A 2000 and 2001 graduate of the University of Louisville, I moved to St. Louis after graduation for a job. Still here, I may be the only person who reads the newspaper, but I do. Browsing the Post-Dispatch's website, a familiar logo in a story about local high school sports grabbed my eye:

via

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/high-school/boys-golf-fall/article_41dfa2d2-e952-11e0-bc0e-0019bb30f31a.html

I know I've seen this guy somewhere, but I just can't quite put my finger on it.

Alton High School is just across the Mississippi River north of town in Illinois, and apparently the home of shameless mascot thieves. That, or our beloved Cardinal bird is really an Alton Redbird and we've been fooling ourselves all these years.

I won't lie, this is pretty tough to watch:

Edgar Sosa suffered an apparently severe leg injury recently while playing for the Dominican Republic alongside fellow former Cardinal Francisco Garcia. Sosa, who was trying to improve his NBA prospects by playing for coach John Calipari and with several NBA players, was injured near the end of a lopsided victory over Panama.

I don't care what your feelings on Sosa were when he was playing for us, neither Good Edgar nor Bad Edgar deserved anything like this. I sincerely hope the man finds a way to recover from this injury with all due speed and finds himself playing basketball again as soon as possible.

Godspeed, Edgar.

http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20110610/SPORTS02/306100072/

It is unbelievable to me that UK passes up the great publicity and the prominence  that comes from playing your rival on the season's first weekend. If they were Florida State and we were Tallahassee Tech or lively college, I might understand a little more, but those schools are probably smart enough to desire the TV exposure.

I'm glad it makes UK feel better to beat up on a couple of patsies first, though.

From the rulebook: [ http://www.ncaapublications.com/productdownloads/BR11.pdf ]

Art. 9 Team followers, as in Rule 4-27, shall not commit an unsportsmanlike
act, including, but not limited to, the following:

Delaying the game by preventing the ball from being promptly made
live or by preventing continuous play, such as but not limited to,
followers entering the playing court before the player activity has
been terminated. When the delay does not interfere with play, it shall
be ignored. [emphasis mine]

So, a ref calling this game has the option of saying that an overzealous cheerleader did or did not "interfere" with play. Since most of the Pitt players were literally watching the ball bounce around and lollygagging their way back up the court, a reasonable person might conclude there was no interference. The one guy looking to inbound the ball had no one to throw the ball to anyway.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2G5Y16pUgow

With 0.3 seconds left, the only way Pitt could have gotten a shot to win was some foolishness like this. Great win by the Cards today, despite the actions of the Cheerbuddy.

I hope that when the refs get graded on their performance today they receive deplorable evaluations (not just for this call though).

A few weeks ago, I had a chance to go to a fundraiser for the Angel Tree project over at the St. Louis Rams' indoor practice facility. The main activity was a trivia night, which is always great fun. One of the side activities, though, was a field  goal kicking contest. For $10, you could kick field goals until you missed three of them. You started at the goal line and moved back 5 yards at a time with each made FG.

I won the contest by kicking a 40 yard field goal. I even kicked it barefooted.

Yes, I know it was indoors. Yes, I know I had all the time in the world. Yes, I know I got a perfect hold every time and there was no chance of a missed snap. But you know what? I put it over the crossbar and between the uprights from 40 yards. I barely missed from 45. However, I am a woefully out-of-shape 31 year old guy who never kicked a football with any coaching and last played soccer about 8 years ago. I'd say the advantages and the disadvantages pretty much balance themselves out.

So why, dear readers, can UofL not find and recruit a kicker who can make a FG with anything approaching regularity? Do we not even look at tape? Are we recruiting guys who kick the ball well in practice but fall apart in games? What is the problem here?

I wish I knew what our problem was. I'd offer to help, but I am devoid of suggestions. Maybe we can get Rob Bironas to run a summer camp and then funnel his best kids towards UofL. Maybe we can recruit a kid with all the mental toughness and leg strength and skill of Art Carmody every four years and we won't have to worry about it. I  hope thecoaching staff can figure something out, because our lack of kicking game hampers our ability to move the ball inside the red zone an undermines my faith in their ability to manage the roster effectively. All I know is that we should make more field goals because of one simple fact:

Really, truly, it's not that hard to  kick a field goal.