By Morgan Davenport
The Louisville Cardinals won a thrilling match against the Creighton Blue Jays along with a swept of the Northern Iowa Panthers for a great showing in the Cardinal Classic.
Business as usual
The Cards started off the weekend on a positive note with a clean sweep against Northern Iowa. The first two sets of the match were tight. The incredible defense played by Cara Cresse gave the Cardinals what they needed to secured a win in set one.
Louisville won the first set 25-23.
Charitie Luper also set the Cardinals up for success as she hit an impressive .600, getting six kills on ten attempts. The Cardinals managed to escape a UNI lead and fight back to take the second set 27-25.
Cresse finished the match with a pair of kills to win the third set 25-15, completing the sweep.
Loose in the middle
The Cardinals then faced the Blue Jays Sunday in a rematch of last season’s Sweet Sixteen match. This game started off extraordinarily strong for Louisville as they won the first two sets with ease, winning set one 25-18 and set two 25-20.
It seemed during the third set as though the Cards were looking staring down another sweep. However, everything seemed to crumble soon after.
After subbing in mostly backups, the Cardinals lost the third set 25-10 and it was not looking good for them. Louisville only had six kills in the set and hit -.098.
Creighton once again took a lead on the Cards to start set four. By the middle of the fourth, it looked like Louisville finally got their momentum back but they could not keep up after Creighton went on a 5-0 run.
The Blue Jays took set four 25-15.
In the end, Louisville handled the fifth set after re-gaining their momentum from sets one and two. They took control right from the start and managed to hold their ground. MVP of the weekend, Luper helped bring the team to victory getting four kills along with Anna DeBeer’s kill at match point.
The Cardinals won the set 15-8, giving them the match 3-2.
While this was a rough game, the Cardinals ended up with another top-10 victory marking their second of the season.
Louisville is now 7-1 on the season, and will face hated-rivals Kentucky on Wednesday in Lexington.
Photo Courtesy // Taris Smith, Louisville Athletics
