All Entries Tagged With: "Notre Dame"

Lady Cards Host Wounded Notre Dame

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Bandwagon Time

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Ready? Another Big East Title Game

No way to really measure the effect of all the rain, delayed games and the reshuffling of the  Big East Tournament schedule on the University of Louisville baseball team.

Took a toll, no doubt, on all the teams … and their fans. The slow pace of baseball sometimes just makes you want to forget about the sport, and we probably would were U of L not involved and winning. Which is worst, the slow pace of baseball or frenetic grind of NBA basketball?

Coach Dan McDonnell had no choice but to again use Justin Marks, the Big East pitcher of the year, with Notre Dame taking batting practice against the U of L pitching staff.

Marks was not immune from the onslaught, giving up three hits, two bases on balls, and two runs in the final three innings.

But Marks had just enough left, with Notre Dame runners dancing off second and third, to strike out one final batter, giving Louisville a 7-6 win over the Irish.

Third straight trip in as many years to the Big East Baseball Tournament championship game.

UConn awaits in the on-deck circle. Game time 11 a.m.

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9 a.m. Baseball Alert

Storms continued in Clearwater, Fla. Friday, forcing postponement of the University of Louisville’s next game to 9 a.m. Saturday. The Cards will play their second straight game against Notre Dame.

The schedule is more than a little complicated but the 1 – 4 p.m. time slot on ESPN-U will not be occupied by Louisville, no matter how the 9 a.m. game turns out.

And if Notre Dame should win, guess who the Cards will play a third consecutive time?

Here’s the revised revised schedule:

Saturday, May 23:
Game 11:  No. 1 Louisville vs. No. 5 Notre Dame, 9 AM
Game 12:  No. 6 Connecticut vs. Game 10 (USF/WVU) winner, 1 PM (LIVE TV:  ESPNU)
Game 13:  Game 11 winner vs. Game 11 loser  (if necessary), 5 PM
Game 14:  Game 12 winner vs. Game 12 loser (if necessary), 8 PM

Sunday, May 24:
Game 15:  Semifinal winners, 10 AM or 1 PM (based on the results of Saturday’s contests)

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Collateral Damage

Either something died on the way to South Bend, or this was the long overdue letdown after all the close ones. The good news is that Notre Dame missed a lot of shots that it usually makes against Louisville.

This third trimester abortion of a team’s effort may have cost U of L any possibility of:

– Landing a No. 2 seed in the NCAA Tournament

– Terrence Williams being named conference player of the year.

– The switch turning on for Earl Clark.

– Remaining in the top 15 in the national polls.

– Any intimidation factor for the rest of the schedule.

Was it a case of a team embracing what it had accomplished during the 10-game winning streak, thinking it had arrived when the coach was telling them otherwise, brushing the advice aside as just more Pitino talk, the coach and part-time comedian who keeps the local media in stitiches during pre-game press conferences.

Or it could have just been an aberration, one of those things that sometimes happens to good teams. Veteran fans can remember a team getting pummeled 99-59 by Xavier during the 1955-56 season but winning the rest of the its games, including what was then college basketball’s biggest prize in the post season.

But that was a long time ago, and it’s difficult to imagine anything so grand happening this season.

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