROOKLYN, NY (LAWSON STATE CC)35 CLEMONS, MONTRAY F 6-7 221 FR (HS) BALTIMORE, MD (POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE)21 CROCKETT, JAMEE F 6-4 201 FR (HS) CHICAGO, IL (CRETE-MONEE HS)33 FABER, KRYS C 6-10 261 SR (3V) PALMDALE, CA (RIBET ACADEMY)22 FREELAND, TONY F 6-7 229 JR (2V) LOS ANGELES, CA (FREMONT HS)11 KELLY, JEREMIAH G 6-0 163 SR (3V) CHICAGO, IL (AMERICAN CHRISTIAN ACADEMY)23 KIRK, DONNAVAN F 6-9 222 SO (2V) PONTIAC, MI (MIAMI (FL))2 MCGHEE, EDWIND F 6-3 207 SO (1V) CHAMPAIGN, IL (CHAMPAIGN CENTRAL HS)32 MCKINNEY, CHARLES G 6-3 178 FR (HS) EVANSTON, IL (QUALITY EDUCATION ACADEMY)12 MELVIN, CLEVELAND F 6-8 208 SO (1V) BALTIMORE, MD (LAKE CLIFTON HS)15 MORGAN, MOSES F 6-6 219 SO (1V) LAS VEGAS, NV (PALO VERDE HS)10 ROBERTSON JR., DERRELL C 6-10 239 FR (HS) PINOLA, MS (MENDENHALL HS)20 YOUNG, BRANDON G 6-3 190 SO (1V) BALTIMORE, MD (FRIENDSHIP COLLEGIATE SCHOOL)

DEPA

UL B

LUE D

EMON

S2011-12 DEPAUL BASKETBALL ROSTER

JANUARY 14Depaul at Louisville

W, 76-59

FEBRUARY 18Louisville at Depaul

12 PM Noon

2011-12 SCHEDULEDATE OPPONENT TIME NOVEMBER Nov 11 UT-Pan American W, 91-72Nov 14 Mississippi Val. W, 80-70Nov 24 Minnesota L, 86-85

DECEMBER Dec 1 Mississippi L, 70-68Dec 5 UW-Milwaukee L, 87-76Dec 7 @Loyola (Ill.) W, 69-58Dec 10 Chicago St. W, 102-95Dec 14 @Northern Ill. W, 75-52Dec 17 Ark.-Pine Bluff W, 81-62Dec 21 Cal Poly W, 63-58

JANUARY Jan 1 Syracuse L, 87-68Jan 5 Pittsburgh W, 84-81Jan 8 @Villanova L, 87-71Jan 10 @Seton Hall L, 94-73Jan 14 @Louisville L, 76-59Jan 17 Georgetown L, 83-75Jan 22 South Florida L, 75-59Jan 25 @Rutgers W, 69-64

FEBRUARY Feb 1 St. John´s (N.Y.) L, 87-81Feb 4 @Cincinnati L, 74-66Feb 6 Marquette L, 89-76Feb 11 @Notre Dame L, 84-76Feb 15 @Connecticut 7:00 pmFeb 18 Louisville 12:00 pmFeb 20 @St. John´s (N.Y.) 9:00 pmFeb 25 Providence 2:00 pmFeb 28 @West Virginia 7:00 pm

MARCH Mar 3 Seton Hall 6:00 pm

Coach: Oliver PurnellLast Season: 7-24, 1-17 Big East

Overall Record: 401-303 (31 years)At DePaul: 7-24 (one year)DePaul had won just two

Big East games the last 3 years

CLEVELAND MELVINCLEVELAND MELVIN

HEAD COACHHEAD COACHOLIVER PURNELLOLIVER PURNELL

Louisville played well enough to beat No. 2 Syracuse Monday night. The Cardinals had an awful night shooting free throws (12 of 21 for 57 percent) and turned the ball over 16 times to Syra-cuse’s eight. The Cardinals’ game plan on Scoop Jardine worked

perfectly, however. He missed all eight of his shots. The Cardinals’ game plan on Syracuse’s shooters worked well, too. The Orange fi nished just 1 of 15 from three-point range. But Syracuse’s game plan against Louisville worked well, too. After the game, SU coach Jim Boeheim said he wanted his players to guard the baseline against Chane Behanan and let Gorgui Dieng have all the foul-line jumpers he wanted. Dieng fi nished 2-of-9 shooting and turned down several wide-open shots late in the game. Still, Louisville had a chance to win with the ball and down by one point with 15 seconds left, but they fumbled the chance away. This one hurts.

Early in the second half of the Louisville-Syracuse game, long-time offi cial Jim Burr was one of the top-10 trending topics on Twitter in the United States. Most artists and writers would give their I-teeth to be trending nationally on Twitter, but if you are a

college basketball offi cial that’s not a good thing. Offi cials should be a part of the game but shouldn’t be recognizable and defi nitely shouldn’t be the top story of the game as Burr made himself at times. There were some awful calls against and for both teams, but the continuation call that Fab Melo got on a foul and subsequent shot in the second half was laughable. Essentially Melo just fl ipped the ball toward the basket after the whistle, but Burr gave him the points. Embarrassing for Burr.

Louisville is still 20-6 and has won seven of its last nine games, with the two losses coming at No. 25 Marquette with-out Kyle Kuric in the lineup and Monday night at home to No. 2

Syracuse. Not bad at all. The Cardinals have games at DePaul and at Cincinnati before closing out the regular-season home schedule against Pitt and South Florida. Each of those four are winnable if Louisville plays like it has been playing the last two weeks. If the Cardinals can take care of business in those four, it will set up a showdown when Louisville travels to Syracuse March 3 for the regular-season fi nale for both teams. “This one hurts - a lot,” Rick Pitino said after Monday night’s loss. “The only way to make this feel better is to go up there and beat them up there.”

Since Pittsburgh’s double-dealing was revealed and the Pan-thers and Syracuse announced they were headed to the ACC, we’ve been impressed with how the Big East has gone about

rebuilding the league. Even with West Virginia’s lawsuit and exit to the Big 12, the Big East has strengthened the football league in the last few weeks with such additions as Boise State, Houston, SMU, San Diego State, Navy and UCF. We understand it’s popular to bash the Big East and commis-sioner John Marinatto, but given the circumstances, it appears the league has comported itself very well, especially if Air Force joins Navy as part of the league in the future.

That said, we believe that Louisville and the Big 12 will be partners at some point in the future. It just makes too much sense. Louisville’s athletic department fi ts right in with the other

Big 12 schools (in fact, UofL would be among the conference leaders in nearly every sport and in budget). The Big 12 is now at 10 teams, and even though some of the league’s public statements have led people to believe it will stick at 10, insiders believe otherwise. The league wants to get back to 12, and Louisville seems to be the logical fi t for No. 11, with a rumor circulating that BYU or some combination of BYU and Notre Dame will be No. 12. The Cardinals will help the Big East as long as they are members but, if given the chance, Louisville will make the leap.

We believe Louisville basketball has the best arena in all of college basketball, and it seems some at ESPN agree. In addi-tion to the rave reviews of the building from ESPN visitors off

the record, the network’s color analyst for last Tuesday’s Louisville-UConn game -- Kara Walters -- professed her love for the one-year-old facility. “I think the NCAA should bring the women’s Final Four to the Yum! Center,” Walters said. We agree. The crowd Tuesday night made the arena feel like a Final Four atmosphere, and Louisville is centrally located to many of the top women’s programs in the

nation. How many fans would make the trip to Louisville for a UConn, Baylor, Kentucky, Notre Dame Final Four? The Yum! would be packed if the Final Four were there this season. On Monday, the NCAA announced the Yum! Center will host the 2013 NCAA Division I Women’s Basketball fi rst and second rounds. Louisville can, and likely will, play in those games.

Speaking of women’s basketball, Saturday’s game against Syracuse was an absolute blast. The Cardinals jumped on the Or-ange early en route to a 27-point victory in which nearly everybody

scored. The fans were rowdy and seemed to become rowdier with each new three-pointer. So by the time the 18th three went in - a school record - the Yum! Center was rocking. We’re guessing many of the 12,463 fans in attendance will be back for another game or two. “We go on the road sometimes and there are 300 or 400 fans in the stands and it is real quiet,” coach Jeff Walz said. “I want our players to always remember how lucky they are that they get to play in front of these crowds.”

We really like Charlie Strong’s pick for the Cardinals’ new tight ends coach, Sherrone Moore. Hiring from in-house (Moore has been on staff as a graduate assistant for three seasons) means

more stability for the coaching staff. Being an ex-offensive lineman, Moore should help bring more toughness to the position than we saw last season. As good as departing senior Josh Chichester could be at times, he also had a maddening tendency to fl ub catches and wasn’t what you would call a strong blocker despite his 6-foot-8 frame. Moore will be working with former walk-on Chris White and unproven talent Nate Nord, the two returners with the most experience from this season. Junior college tight end Ryan Hubbell and two incoming freshmen also could be in the mix.

We were saddened to hear of Bernard Trager’s passing last week. The founder of Republic Bank and a pillar of the community, Mr. Trager was a proud supporter of the University, and his family

name is emblazoned on several buildings throughout Belknap Campus, including the massive Trager Indoor Practice Facility next to Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium. For more on Trager and what he meant to UofL athletics, see page 16.

Somebody get West Virginia coach Bob Huggins a violin, be-cause he’s been singing a sad tune since his Mountaineers were beaten by Louisville Saturday. After the game, he sent out this

message on Twitter, “WOW, was that a physical press or what,” with the implication being, of course, that Louisville was fouling on its press. He was asked about the tweet Monday and replied, “If you’re allowed to press that way, we should all press.” Note to Huggins: Louisville was whistled for 23 fouls to West Virginia’s 16. The Mountaineers shot 27 free throws to Louisville’s 15. It’s not Louisville’s fault your team missed 10 free throws in a three-point loss, Bob. Was someone guarding them too physically then?

We got a quick look at the expansion plans for Louisville’s baseball stadium, and we’re excited about the possibilities. Jim Patterson Stadium should be vaulted into the discussion to host

an NCAA Regional every season as long as the team holds up its end of the bargain. And the ameni-ties for fans with families will be tremendous.

Louisville softball got off to a great start over the weekend, sweeping all fi ve of its games in the Florida International Combat Classic in Miami. The Cardinals beat Michigan State and Illinois

Friday, UAB and FIU Saturday, and UMass on Sunday. Next up, they’ll take on Virginia and East Carolina Friday, then face UNC Greensboro and Hofstra on Saturday and Fordham on Sunday in the East Carolina Pirate Clash Invitational in Greenville, N.C. It is very possible the Cards could start the season 10-0 before hosting Creighton in their home opener on Feb. 24-25. The Cardinals struggled with injuries all of last season but seem to have a team that could make a run toward national prominence this season. Softball is all about pitching, and the Cardinals have solid starters in Tori Collins, Chelsea Leonard and Caralisa Connell. Jordan Trimble also could be a factor in the circle this season.

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LOUISVILLE BASKETBALL PHOTO GALLERY

Senior Chris Smith tried to split two Syracuse defenders, but lost the ball. Louisville had 16 turnovers to Syracuse’s 8 Monday night. - photo by Gail Kamenish

On Louisville’s second-to-last possession, junior Peyton Siva tried to pass into the paint to Gorgui Dieng, but the ball was knocked away. Replays showed Siva had Kyle Kuric open on the wing for a three. - photo by Gail Kamenish

After Louisville’s second-to-last possession failed the Cardinals were forced to foul. Louisville’s bench (pictured here are L. to R. Tim Henderson, Russ Smith and Elisha Justice) sat stunned as Syracuse celebrated. - photo by Gail Kamenish

The WhiteOut was a big success with participation in the 90 percent range. The student section was wild and loud throughout the game. - photo by Howie Lindsey


WOMEN’S BASKETBALLCARDINAL FOOTBALL

By Howie LindseyJust fi ve years ago Sherrone Moore was

fi elding calls from some of the nation’s top football programs and taking offi cial visits as a four-star recruit. Moore, who eventu-ally signed with Oklahoma and played two seasons for the Sooners, is now the Univer-sity of Louisville’s newest - and youngest - assistant football coach.

But don’t expect him to apologize for his age. Moore sees it as an advantage.

“Some may see my youth as a disadvantage, but I am defi nitely going to use it to my advan-tage,” the 26-year-old Moore said. “I’m young enough that I went through the recruiting process and I know what it is like being recruited

by big-time programs. I know what it is like getting the calls and all that. I’m going to be able to relate to the recruits better be-cause we are closer in age and I understand what they are dealing with. I feel like one of my advantages will be developing relation-ships with players.”

Moore, who was hired by Charlie Strong last week to direct the tight ends, had been on staff at Louisville for the last three sea-sons as a graduate assistant -- two with Strong and one with former coach Steve Kragthorpe.

“When (former offensive coordinator Mike) Sanford left the staff, I started work-ing more closely with the tight ends, and I worked with them for the second half of the season,” Moore said. “And then after the season ended we talked about it and I knew it was a possibility. Once we got through Signing Day and just before Coach Strong gave the staff a few days off, he called me in and we talked about the position and he let me know the good news.”

Strong also promoted Shawn Watson to offensive coordinator and changed Mike Borbely’s title from offensive line coach to running game coordinator. Strong an-nounced staff updates last week just after he broke the offi cial word to Moore.

“Oh, I was excited,” Moore said. “This has been something I’ve been working to-ward, so when he let me know I’d be coach-ing the tight ends it was exciting.... I called my mother fi rst and shared the good news, and I spoke to my dad, who is in Quatar currently. He was really excited for me. This is a great opportunity.”

Moore’s father works with oil fi elds, a job that sometimes takes him thousands of miles away from his family. But he was just a phone call away when Moore wanted to share the good news last week.

“I’m not sure what time it was over there, but he answered anyway,” Moore said.

Family has always been important to Moore, and he made sure his family heard the news fi rst.

“My family has always been a big part of my life and a big reason for any success I’ve had,” he said. “My family has supported me every step of the way. When I was pursuing college football, my dad had the chance to take a job that would have had to move our family, but I was able to stay and continue working toward college football. They have always been my biggest supporters.”

Now Moore will transition from offensive line assistant to full-time tight ends coach. Given the responsibilties of graduate assis-tants on Strong’s staff, Moore believes he’s up for the challenge.

“I don’t feel like it will be too big of a transition for me because on Coach Strong’s coaching staff the GAs have a lot of respon-sibilities, just like a coach,” he said. “Now, I would still have to do all the normal GA activities and that kind of thing, but Coach Borbs trusted me to coach the line and help him during practices. There were times when he’d take half and I’d take half for drills and we’d work them that way. I’m grateful I got that opportunity to work as much as I did because it prepared me to be a coach. Recruiting will be the biggest dif-ference.”

When asked what he brings to the coaching staff, Moore had a quick answer. “I think the thing I bring is energy,” he said. “I love football and I want to bring that en-ergy and that passion to coaching. I’m really looking forward to the recruiting side of it. You get just a taste of what it’s like when you are working as a graduate assistant, but I’m looking forward to being able to go out and recruit players.”

For that, he’ll draw on his recent experi-ence as a recruit himself. For his tight ends, he’ll draw from his experience as a tough offensive lineman.

“I’d like for people to call my guys re-lentless,” he said. “I want them to just keep coming throughout the game. Keep working hard. Keep blocking and have that toughness about them.”

The Cardinals lost starting tight end Josh Chichester to graduation but have a pair of players returning with potential, junior Chris White and senior Nate Nord. The Car-dinals also added four recruits at that spot, including a junior college player.

“We have some guys there, but we need some guys to step up, too,” Moore said. “White is a former walk-on that has really come along, and Nate Nord, everybody saw what he is able to do when he made that catch in the bowl game. That was a big play, but we need him to do more of that. We defi nitely need to develop more consisten-cy. And then the guys we have coming in - we have Gerald Christian and Ryan Hubbell here now on campus. Both of those guys are big and physical and have what you look for. Gerald has to sit out a year after transferring from Florida, and then we have a couple of freshmen coming in.”

LOUISVILLE’S YOUNG NEW COACH LOOKING FORWARD TO RECRUITING

Sherrone Moore, 26, was named UofL’s new tight ends coach last week after serving the previous three seasons as a graduate assistant. “Oh, I was excited,” he said, adding that he views his youth -- he’s the youngest coach on the staff -- as an advantage “because I can relate to the recruits better because we are closer in age and I understand what they are dealing with.” - photo by Howie Lindsey

HOWIE LINDSEYHOWIE LINDSEY


CARDINAL FOOTBALL

By Russ BrownNext season’s University of Louisville football

team could look a lot like Rick Pitino’s basket-ball team in helmets and shoulder pads. In oth-er words, the football version of a fast break attack.

That’s because new offensive coordinator Shawn Watson believes the Cardinals might operate most effi ciently out of an up-tempo,

no-huddle offense after watching them have suc-cess with that style occa-sionally last season.

Watson, 52, made his comments about the 2012 season Friday afternoon during his fi rst meeting with the media since being

offi cially named offensive coordinator earlier in the week. His promotion was no surprise. He took over play-calling duties from former of-fensive coordinator Mike Sanford in the fi fth game last year, adding that responsibility to coaching the quarterbacks.

Watson said he, offensive line coach Dave Borbely, whom head coach Charlie Strong has named running-game coordinator, and the rest of the staff are excited about the possibility that the Cards will play faster next fall.

“I think one of the things everybody on the staff is intrigued by, because we do it very well, is the tempo offense,” said Watson, who pre-viously was offensive coordinator at Colorado and Nebraska. “Whenever we were in tempo offense we were really good, whether it be a two-minute or just us in no-huddle gear. We didn’t do a lot of it because we were so young and there was only so much we could handle. As we move along there will be things you’ll see us utilizing the talent we have. It’s always been what my trademark has been to utilize what we have and play to our best suit.”

The Cards played as many as eight fresh-men or redshirt freshmen at the same time on offense last year, so they should be better equipped to handle a more versatile and faster-paced attack. Watson also said the style suits sophomore quarterback Teddy Bridgewater and his receivers.

“What I like to do is play to our talent, and we have a unique skill set here at quarterback,” Watson said. “Teddy has proven he takes to the passing game very well. He can handle a lot of checking in the run game, so we can do a lot of things with him, which we found out last year. His ability to throw the ball, his ability to create plays, we’re going to utilize that, obviously.

“Then we have a great group of receivers. They’re all young and they all have different skills that play to that position, and I love our tailbacks. I think each one has something dif-ferent he brings to the table, so that gives us more multiplicity and more fl exibility.

“I believe this about college football -- you

want to try to create more play opportunities, and tempo offense obviously gives you that ability. At the same time, one of the things I really love about our entire staff is that we win as a team. So there are some games we don’t necessarily want to be in a no-huddle attack all the time. That’s why it’s important to have the huddle approach, too.”

Watson used Louisville’s 38-35 upset of West Virginia in Morgantown as an example of the philosophy that a more deliberate pace also can have its advantages. It was a season-high for points even though the Cards were out-gained 533 yards to 351 and had just 15 fi rst downs to the Mountaineers’ 28. Bridgewater was an effi cient 21 of 27 for 246 yards and a touchdown.

“Like West Virginia, we picked our times and chose our places to no-huddle,” Watson said. “But playing in a huddle, controlling the ball, chewing up chains, chewing up clock, re-ally helped us win that game. So it’s important to have both gears. A lot of people don’t do that today, it’s either one or another, but it’s something we started doing with our players last year, taking it in that direction, so there’s

familiarity with it. And how much we do with it depends on our opponent, and obviously more than anything else how much we can handle because we’re still going to be young at some positions.”

The Cards’ offense steadily improved last season. After scoring 24 or fewer points in each of their fi rst seven games, they exceeded that in fi ve of their fi nal six contests. Still, UofL has a long way to go offensively, based on last year’s dismal numbers. The Cards ranked 103rd among 120 FBS schools in total offense at 333 yards per game. Only Connecticut (313) was worse in the Big East Conference. And UofL was 98th in scoring at 21.92 points per game, last in the league.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do, we’d all tell you that,” Watson said.

At least, though, the coaches will have an experienced group to work with, unlike last season. UofL lost just fi ve seniors from its two-deep roster on offense and returns four starters on the offensive line, two of its top three rush-ers in Dominique Brown and Jeremy Wright and its two leading receivers in Eli Rogers and Michaelee Harris. And, of course, Bridgewater

and senior backup Will Stein.UofL opens spring practice on March 21,

with the fi rst three workouts (21st, 23rd, 24th)open to the public. The spring intrasquad gamewill be played April 14 in Papa John’s CardinalStadium.

With the Cards having tied West Virginia and Cincinnati for the Big East championshipand competing in their second straight bowlgame -- a 31-24 loss to North Carolina State inthe Belk Bowl -- after winning fi ve of their lastsix regular-season games, Watson said the ex-citement, hunger and enthusiasm at the How-ard L. Schnellenberger Football Complex thesedays is palpable.

“Spring ball is totally different than what is was a year ago,” he said. “Number one, wehave numbers, we have a lot of kids out thereon the fi eld. The beautiful part is a lot of thekids that played were younger players. At timeswe looked out and had eight kids who were ei-ther true or redshirt freshmen, and defensivelythere were six.

“So we played a lot of young guys, and what happens is there’s an enthusiasm in ourbuilding and everybody is hungry to chasesomething special because they got to taste itlast year. The beautiful thing is you had thatexperience and there’s a real hunger now toachieve even more The whole attitude in ourbuilding is different.

“Charlie has done a great job of holding the kids acountable to do the right things off thefi eld, like going to class. Our grade point aver-age and graduation shows it, so good thingsare happening inside the program and they allfeed off each other. Spring ball will be exciting.They eliminate the distractions by taking careof business in the classroom and off the fi eld,so when they come into the building they’refocused on football.”

A L S O S A Y S P L A Y E R S A R E H U N G R Y F O R M O R E S U C C E S S

WATSON WANTS FOOTBALL CARDS TO PLAY FASTER NEXT SEASONShawn Watson was named UofL’s new offensive coordinator last week after serving as the OC for most of last season after the previous OC, Mike Sanford, left the program before Game 5. Watson has vowed to increase the team’s offensive tempo this coming season. “You want to try to create more play opportunities, and tempo offense obviously gives you that ability,” he said. - photo by Howie LindseyRUSS BROWNRUSS BROWN


CARDINAL KIDS PHOTO GALLERY

Maclean Larlee, age 4, at his fi rst game ever.

Ethan Aarvig, a 5-year-old Cardinal Kid, has been attending, watching, and rooting for the UofL Cardinals since he was born. His mother Lisa actually went into labor while attending a UofL basketball game. He has a bulletin board in his room with his favorite pictures, posters, and memories of his burgeoning collection of UofL memorabilia.

Dominic Springer, the 2-year-old grandson of Charlie and Barbara Springer, in his new Christmas gear. His Grandpa, Charlie, runs UofLCardGame.com

Gwen and Tim O’Dea’s grandson, Harrison, enjoyed his fi rst UofL tailgate at Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium. Harrison is the son of Emily and Dan Holeman.

Cardinal Kid Kylie Virg

Makayla Mosser and her daddy, Gary, at her fi rst UofL game.

Kaitlyn Reynolds, a 3-year old Cardinal Kid, at the Red-White game.


RECRUITING NOTEBOOK

By Jeff WaffordRivals.com released its early rankings for

the 2013 class, and several players listed near the top of the rankings have the Uni-versity of Louisville on their radar.

Two of the highest-rated players in the 2013 class are right in the Cardinals’ own backyard at Trinity H.S. -- wide receiver James Quick and defensive end Jason Hatch-er. Both are rated as four-star players.

Quick (6-1, 180) is rat-ed as the No. 194 player in the class and is likely to be rated the No. 1 player in Kentucky when the statewide ratings are released later this spring. Already with offers from Alabama, Auburn, Ar-

kansas, Louisville, Kentucky, Michigan, Ten-nessee and others, Quick likely will pick up many more offers as he hits the camp circuit this summer.

Quick, who runs the 40-yard dash in 4.41 seconds, is an electrifying talent who can break the big play at any moment. He has made several unoffi cial visits to colleges al-ready, including to Louisville, Alabama and Kentucky.

Hatcher (6-2, 238) is rated as the No. 224 player in the class and should start as the No. 2 player in the state. An extremely strong defender with good speed (4.67 in the 40), Hatcher already has racked up offers from Alabama, Arkansas, Auburn, Illinois, Ken-tucky, Louisville, Michigan, North Carolina and many others.

Hatcher has stated that he doesn’t plan to make an early commitment but noted that he plans to make some visits this summer and start narrowing down his list.

The Cardinals already have a verbal com-mitment from a quarterback in the 2013 class – Kyle Bolin of Lexington Catholic H.S.

Bolin (6-3, 190) committed to the Cards in September over offers from Cincinnati and Illinois. He also was getting interest from Notre Dame and Kentucky. While he isn’t currently rated as a four-star player, Rivals.com analyst Keith Niebuhr said on a recent Rivals.com recruiting chat that he was “very impressed” with Bolin on fi lm and could see him as a potential four-star recruit when the

rankings are updated.

LOCAL LINEMAN WORKING FOR OFFERSLouisville Ballard H.S. offensive lineman

Joey Bloomfi eld (6-6, 295) is starting to draw interest from around the nation. In-state teams Western Kentucky, Kentucky, and Louisville have been in contact with the junior, and the list of schools he’s been hear-ing from includes Colorado, Duke, Purdue, Washington and Wisconsin.

Bloomfi eld will be busy in the coming months, with unoffi cial visits scheduled to both Virginia and Virginia Tech, as well as a second unoffi cial visit to Clemson which, he said, is showing a lot of interest. He already has made unoffi cial visits to Indiana, Purdue, Tennessee, Kentucky and UofL.

Although he was born in Cleveland, Ohio, he has called Louisville home for many years and cheers for the Cardinals.

“My family, we’ve always rooted for the Cardinals,” Bloomfi eld told Kentuckypreps.com writer Eric Fraley in a recent interview. “But that doesn’t infl uence my decision.”

As his 3.7 GPA indicates, Bloomfi eld lists a quality education as a priority in selecting a college.

“Academics, that’s number one with me,” he affi rmed. “After that, I want to be sure it is a good fi t socially, and with the coaching staff.”

Bloomfi eld wants to keep his options open for now. He said he would like to pick a college before his senior season of football starts but admits he won’t hold himself to that deadline.

FLORIDA LINEMAN HAS EARLY LOUISVILLE OFFER

Charlie Strong and his coaching staff have had success recruiting Florida over the past two seasons, and it’s likely they’ll continue to mine the area in 2013. One player they’ve al-ready offered is Shawn Curtis (6-5, 270), an offensive lineman from Olympia H.S. (Olym-pia, Fla.) who also already holds offers from Connecticut, Kentucky, North Carolina and Cincinnati. Curtis mentioned that his coach told him he has a couple more as well, al-though he wasn’t sure from which schools yet.

Obviously, Curtis has the size of a big-time college offensive lineman, but he said colleges also love his work in the trenches. “I have great footwork,” Curtis said when asked to describe his strengths. “I fi re off the ball real well.”

With all of the early interest he’s receiving, Curtis already has started thinking about what he wants in a college. “I’m not looking for much,” he admitted. “I just like a great coaching staff. Pretty much everywhere has great facilities. Once I meet all of the coach-

ing staffs, I’ll go from there.”Will distance play a factor? “It doesn’t

make much difference to me,” Curtis said.“I’ll probably stay somewhere not too faraway ... within a couple of states.”

One state he’s keeping his eye on is the Bluegrass State, as he holds offers from boththe Cardinals and Wildcats.

“I haven’t been up to Louisville yet, but I went up to Kentucky and checked every-thing out up there,” he said. “I saw their in-side facilities and met the coaches. They’regreat people. I mainly talked to Coach (Mike)Summers when I was up there, the O-linecoach.”

Curtis admitted he still has a lot to learn about UofL. “I’ve seen them play a game be-fore, but (I don’t know) much (about them),”he said. “I’d consider them and I’d probablymake a visit up there if I could.”

Curtis also noted that he and his dad are trying to arrange a visit to North Carolina fora Junior Day event.

TOP 2013 BBALL RECRUIT RECLASSIFIES; UofL LIKELY OUT OF RUNNING

Several weeks ago fi ve-star basketball re-cruit Nerlens Noel (6-11, 200) made an un-offi cial visit to both Kentucky and Louisvilleas a member of the 2013 class. However,the product of Tilton School (N.H.) has nowreclassifi ed to the 2012 class, meaning he’llgraduate a year early and plans to enroll inschool this fall.

That appears to knock the Cardinals out of the running for the talented shot-blockerbecause Noel fi gures to be a one-and-doneplayer who wants to start right away. WithGorgui Dieng slated to be the defi nite starterat center for Rick Pitino’s team next season,it’s unlikely Noel would have the unlimitedplaying time he craves.

At his two other favorites, however – Syracuse and Kentucky – Noel would havea chance to replace Anthony Davis or FabMelo, both of whom are expected to declarefor the NBA draft after this season. Look forNoel to end up at one of those programs.

Louisville already has one commitment for the 2013 class – Anton Gill (a 6-3 shootingguard from Raleigh, N.C.), and it appearsthey’ll sign one or two more players in thatclass, including at least one low-post player.

LOCAL GRID PROSPECTS SHOWUP IN INITIAL RANKINGS

JEFF WAFFORDJEFF WAFFORD

JAMES QUICK JASON HATCHER

FOR UP-TO-THE-MINUTE RECRUITING NEWS, LOG ON TO

CARDINALSPORTS.COM


Big East Basketball Standings

1. Syracuse 26-1 (12-1)The Orange, after squeaking by UofL Monday, will play at Rutgers Sunday.

2. Marquette 21-5 (10-3)Golden Eagles at UConn Saturday.

3. Notre Dame 17-8 (9-3)Irish, winners of fi ve straight, host Rutgers Wednesday, at Villanova Saturday.

4. Georgetown 19-5 (9-4)Hoyas at Providence Saturday.

5. South Florida 15-10 (8-4)Surprising Bulls host Villanova Wednesday, at Pittsburgh Sunday.

6. Louisville 20-6 (8-5)Cards will try to start a new win streak at DePaul Saturday.

7. Cincinnati 16-8 (6-5)Bearcats host Providence Wednesday, Seton Hall Saturday.

8. West Virginia 16-10 (6-7)Slumping Mountaineers at Pittsburgh Thursday.

8. Seton Hall 17-8 (6-7)Pirates host St. John’s Tuesday, at Cincinnati Saturday.

10. Connecticut 15-9 (5-7)Puzzling Huskies host DePaul Wednesday, Marquette Saturday.

11. Rutgers 12-13 (4-8)Knights at Notre Dame Wednesday, host Syracuse Sunday.

11. St. John’s 10-14 (4-8)Red Storm at Seton Hall Tuesday, hosts UCLA Saturday.

11. Villanova 11-13 (4-8)Wildcats at USF Wednesday, host Notre Dame Saturday.

14. Pittsburgh 15-11 (4-9)Panthers, back on the slide, host WVU Thursday, USF Sunday.

15. DePaul 11-13 (2-10)Blue Demons at UConn Wednesday, host UofL Saturday.

16. Providence 13-13 (2-11)Friars at Cincinnati Wednesday, host Georgetown Saturday.

By Howie LindseyBernard Trager, the founder of Republic Bank

and a noted philanthropist, died last Friday at his home in Louisville at the age of 83 with his family by his side. While news of his passing spread around the nation on business web sites and among banking circles, Trager will be re-membered at the University of Louisville not for what he contributed to his banking business, but for the massive impact he had on the lives of student-athletes.

Trager and his family have contributed mil-lions to the University, including a million-dollar donation to help build the Cardinal Park sports complex on Floyd Street. UofL’s fi eld hockey stadium and the indoor football practice facility near Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium both bear the Trager name.

UofL Vice President for Athletics Tom Jurich told The Courier-Journal that Trager’s “gener-osity and humility were simply incredible. His fi ngerprints are all over our campus with the developments we were able to accomplish with his, his wife Jean, and his family’s support.”

Louisville’s fi eld hockey stadium is nation-ally renowned for being an elite facility. UofL has hosted the NCAA Final Four in Division I fi eld hockey four times in the last 10 seasons. The fi eld also is used frequently for local junior league and high school tournaments.

“Mr. Trager was an incredible man and will be sorely missed,” UofL fi eld hockey coach Jus-tine Sowry said. “His impact throughout the community and specifi cally our fi eld hockey program is immeasurable. The Louisville fi eld hockey program would not be what it is today without the support and generosity that Mr. Trager and his family have given. However, it is so much more than just the fi nancial support. Mr. Trager always showed so much love, care and respect toward the people behind the pro-gram. Trager Stadium will always be here, and we are proud to call this amazing stadium and facility home. Our condolences go out to Mrs. Jean Trager and the family.”

The Trager Indoor Practice Facility is a key workout facility and recruiting tool for the foot-ball team, but it frequently serves more than a dozen other sports from track and fi eld to base-ball and softball.

UofL softball coach Sandy Pearsall wrote: “Mr. Trager meant so much to our athletic pro-grams. We are so fortunate to have the Trager Indoor Facility because it provides us with a tre-mendous indoor facility to practice when we have bad weather. It is certainly unmatched by other programs around the country.”

Trager, who previously served as chairman of the university’s Board of Overseers, also has a namesake in the heart of Belknap Campus -- Trager Plaza between Lutz Hall and the Miller Information Technology Center.

“He was also a mentor to me,” University President James Ramsey said in a statement. “Mr. Trager was a great friend to the University of Louisville and to education in our commu-nity. He will be greatly missed. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the Trager family.”

Trager was not just generous with the Uni-versity of Louisville. He also gave a million-dollar gift to the Jewish Community Center in 1999, hundreds of other gifts to charities too numer-ous to count throughout the years, and was a constant advocate for the Fund for the Arts. He served on the boards of several civic groups, in-cluding the Catholic Heritage Council, Greater Louisville Inc., Boy Scouts of America and the Louisville Community Foundation.

Trager was named Professional Entrepre-neur of the Year by Louisville’s Entrepreneur Society, is a member of the Louisville Male High School Hall of Fame, was inducted to the Ju-nior Achievement Business Hall of Fame and re-ceived the 2011 Louisvillian of the Year Award from the Advertising Federation of Louisville.

He is survived by Jean, his wife of 56 years; a daughter, Shelley Trager Kusman; a son, Steve Trager (Amy); a brother, Alan Trager (Roz); and fi ve grandchildren, Michael, Andrew and Brett Trager Klusman and Kevin and Emily Trager. Mr. Trager was born in Louisville in 1928 and, with the exception of an absence for military service (USAF/1950-52), resided continuously in Louis-ville for his entire life.

His grandchildren remember him saying, “It doesn’t take a dime to be a nice person.”

Expressions of sympathy can go to the Jew-ish Community Center on Dutchmans Lane or the Boys & Girls Club of Louisville.

BERNARD TRAGER 1928-2012

LOUISVILLE BASEBALL


By Russ BrownThere’s no denying that the 2011 Univer-

sity of Louisville baseball season wasn’t up to the high standards established by coach Dan McDonnell during his previous four seasons that produced four Big East Conference reg-ular-season and tournament championships and four NCAA Regional appearances.

The Cardinals got off to an 11-3 start last year but struggled to a 21-26 record the rest of the way, including an eight-game losing streak in mid-season that was the lon-gest by far of McDonnell’s tenure. They regrouped to win seven of their last 10 games and advance to the Big East title game against

St. John’s (losing 5-1) but still fi nished in the middle of the pack in the league at 14-13 and 32-29 overall.

Along with the inconsistency that came with having a relatively young team, there were some discipline and chemistry prob-lems, and some of those players are no longer around.

“It has to come from the players to under-stand what Louisville baseball is all about,” McDonnell said. “Sometimes players have a sense of entitlement and just assume, ‘I play for this program and I’m going to win.’ They have to understand that, ‘You’re the reason you win. We’ll coach you and put you in a successful system, but at the end of the day if you’re not living the way we preach it’s not going to work.’ Last year was really an eye opener for them, so they grew up.

“It’s about being accountable, and the locker room has to police that. It’s who’s work-ing hard when we’re not around. Everybody works hard when I’m standing there. There was a great deal of emphasis on that going into this year.”

In the so-called exit meeting after the sea-son, McDonnell made it clear to his returning players that such mediocrity wasn’t accept-able and certain habits and behavior wouldn’t be tolerated, and he is carrying that approach into this season with the theme of “no ex-cuses.”

He thinks the Cards, with a ton of playing experience from last year and the addition of one of the nation’s top recruiting classes, are ready to make amends for 2011, and others think so, too. Louisville is ranked in the pre-season top 25 by both Baseball America and in the USA Today/ESPN coaches’ poll.

“We’ve defi nitely grown up,” senior pitch-er Derek Self said. “The freshmen we had last year were thrown into the fi re and had to play. All of them played well at times, it’s just that consistency that comes with age. Last year was full of ups and downs, and I don’t see it being that much of a roller-coaster ride this year. I think we’re going to be far more con-sistent, beat the teams we should beat and give everybody a run for their money, that’s

for sure.“We have something to prove. I was a part

of the team that went to the Super Regionals and won 50 games (two years ago). Last year we had a pretty good start to the season. It was, ‘OK, we’re making mistakes, but we’re still winning and that’s the important thing.’ But honestly, toward the end of last year it got to the point where it wasn’t fun showing up at the ball park, and that’s awful to say. But the direction that team was headed last year wasn’t the right one. I think we’re in good shape this year.”

With four seniors he calls “special,” an ex-perienced sophomore class, the highly ranked freshmen group and several JUCO transfers, McDonnell thinks Louisville has a good blend. And he said he and strength and conditioning coach Eric Hammer have been impressed by the players’ improved work ethic.

The roster breakdown is 12 sophomores, 15 freshmen and eight juniors, along with the four seniors. Three of the juniors are JUCO products.

“Our sophomore class is the large group,” McDonnell said. “We threw them into the fi re, they had their ups and downs and then they went off and had a great summer. They’re ready to not just play, but to lead, and you need sophomores who can do that.

“We really put an emphasis on the weight room, and it’s hard to be a team that loves the weight room when you’re very young. Fresh-

men don’t normally love the weight room, but now as sophomores they really see the ben-efi ts, their self-esteem is high, they’re healthy and they’re making the right decisions.

“This is the most productive team in the weight room from August to now that I’ve ever coached. They’ve worked extremely hard to be in the best shape of their lives and put themselves in position to succeed.”

Pitching will be UofL’s strength. Nearly the entire pitching staff returns, headed by preseason All-American and all-Big East per-former Justin Amlung, a senior from St. Xavier High who was 10-2 with a 2.31 ERA and 80 strikeouts in 15 starts last season. He ranks second on Louisville’s career ERA list at 3.06 and has a 15-4 career record. The other senior hurlers are Self (3-3, 2.26 ERA, 17-3 career re-cord) and Travis Tingle (3-1, 2.60).

Self, Tingle and sophomore outfi elder Adam Engel are the team captains. Engle got off to a slow start to his collegiate career last season but then led the Cards in hitting in May with a .392 average. Overall, he hit .250 with 16 stolen bases.

The only non-pitcher who is a senior is outfi elder Stewart Ijames, who hit .247 with 11 home runs and 45 RBIs last year. Engel hit .250, but no other returning player with 100 or more at-bats hit .250 or above.

Other than Engel, some of the key sophs are shortstop Alex Chittenden, who was named the top defensive player in the Northeast Col-

lege Baseball League last summer; infi elder/designated hitter Ty Young; and catcher KyleGibson.

McDonnell’s fi rst four teams at Louisville were high-scoring, power-hitting outfi ts, butwith the new bat regulations mandated bythe NCAA the Cards’ batting average andextra-base numbers took a huge dive lastseason to .253 and 36 homers. Due to thedifference in the bats, fewer runs are beingscored and fewer home runs are being hitthroughout college baseball, so McDonnellhas put more emphasis on defense this sea-son.

“The game has changed, and we had to change with it,” he said. “So that explainsone of the reasons we say, ‘No excuses,’ be-cause now we know what to expect, how tohandle the bats better, the best way to scoreruns now.

“It would be nice to get two 3-run hom-ers in a game. That’s how we played in thepast. Now it’s a run or two here, a run or twothere, and if you pitch well and make playsbehind them you have a chance of winning.

“There’s a belief that you want to start the game with as good an offense as you canand fi nish by putting your best defense onthe fi eld. That works out great if you knowyou can score four or fi ve runs, but we’re notgoing to score the number of runs we havein the past. So two runs now seems like fourruns, and by playing better defense you giveyourself a better chance. In the past, we’veput backup infi elders who could really hitin the outfi eld. Now we have kids out therewho have played the outfi eld their entire lifebecause if a guy makes a catch that savestwo runs, it’s almost like saving four.”

In the preseason Big East coaches’ poll, UofL was picked to fi nish second behind2011 tournament champ St. John’s, getting110 points to the Red Storm’s 118, with Con-necticut third at 92 points. Baseball Americapicked the Cards over St. John’s, however.

“What’s exciting about the Big East is that one year you might be the eighth-place teamand the next year you’re fi ghting to win theleague and make a statement in the NCAATournament,” McDonnell said. “St. John’shas star power returning. I think we’ve gotnice balance. In one sense, there’s alwaysgoing to be a target on our backs becauseof who we are and we’re being chased. Butlike I tell our kids, we also have to go outand chase other people. We have to be ableto be both the hunted and the hunter.”

Louisville will open the season Friday against Minnesota in the Big Ten/Big EastChallenge in Clearwater, Fla. The Cards, whowon the event last year, will then meet IllinoisSaturday and Michigan State Sunday, both inSt. Petersburg.

UofL will open its home schedule in Jim Patterson Stadium on Feb. 22 against EasternKentucky, the fi rst in a nine-game homestandhighlighted by a three-game visit by Pepper-dine March 2-4.

M C D O N N E L L E N C O U R A G E D B Y E X P E R I E N C E , W O R K E T H I C

NO EXCUSES FOR CARDS AS THEY EYE BOUNCE-BACK SEASONUofL senior Justin Amlung, a Louisville St. Xavier product, was named the Big East Preseason Pitcher of the Year after going 10-2 with a 2.31 ERA and 80 strikeouts in 15 starts last season. He turned down an offer to sign with a major league team to return to UofL this year and is projected as the team’s ace. - photo by Howie Lindsey

RUSS BROWNRUSS BROWN


GAMEDAY PREVIEW - WEST VIRGINIA

LACROSSEDATE OPPONENT / EVENT LOCATION TIME / RESULT 02/19/12 at Ohio State Columbus, Ohio 1:00 p.m. ET02/24/12 at Longwood Farmville, Va. 4:00 p.m. ET02/26/12 at Old Dominion Norfolk, Va. 12:00 p.m. ET03/02/12 vs. DENVER UofL LACROSSE STADIUM 2:00 p.m. ET03/07/12 vs. NORTHWESTERN UofL LACROSSE STADIUM 5:00 p.m. ET03/10/12 vs. Presbyterian Cumming, Ga. 1:00 p.m. ET03/14/12 at Vanderbilt Nashville, Tenn. 4:00 p.m. ET03/17/12 at Jacksonville Jacksonville, Fla. 12:00 p.m. ET03/24/12 at Notre Dame # South Bend, Ind. 1:00 p.m. ET03/27/12 at Cincinnati # Cincinnati, Ohio 5:00 p.m. ET04/05/12 vs. LOYOLA (Md.) # UofL LACROSSE STADIUM 5:00 p.m. ET04/07/12 vs. GEORGETOWN # UofL LACROSSE STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET04/13/12 at Rutgers # New Brunswick, N.J. 5:00 p.m. ET04/15/12 at Villanova # Philadelphia, Pa. 1:00 p.m. ET04/20/12 vs. SYRACUSE # UofL LACROSSE STADIUM 5:00 p.m. ET04/22/12 vs. CONNECTICUT # UofL LACROSSE STADIUM 1:00 p.m. ET05/03/12 BIG EAST CHAMPIONSHIP Syracuse, N.Y. TBD

SWIMMING AND DIVINGDATE OPPONENT / EVENT LOCATION TIME / RESULT 01/14/12 at Cincinnati # Cincinnati, Ohio M 2-0, W 2-001/28/12 at Indiana Bloomington, Ind. M 165.5-134.5, W 128-16502/03/12 vs. KENTUCKY Ralph Wright Natatorium M 188-107, W 183-10702/10-12/12 BIG EAST Diving Championship # Pittsburgh, Pa. M 4th, W 1st02/15-18/12 BIG EAST Swimming Championship # Pittsburgh, Pa. All Day02/24-25/12 Championship Qualifying Meet Knoxville, Tenn. TBA03/08-10/12 NCAA Diving Zones TBA All Day03/09-11/12 Grand Prix - Columbus (LC) Columbus, Ohio All Day03/15-17/12 NCAA Women’s Swimming and Diving Championship, Auburn, Ala. All Day03/22-24/12 NCAA Men’s National Championship Federal Way, Wash. All Day03/29-31/12 Grand Prix - Indianapolis Indianapolis, Ind. All Day05/03-06/12 Grand Prix - Charlotte Charlotte, N.C. All Day06/07-09/12 Mutual of Omaha Swimvitational Omaha, Neb. All Day06/25/12 US Olympic Trials

BASEBALLDATE OPPONENT / EVENT LOCATION TIME / RESULT Big Ten/BIG EAST Challenge02/17/12 vs. Minnesota Clearwater, Fla. 10:00 AM ET02/18/12 vs. Illinois St. Petersburg, Fla. 4:00 PM ET02/19/12 vs. Michigan State St. Petersburg, Fla. 10:00 AM ET02/22/12 vs. EASTERN KENTUCKY JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 3:00 PM ET02/24/12 vs. OAKLAND UNIVERSITY JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 3:00 PM ET02/25/12 vs. OAKLAND UNIVERSITY JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET02/26/12 vs. OAKLAND UNIVERSITY JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET02/28/12 vs. EASTERN ILLINOIS JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 3:00 PM ET03/02/12 vs. PEPPERDINE JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 3:00 PM ET03/03/12 vs. PEPPERDINE JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET03/04/12 vs. PEPPERDINE JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET03/06/12 vs. INDIANA JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 3:00 PM ETAlabama Tournament03/09/12 vs. Oral Roberts Tuscaloosa, Ala. 2:00 PM ET03/10/12 at Alabama Tuscaloosa, Ala. 5:05 PM ET03/11/12 vs. East Carolina Tuscaloosa, Ala. 11:00 AM ET03/13/12 vs. OLE MISS JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET03/14/12 vs. OLE MISS JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 12:00 PM ET03/16/12 vs. BALL STATE JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET03/17/12 vs. BALL STATE JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET03/18/12 vs. BALL STATE JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET03/20/12 vs. OHIO STATE JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET03/23/12 vs. CINCINNATI # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET03/24/12 vs. CINCINNATI # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET03/25/12 vs. CINCINNATI # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET03/27/12 at Purdue West Lafayette, Ind. 4:00 PM ET03/30/12 vs. VILLANOVA # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET03/31/12 vs. VILLANOVA # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET04/01/12 vs. VILLANOVA # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET04/03/12 vs. WESTERN KENTUCKY JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET04/05/12 at Georgetown # Bethesda, Md. 3:00 PM ET04/06/12 at Georgetown # Bethesda, Md. 4:00 PM ET04/07/12 at Georgetown # Bethesda, Md. 12:00 PM ET04/10/12 at Kentucky Lexington, Ky. 6:30 PM ET04/13/12 vs. SETON HALL # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET04/14/12 vs. SETON HALL # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET04/15/12 vs. SETON HALL # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET04/17/12 at Indiana Bloomington, Ind. 3:00 PM ET04/20/12 at USF # Tampa, Fla. 7:00 PM ET04/21/12 at USF # Tampa, Fla. 6:00 PM ET04/22/12 at USF # Tampa, Fla. 1:00 PM ET04/24/12 vs. KENTUCKY JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET04/27/12 vs. CONNECTICUT # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET04/28/12 vs. CONNECTICUT # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET04/29/12 vs. CONNECTICUT # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET05/01/12 at Western Kentucky Bowling Green, Ky. 7:00 PM ET05/05/12 at West Virginia # Morgantown, W.Va. 2:00 PM ET at West Virginia # Morgantown, W.Va. 5:30 PM ET05/06/12 at West Virginia # Morgantown, W.Va. 1:00 PM ET05/08/12 at Vanderbilt Nashville, Tenn. 7:00 PM ET05/11/12 vs. ST. JOHN’S # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET05/12/12 vs. ST. JOHN’S # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET05/13/12 vs. ST. JOHN’S # JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 1:00 PM ET05/15/12 vs. MOREHEAD STATE JIM PATTERSON STADIUM 6:00 PM ET05/17/12 at Pittsburgh # Pittsburgh, Pa. 6:00 PM ET05/18/12 at Pittsburgh # Pittsburgh, Pa. 6:00 PM ET05/19/12 at Pittsburgh # Pittsburgh, Pa. 1:00 PM ET05/23-27/12 BIG EAST Championship Clearwater, Fla. TBA

SOFTBALLDATE OPPONENT / EVENT LOCATION TIME / RESULT Florida International University Tournament02/10/12 vs. Michigan State Miami, Fla. W, 4-1 vs. Illinois Miami, Fla. W, 8-302/11/12 vs. UAB Miami, Fla. W, 5-4 at Florida International Miami, Fla. W, 4-202/12/12 vs. Massachusetts Miami, Fla. W, 2-0East Carolina University Tournament02/17/12 vs. Virginia Greenville, N.C. 11:00 a.m. ET02/17/12 at East Carolina Greenville, N.C. 4:00 p.m. ET02/18/12 vs. UNC Greensboro Greenville, N.C. 11:00 a.m. ET02/18/12 vs. Hofstra Greenville, N.C. 9:00 a.m. ET 02/19/12 vs. Fordham Greenville, N.C. 9:00 a.m. ET02/25/12 vs. Creighton ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET02/26/12 vs. Creighton ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ETTennessee Classic03/02/12 vs. Middle Tennessee State Knoxville, Tenn. 1:30 p.m. ET vs. Dutch National Team Knoxville, Tenn. 8:15 p.m. ET03/03/12 vs. Memphis Knoxville, Tenn. 12:15 p.m. ET at Tennessee (W) Knoxville, Tenn. 2:30 p.m. ET03/04/12 vs. Boston University Knoxville, Tenn. 9:00 a.m. ET03/02/12 vs. Tennessee Tournament Knoxville, Tenn. TBA03/03/12 vs. Tennessee Tournament Knoxville, Tenn. TBA03/04/12 vs. Tennessee Tournament Knoxville, Tenn. TBARed and Black Tournament03/10/12 vs. Saint Louis ULMER STADIUM 11:00 a.m. ET vs. Michigan ULMER STADIUM 1:00 p.m. ET03/11/12 vs. Saint Louis ULMER STADIUM 3:00 p.m. ET03/12/12 vs. Illinois State ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET vs. Illinois State ULMER STADIUM 2:00 p.m. ET03/14/12 vs. Western Kentucky Bowling Green, Ky. 5:00 p.m. ETSacramento State Capital Classic03/16/12 vs. Colorado State Sacramento, Calif. 1:00 p.m. ET vs. Princeton Sacramento, Calif. 5:00 p.m. ET03/17/12 vs. Akron Sacramento, Calif. 2:00 p.m. ET at Sacramento State Sacramento, Calif. 6:00 p.m. ET03/24/12 vs. Pittsburgh # ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET vs. Pittsburgh # ULMER STADIUM 2:00 p.m. ET03/25/12 vs. Pittsburgh # ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET03/28/12 vs. Kentucky Lexington, Ky. 5:30 p.m. ET03/31/12 vs. DePaul # Chicago, Ill. 1:00 p.m. ET vs. DePaul # Chicago, Ill. 3:00 p.m. ET04/01/12 vs. DePaul # Chicago, Ill. 12:00 p.m. ET04/04/12 vs. Kentucky ULMER STADIUM 6:00 p.m. ET04/06/12 vs. Rutgers # ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET vs. Rutgers # ULMER STADIUM 2:00 p.m. ET04/07/12 vs. Rutgers # ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET04/11/12 vs. Villanova # Villanova, Pa. 11:00 a.m. ET vs. Villanova # Villanova, Pa. 1:00 p.m. ET04/14/12 vs. Longwood ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET vs. Longwood ULMER STADIUM 2:00 p.m. ET04/15/12 vs. Longwood ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET04/18/12 vs. USF # ULMER STADIUM 2:00 p.m. ET vs. USF # ULMER STADIUM 4:00 p.m. ET04/21/12 vs. Seton Hall # South Orange, N.J. 12:00 p.m. ET vs. Seton Hall # South Orange, N.J. 2:00 p.m. ET04/22/12 vs. Seton Hall # South Orange, N.J. 12:00 p.m. ET04/25/12 vs. Indiana Bloomington, Ind. TBA04/28/12 at Georgetown # ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET at Georgetown # ULMER STADIUM 2:00 p.m. ET04/29/12 at Georgetown # ULMER STADIUM 12:00 p.m. ET05/05/12 vs. St. John’s # Jamaica, N.Y. 12:00 p.m. ET vs. St. John’s # Jamaica, N.Y. 2:00 p.m. ET05/06/12 vs. St. John’s # Jamaica, N.Y. 12:00 p.m. ETBIG EAST Championship05/10-12/12 BIG EAST Championship South Bend, Ind. TBA

SPRING SPORTS SCHEDULES


LOUISVILLE WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

By Howie LindseyUniversity of Louisville senior shooting

guard Becky Burke spells relief T-H-R-E-E.

The team captain went scoreless dur-

ing losses to Connecticut and West Virginia

last week and had just fi ve points during a

loss at DePaul a week prior. Burke, typically

Louisville’s most active three-point threat,

hit just 1 of 10 from beyond the arc during

the three-game losing streak.

All her stress from the

slump ended Saturday

when she made a school-

record eight threes and

scored 28 points to lead

No. 17/20 Louisville (18-

7, 7-5) to an 89-62 vic-

tory over Syracuse (15-

10, 4-8) at the KFC Yum!

Center. Burke fi nished with a career-high 28

points.

“After I hit my fi rst three, I think every-

body kind of gave a sigh of relief,” she said.

“I just kept shooting and the crowd was

great, it was a really a good time overall.

Coach (Jeff) Walz always says you never

stop shooting if you’re a shooter. I could

struggle for fi ve games in a row and I’ll still

keep shooting.”

And shoot she did. Burke hit 8 of 15

three-point shots.

“Today was a game that I was hoping that

she would be able to have some success; of

course, you never expect a kid to go 8 of 15

from the three-point line,” Walz said. “With

them playing as much zone as they did, we

were able to get her a lot of open looks ear-

ly. As soon as you get some confi dence go-

ing, then you start making some shots and

feeling really good about things. I was really

pleased with how well she played and how

well she shot the basketball.”

Said Burke: “It feels great, it feels really

good. It felt great because, A. we’ve lost

three in a row and, B. because I’ve been

struggling with shooting a little bit and

it feels good to get out of that. I mean, I

haven’t really been shooting that well re-

cently, so it felt really good.”

Burke has had to take a more active lead-

ership role this season because the Cardi-

nals lost leading scorer Monique Reid and

starting shooting guard Tia Gibbs to injury

early in the season.

“I just come every day to practice, and

my teammates always rely on me to get us

excited and stay happy,” Burke said. “I’m a

senior, I’ve got nothing to lose, so I have to

come out every game and play like it’s my

last. It’s just really exciting. We have a great

crowd, and my teammates were getting ex-

cited for me.

Burke wasn’t the only one hitting threes.

The Cardinals hit a school-record 18 threes,

including six by Shoni Schimmel, two by An-

tonita Slaughter and one apiece by Bria

Smith and Sara Hammond. Late in the game

Asia Taylor appeared to have the Cardinals’

19th three, but it was ruled a two.

“Overall, as a team it felt good,” Burke

said. “Everybody was hitting some, so it felt

really good.... They were playing a zone, and

against a zone you have to make them pay.

Sometimes you hit your shots and some-

times you don’t, but today we did.”

Said Walz: “I think that is as good as we

could play offensively.... Well, no, I guess we

could shoot 20 for 31 threes, but 18 of 31

is pretty good.”

While Burke’s shooting was the story of

the game, Schimmel’s passing was a close

second. She had 10 assists.

“It was fun to see our kids out there

playing as hard as they did,” Walz said. “I

thought we shared the ball extremely well.

I thought Shoni started us off with the way

she passed the basketball. She made hard

crisp passes, and we fi nally got the ball into

our shooters’ hands when they were open.

We are normally a second late. By the time

you catch it someone has already closed out

on you and instead of an open easy three,

it’s contested. I thought we did a much bet-

ter job of getting the basketball moving.”

Led by Burke and Schimmel, UofL had

perhaps its best offensive performance of

the season in the fi rst half. The Cardinals

scored 51 points, hit 18 of 33 shots (54.5

percent) and drained nine threes. Burke had

four, Schimmel three and Slaughter two.

But Walz was more concerned with Lou-

isville’s defense, or lack of it. The Cardinals

allowed a number of wide-open shots, and

Syracuse hit 16 of 28 for the half. The Car-

dinals’ defense was much better to start the

second half. They allowed 40 points in the

fi rst half but allowed the Orange just seven

points in the fi rst seven minutes of the sec-

ond half. Better defense allowed Louisville

to build a 19-point lead at 66-47 with just

over 13 minutes left.

“We did a great job on (Iasia) Heming-

way,” Walz said. “I was really concerned

about her before the game started. She at-

tacks the basket so well and is such a strong

player. She goes out and competes for every

possession, but we did a really nice job of

not allowing her to get the ball. Once she

gets the ball, she is very effi cient. I thought

we did a nice job against (Kayla) Alexander,

we just fouled her too much.... I thought

our players did a great job of following the

scouting report.”

Louisville’s improved defensive effort

was the primary reason Syracuse missed 9

of its fi rst 12 shots in the second half. The

Cardinals used a late 16-8 run to take a

commanding 87-60 lead with 1:30 left af-

ter Burke and Schimmel hit back-to-back

threes.

Despite Louisville’s long-range accuracy,

Syracuse rarely strayed from its zone, banking

instead that the Cardinals’ shooters would

cool off. They didn’t as the Cards cruised to

its 89-62 victory while shooting 58.1 per-

cent from three-point range.

“Syracuse plays that way 99 percent of

the season,” Walz said. “What are the odds

we are going to go 18 of 31 from the three-

point line? For Syracuse, you would have to

think that the percentages are in their favor

and we are eventually going to miss, and

fortunately for us we never did.

“For the most part they did (play zone), I

would say 95 percent of the time they did.

They played a little man on us for a couple

of minutes, but we just kept going at them

and it worked out for us.”

BURKE’S BIG GAME BOOSTS CARDS PAST SYRACUSESenior Becky Burke made a school-record eight three-point shots and scored a career-high 28 points as the Cards pasted visiting Syracuse 89-62 last Saturday to snap a three-game losing streak. Burke, who had been in a shooting slump, said, “After I hit my fi rst three, I think everybody kind of gave a sigh of relief.” She made 8 of 15 treys in all.- photo by Darrell Russell

HOWIE LINDSEYHOWIE LINDSEY


2011-12 MEN’S SCHEDULE DATE OPPONENT SITE TIME / RESULTS OCTOBER10/14/11 Red-White Scrimmage KFC YUM! CENTER White, 86-8510/22/11 Red-White Scrimmage KFC YUM! CENTER Red, 105-6010/26/11 vs. PIKEVILLE * KFC YUM! CENTER W, 74-55NOVEMBER 11/03/11 vs. BELLARMINE * KFC YUM! CENTER W, 62-54GLOBAL SPORTS INVITATIONAL11/11/11 vs. TENNESSEE-MARTIN KFC YUM! CENTER W, 83-4811/13/11 vs. LAMAR KFC YUM! CENTER W, 68-4811/19/11 at Butler Indianapolis, Ind. W, 69-5311/22/11 vs. ARKANSAS STATE KFC YUM! CENTER W, 54-2711/25/11 vs. OHIO KFC YUM! CENTER W, 59-5411/28/11 vs. LONG BEACH STATE KFC YUM! CENTER W, 79-66DECEMBERBIG EAST / SEC CHALLENGE12/02/11 vs. #19 VANDERBILT KFC YUM! CENTER W, 62-6012/07/11 vs. IUPUI KFC YUM! CENTER W, 90-6012/10/11 vs. FAIR. DICKINSON KFC YUM! CENTER W, 80-58BASKETBALL HALL OF FAME SHOOTOUT12/17/11 vs. MEMPHIS TV KFC YUM! CENTER W, 95-8712/20/11 vs. C. OF CHARLESTON KFC YUM! CENTER W, 69-62BILLY MINARDI CLASSIC12/23/11 vs. WESTERN KENTUCKY KFC YUM! CENTER W, 70-6812/28/11 vs. GEORGETOWN # KFC YUM! CENTER L, 71-6812/31/11 at Kentucky TV Lexington, Ky. L, 69-62JANUARY01/03/12 at St. John’s # TV New York, N.Y. W, 73-5801/07/12 vs. NOTRE DAME # KFC YUM! CENTER L, 67-6501/10/12 at Providence # Providence, R.I. L, 90-5901/14/12 vs. DE PAUL # KFC YUM! CENTER W, 67-5901/16/12 at Marquette # Milwaukee, Wis. L, 74-6301/21/12 at Pittsburgh # Pittsburgh, Pa. W, 73-6201/25/12 vs. VILLANOVA # KFC YUM! CENTER W, 84-7401/28/12 at Seton Hall # Newark, N.J. W, 60-51FEBRUARY02/04/12 vs. RUTGERS # KFC YUM! CENTER W, 78-6602/06/12 vs. CONNECTICUT # KFC YUM! CENTER W, 80-5902/11/12 at West Virginia # Morgantown, W.Va. W, 77-7402/13/12 vs. SYRACUSE # KFC YUM! CENTER L, 52-5102/18/12 at DePaul # Chicago, Ill. 12:00 noon02/23/12 at Cincinnati # TV Cincinnati, Ohio 9:00 p.m.02/26/12 vs. PITTSBURGH # TV KFC YUM! CENTER 2:00 p.m.02/29/12 vs. USF # KFC YUM! CENTER 7:00 p.m.MARCH03/03/12 at Syracuse # TV Syracuse, N.Y. 4:00 p.m.BIG EAST CHAMPIONSHIP: New York, N.Y. (Madison Square Garden) 03/06-10/12 TBD TBA * - Exhibition game, # - Big East Conference game

2011-12 WOMEN’S SCHEDULE

DATE OPPONENT SITE TIME / RESULTS

OCTOBER

10/30/11 VS. LINDSEY WILSON * KFC YUM! CENTER W, 118-41

NOVEMBER

11/13/11 at Missouri State Springfi eld, Mo. W, 73-64

11/15/11 at #4 Texas A&M College Station, Texas L, 76-58

11/17/11 at Eastern Kentucky Richmond, Ky. W, 77-53

11/20/11 vs. XAVIER KFC YUM! CENTER W, 62-44

11/22/11 vs. AUSTIN PEAY KFC YUM! CENTER W, 78-60

11/25/11 at #24 Florida State Tallahassee, Fla. W, 85-76

11/26/11 at Florida A&M Tallahassee, Fla. W, 86-66

11/29/11 vs. MURRAY STATE KFC YUM! CENTER W, 105-62

DECEMBER

12/04/11 at Kentucky Lexington, Ky. L, 74-54

12/10/11 vs. GARDNER-WEBB KFC YUM! CENTER W, 92-27

12/14/11 at Cincinnati # Cincinnati, Ohio W, 64-59

12/17/11 at Portland Portland, Ore. W, 71-42

12/19/11 at Washington State Pullman, Wash. W, 75-71

12/28/11 vs. UT-MARTIN KFC YUM! CENTER W, 70-57

JANUARY

01/03/12 vs. MARQUETTE # KFC YUM! CENTER W, 70-53

01/08/12 at St. John’s # TV Queens, N.Y. L, 72-64

01/11/12 vs. SOUTH FLORIDA # KFC YUM! CENTER W, 63-57

01/14/12 at Rutgers # Piscataway, N.J. L, 68-71 (OT)

01/18/12 vs. PROVIDENCE # KFC YUM! CENTER W, 64-48

01/22/12 at Georgetown # Washington D.C. W, 64-61

01/28/12 vs. VILLANOVA # KFC YUM! CENTER W, 62-58

01/31/12 at DePaul # TV Chicago, Ill. L, 86-61

FEBRUARY

02/04/12 at West Virginia # Morgantown, W.Va. L, 66-50

02/07/12 vs. CONNECTICUT # TV KFC YUM! CENTER L, 56-46

02/11/12 vs. SYRACUSE # KFC YUM! CENTER W, 89-62

02/14/12 at Pittsburgh # Pittsburgh, Pa. 7:00 p.m.

02/20/12 vs. NOTRE DAME # TV KFC YUM! CENTER 2:00 p.m.

02/25/12 vs. DEPAUL # TV KFC YUM! CENTER 12:00 p.m.

02/27/12 at Seton Hall # South Orange, N.J. 7:00 p.m.

MARCH

BIG EAST CHAMPIONSHIP: Hartford, Conn.

03/02-8/12 TBD TBA


WOMEN’S BASKETBALL

By Howie LindseyDown 33-12 in the fi rst half, No. 17/20

Louisville appeared to be speeding toward a 40-point loss against No. 3 Connecticut last Tuesday night at the KFC Yum! Center. But a second-half comeback not only made a game of it, but made UConn coach Geno Auriemma and the Huskies sweat out a 56-46 victory.

“That was a diffi cult game to sit and watch, I don’t know what it felt like to play in it,” Auriemma said. “It was diffi cult to watch, but at the same time, sometimes you get caught in those kinds of games and you have to fi gure out a way to win it. We made just enough good plays at the end.”

Louisville cut the UConn lead to 46-40 with just over fi ve minutes left before the Huskies secured the win in the fi nal two minutes. The Cardinals held UConn to a season-low 56 points and forced 20 turn-overs.

“We lost and now we are 6-5 in the league, but I’m really proud of the effort,” UofL coach Jeff Walz said. “I thought we came out and competed for 40 minutes. We couldn’t buy a bucket in the fi rst half, we missed point-blank layups to start the game, and you can’t do that if you want to win in the Big East.”

The bigger, more physical Huskies are used to getting big early leads and see-ing teams relent under their tough pressure defense. But Louisville didn’t wilt.

“Yeah, I mean, we see it, we know when teams give up,” UConn guard Caroline Doty said. “That’s usually when we crank it up and put the game away, but Louisville just kept coming back at us, and that is a credit to them.”

It is also a credit to Walz, who devised a game plan to make the game ugly and force UConn’s non-shooters to take the ma-jority of the shots.

“We have got to follow the game plan,” Walz said when asked what he told his team at halftime. “They are such a good team that you have got to pick your poison on what you are going to do. I sat there and told our team before the game started, ̀ You want me to put a game plan together that will allow us to not lose by 40 or do you want me to put a game plan together that gives us a chance to win?’”

The Cards went out and followed the game plan, especially in the second half.

“They’ve had a tough run of it with two

of their top scorers going out and losing the two games before this one,” Auriemma said of Louisville. “Jeff did what he had to do to try to win this game. If it was a pretty game running up and down the court, they aren’t going to win like that, so they made it tough.”

It was a brutal game at both ends of the court, with a smaller Louisville squad bat-tling to outrebound the Huskies 42-38.

The Cards stuck with the Huskies for a while in the fi rst half. Despite missing 8 of their fi rst 10 shots, the Cardinals were down just 7-6 at the fi rst media timeout because of strong rebounding.

After Louisville cut the margin to 9-8, UConn launched an 11-0 run to crack open the game. A three by Kelly Faris made it 12-8 with 11:51 left, and a three by Tif-fany Hayes made it 15-8 two possessions later. Another Louisville turnover - their sixth in just 10 minutes - gave Kiah Stokes a layup in transition to increase UConn’s lead to nine.

Another three, this time by Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis, made it 20-8 with 9:42 left. Because UConn’s defense is so tough, the Huskies can go from up by one to up by 12 in a couple of minutes, and that is what they did. UConn led 33-17 at the half as the

Cardinals hit just 5 of 31 shots and commit-ted 13 turnovers in the half.

Louisville’s fi ghting spirit emerged in the second half. The Cardinals fell behind by 20 early in the second half but began to chip away at UConn’s lead.

The difference was “that we just needed to pick it up on defense, to be honest with you,” Shoni Schimmel said. “We were do-ing exactly what we needed to do. We just needed to stay together and continue to go after them. We threw the fi rst punch, and we kept going at them.”

Despite the loss, the Cardinals can cer-tainly build on their performance in the sec-ond half against one of the most talented teams in America.

“Just for us to go out there and com-pete like we did today with UConn being ranked third in the nation is good for us,” Schimmel said. “We know how good we can be, so for us to just continue to grow and evaluate after this game is going to be big for us.”

Said freshman guard Bria Smith, “I think we can just keep working on our defense and pretty much just take this game as a learning experience and just get up for ev-ery game and work hard.”

The Cards also can take heart that fresh-

man McDonald’s All-American forward SaraHammond broke out of her slump. She had10 points and knocked down several foul-line jumpers in the middle of the UConndefense.

“Coach has been giving me opportuni-ties, so I’ve got to take advantage of thoseopportunities,” Hammond said. “It’s notabout the offensive side. He challenges uson the defensive side, and especially for theposts to get rebounds. So when I went inthere, that’s what I was looking for. The of-fense came after a while because I was hus-tling and trying to go after the boards andmy teammates were getting me open.”

Walz said with center Cierra Warren hav-ing left the team, Louisville needs all thehelp it can get, especially from Hammond.

“We need her to keep building and im-proving,” he said. “She is the type of playerthat just takes a little bit longer than it doessome freshmen to adjust to the collegegame. You can’t survive on what you didin high school; you can’t just outjump ev-eryone. She wants to work and to continueto get better. I think she will get better be-cause she wants to.”

Schimmel fi nished with 20 points in ad-dition to Hammond’s 10. No other UofLplayer had more than four points. Schim-mel also had eight rebounds and three as-sists (eight turnovers) in 40 minutes played.For UConn, four players scored eight ormore, but only Doty reached double fi gureswith 15. Hayes had nine points and 11 re-bounds.

WARREN GONEA 6-foot-4 junior center who transferred

to Louisville from North Carolina, Warrenwas struggling in recent weeks to catch upwith the pace of her teammates in practice.That struggle came to a head earlier thismonth when a players-only team meetingresulted in Warren’s packing her bags.

“The girls had a team meeting after the DePaul game and they were like, ‘Hey, thisis not acceptable. We have to go harderand push ourselves,’” Walz said. “Cierradecided she didn’t want to work that hard.She came into my offi ce the next day andsaid, ‘I think I am going to quit.’ That’s herchoice. We just have to move on. That’s allyou can do.”

Warren was fourth on the team in scor-ing at 8.0 points a game and was second inrebounding at 4.5 a game.

CARDS’ COMEBACK NOT ENOUGH VS. NO. 3 UCONN

Sophomore Shoni Schimmel scored 20 points and sparked a second-half

comeback, but the Cards fell to No. 3 Connecticut 56-46 last Tuesday after

trimming a 21-point, fi rst-half defi cit to 46-40 with

just over fi ve minutes left. - photo by Darrell Russell


CARDINAL STARSBECKY BURKE - WOMEN’S BASKETBALLThe senior from Clark’s Summit, Pa., hit a school-record eight three-pointers and scored a career-high 28 points to help No. 17/20 Louisville blow out Syracuse 89-62 last Saturday at the KFC Yum! Center. Burke hit 8 of 15 threes and 9 of 16 shots overall. She also hit both her free throws, grabbed four rebounds, had three assists and a steal with just one turnover in 38 minutes. “After I hit my fi rst three, I think everybody kind of gave a sigh of relief,” said Burke, who had been in a shooting slump recently.

SHONI SCHIMMEL - WOMEN’S BASKETBALLHad Burke not had a career day, the big story from Louisville’s 27-point victory over Syracuse would have been Schimmel. The sophomore from Mission, Ore., hit 6 of 10 threes and two free throws to score 20 points. She also had 10 assists, fi ve steals and four rebounds with four turnovers in 33 minutes. She is Louisville’s leading scorer this season at 14.3 points per game. She also is averaging 4.5 assists and 4.3 rebounds per game. She leads the team in assists and is second in steals with 50 to Bria Smith’s 51.

TORI COLLINS - SOFTBALLThe senior from Lafayette, Ind, had a career-high 13 strikeouts to help Louisville beat Massachusetts 2-0 Sunday in Miami. Collins scattered three hits in 6 1/3 innings, with three base on balls. Collins had three wins over the weekend and was named Big East Softball Pitcher of the Week Monday. A 5-foot-10 lefty, Collins posted a 16-12 record last season with a 2.19 ERA and 184 strikeouts in 185 innings. She was named to the All-Big East Tournament team and tossed back-to-back complete-game shutouts in the quarterfi nals and semifi nals of the Big East Tournament. She has 44 career wins (44-19).

TANNER FOWLER - SOFTBALLThe sophomore from Morganfi eld, Ky., was named to the Big East Softball Honor Roll Monday. Fowler started all fi ve games at catcher, fi rst base or designated hitter last weekend and led the Cardinals offensively, batting .500 (8 for 16) with two home runs, fi ve RBIs and three runs. She had three multi-hit games, including a 3-for-3 performance in the 4-1 victory over Michigan State. Fowler also registered an .875 slugging percentage and .500 on-base percentage. The Cardinals (5-0) will travel to Greenville, N.C., Friday through Sunday for the East Carolina Pirate Clash.

ALBERT WAGNER - MEN’S TENNISThe freshman from Amberg, Germany, was crucial to Louisville’s 5-2 victory over Clemson Saturday night at the Bass-Rudd Tennis Center. Playing at No. 4 singles, Wagner beat Clemson’s Cedric Willems 6-1, 6-3 to earn Louisville’s third point of the match. Wagner also teamed with Andew Carter to win the No. 2 doubles match and secure the doubles point for the Cardinals. “If I had to choose an MVP of the match, it would have to be Albert Wagner for his play at No. 4,” said coach Rex Ecarma. Wagner was ranked 16th in Germany as a high school senior and was No. 209 in the World Junior Rankings. He competed with the German National team as a U12, U14, U16 and U18 player.

SARAH MILLER - WOMEN’S TENNISThe senior from Melbourne, Australia, clinched Louisville’s fourth point to win the match against Furman Saturday at the Bass-Rudd Tennis Center. Miller, who earlier teamed with Mandy Brown to win the No. 3 doubles match 9-7, won as the No. 5 seed, 6-2, 6-1 over Furman’s Alex Moreno. The Cardinals swept Furman 7-0 to improve to 3-3 on the season. “This was a great win today,” UofL women’s coach Mark Beckham said. “This is the type of team that we have lost to the past couple of years. For us to get a breakthrough win will help our confi dence as a team as a whole. Furman has been ranked, but that is irrelevant because just the fact that we beat a high-quality team and beat them convincingly can do nothing but help everyone’s individual confi dence as well.”

MICHAEL EDWARDS - MEN’S TRACK AND FIELDThe redshirt junior from Manchester, England, won the high jump at the Hoosier Hills Invitational on the campus of Indiana University Friday night. Edwards cleared seven feet for the third time this season, winning his third competition in the high jump after leaping 2.16m/7 feet, 1 inch. Currently, his season-opening mark of 2.20m/7-2 1/2 ranks 14th nationally. Teammate Taylor Caldwell placed third in the high jump, clearing 2.06m/6-9.

MILLERMILLER

EDWARDSEDWARDS

SCHIMMELSCHIMMEL

COLLINSCOLLINS

BURKEBURKE

FOWLERFOWLER

WAGNERWAGNER

HOWIE LINDSEY’SHOWIE LINDSEY’S

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KEEP UP ON ALL THE LATEST CARDINAL NEWS!AMERICA’S FOREMOST AUTHORITY ON UofL ATHLETICS

NO NAME HT WT POS CL HOMETOWN (PREVIOUS SCHOOL)

1 Angel Nunez 6-7 190 F FR Washington Heights, N.Y. (Notre Dame Prep)

2 Russ Smith 6-0 160 G SO Brooklyn, N.Y. (Archbishop Molloy/South Kent)

3 Peyton Siva 6-0 180 G JR Seattle, Wash. (Franklin)

4 Rakeem Buckles 6-7 215 F JR Miami, Fla. (Monsignor Pace)

5 Chris Smith 6-2 195 G SR Millstone, N.J. (Manhattan)

10 Gorgui Dieng 6-11 235 C SO Kebemer, Senegal (Covenant/Huntington Prep)

11 Luke Hancock 6-6 200 F JR Roanoke, Va. (George Mason)

12 Zach Price 6-10 235 C FR Louisville, Ky. (Jeffersontown)

14 Kyle Kuric 6-4 195 G/F SR Evansville, Ind. (Memorial)

15 Tim Henderson 6-2 185 G SO Louisville, Ky. (Christian Academy)

21 Jared Swopshire 6-8 200 F RS JR St. Louis, Mo. (IMG Academy)

22 Elisha Justice 5-10 175 G SO Dorton, Ky. (Shelby Valley)

23 Kevin Ware 6-3 185 G FR Conyers, Ga. (Rockdale County)

24 Chane Behanan 6-6 245 F FR Cincinnati, Ohio (Bowling Green)

25 Wayne Blackshear 6-5 225 G/F FR Chicago, Ill. (Morgan Park)

33 Mike Marra 6-5 200 G JR Smithfi eld, R.I. (Northfi eld Mt. Hermon School)

44 Stephan Van Treese 6-8 235 F JR Indianapolis, Ind. (Lawrence North)

2 0 1 1 - 1 2 M E N ’ S B A S K E T B A L L R O S T E R

LOUISVILLE SPORTSREPORT FEBRUARY 16, 2012 L

OUIS

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PAID

LOUISVILLE SPORTSREPORT’S CARDINAL KIDS

Reid Justice, son of Kelly and Jason Justice, is a young Cardinal Kid.

Cardinal Kid Cora Kirby enjoyed a home football game from her end zone seat.

Derek Collins’ daughter, Devyn, posed for a quick picture in front

of the big Cardinal Bird head on the front of the KFC Yum! Center.

Presley Emerson, 6 years old, loves having

season tickets to watch Cards basketball!

Alex and Aden Edwards enjoyed their fi rst Louisville game at the KFC Yum! Center.

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feb. 16 issue: louisville sports report

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