Wednesday afternoon Cardinal news and notes

—The Louisville baseball team snapped its seven-game losing streak with an 18-5 throttling of Northern Kentucky Tuesday night. The Cards now need to sweep Florida State this weekend to guarantee themselves a spot in next week’s ACC tournament.

—Tom Fornelli of CBS ranks all 69 power conference college football coaches, and has Jeff Brohm at No. 33. Scott Satterfield, for those interested, checks in at No. 54.

—Nice video summary of Monday night here:

—Mike DeCourcy says that ACC schools can daydream about leaving league, but there’s nowhere to go and no way to get there.

—Do ticket prices drive hoops attendance? One school official says no.

—Former U of L volleyball stars Tori Dilfer-Stringer and Anna Hall have been named to the USA Volleyball roster for the 2023 Volleyball Nations League.

—Chane Behanan has joined the Louisville team for this summer’s TBT squad, becoming the fourth starter from the 2013 national championship team to sign on.

—Eric Crawford writes about the current dysfunction amongst the ACC’s member institutions.

—The Washington Mystics have waived former Cardinals Jazmine Jones and Emily Engstler.

—William Bridges snapped these photos at Denny Crum’s 600th career victory game and wanted the Chronicloids to see them:

—We have a major late entry into the transfer portal in UC Riverside guard Zyon Pullin, who averaged 18.3 ppg, 4.4 rpg and 4.2 apg last season.

—The ACC is close to adopting a new unequal revenue distribution model, quieting concerns (primarily from Florida State) about the conference’s stability — for now.

—The Sporting News ranks the 25 best quarterbacks in college football for the upcoming season. Louisville will face two of them.

—We’re gonna get you paid.

—College basketball needs to bring back BracketBusters.

—Kentucky-based Country Boy Brewing is opening a new tap room in downtown Louisville.

—ACC hoops coaches are once again talking NCAA tournament expansion, and I am once again triggered.

“Steve [Forbes] brought up a couple of years ago, he scheduled Oregon State, they had gone to the Elite Eight the year before, they had four starters back, and they won four games that year,” Pitt basketball coach Jeff Capel said. “You know what I mean? I don’t think anyone anticipated Louisville just winning four games. It’s tough. It’s harder now because there’s way more parity.”

Clemson was on the bubble on Selection Sunday and did not make the NCAA tournament because it lacked enough quality wins. Coach Brad Brownell said that because of the metrics that are used, he now has found himself rooting for league teams in nonconference play to help boost the entire league.

“Sometimes early on when I was here, you know, your first couple of years, you’re watching games, and you’re not necessarily always rooting real hard for your opponents in the league, but now you want them all to win all their games,” Brownell said. “When we get to January and February, we’re going to try to kick each other’s teeth in, but in November and December, we need to cheer with pompoms for each other, because that’s what it is right now. That’s what it’s become. It’s become such a metric-driven situation.”

1. Ever since the tournament expanded to 64 teams, it’s always been in every team’s best interest for the other teams in their conference to do well. This has always been a “metric-driven situation,” the metric just switched from the RPI to a more reliable formula.

2. If ACC coaches want more ACC teams in the NCAA tournament, then ACC teams need to not suck absolute ass in November and December like they have the last two years. Pretty simple.

3. You don’t get to complain about not hearing your name called on Selection Sunday when you lost to a 4-28 team by double digits. I’m pretty sure James Naismith actually made that rule.

—The Athletic’s John Hollinger ranks the 20 best players for the upcoming NBA draft.

—U of L has offered JUCO tight end Dallen Bentley.

—Nick Burdi’s journey back to The Show is finally complete.

—After a few weeks of betting, BetOnline has upped Louisville football’s over/under win total for 2023 from 7.5 to 8.

—Louisville’s Ashlee Northington, the owner and executive chef of Happy Belly Bistro, will be competing on Guy Fieri’s Grocery Games on Wednesday, May 24, at 9 p.m. on the Food Network.

—It’s game day for Racing Louisville, which hosts the Kansas City Current in an NWSL Challenge Cup match at 7:30 p.m. ET tonight at Lynn Family Stadium.

—Soccer Holdings, LLC — the parent company of Racing Louisville FC — has pledged support toward the newly launched Hamida Nadim Memorial Fund, which honors the late mother of Racing forward Nadia Nadim.

When the Taliban executed her husband, Hamida Nadim and her children fled Afghanistan, eventually settling at a refugee camp in Denmark. There, Nadia Nadim discovered soccer, marking the beginning of what would become a stellar professional and star-studded international career.

Following Hamida Nadim’s death last November in a tragic traffic accident, this memorial fund will aid refugee families led by single mothers as they newly settle in Louisville.

“My mom really cared about people, and all my life she was always working to help others,” Nadia Nadim said. “She raised five kids alone and did it with grace. Empathy and compassion are qualities she instilled in me, along with being a strong woman — a fighter.

“This fund in honor of her is a great, great thing, and I love that we’re going to help families similar to mine right here in Louisville. When you’re struggling, in that moment a little bit can go a long way. This fund is a beautiful way to honor my mom’s memory.”

—EA Sports has partnered with OneTeam to facilitate athletes’ names and likenesses in the 2024 college football video game.

—With reports swirling about seven members of the ACC trying to break out of the league’s grant of rights deal, where does the conference go from here?

—Or maybe that whole rumor is just a gigantic nothingburger.

I hate conference realignment with every fiber of my being.

—Florida Atlantic’s players became attractive to high-major programs during the Final Four run. There was tampering and talk of big NIL offers. Not one guy left. Refreshing story from The Athletic here.

—Big Red Louie talked to Danilo Jovanovich’s former coach about what the surprise addition to Kenny Payne’s second team will be bringing to U of L.

“He absolutely wanted to be at Louisville, his former coach says. He wanted to play for Kenny and wanted to be a Louisville Cardinal. He can play in any system – as smooth a low post scoring forward as there is – long with solid vertical athleticism.

He will be great with KP and exceptional for the overall culture and in helping develop a winning tough culture at Louisville. Kid is a Class A+ character guy as well off the court – outstanding young man.”

—From the Pink Seats catches up with Jonathan Greenard.

—Cool Louisville Bats press in The Athletic here.

—Days later, this is all still a lot to handle.

—Four-star wide receiver James Madison has scheduled a return trip to Louisville.

—Louisville native Justin Thomas will start the defense of his PGA Championship title tomorrow in Rochester.

—Billionaire booster Mike Repole is all-in on St. John’s after the hiring of Rick Pitino.

—Rick Bozich writes about former Louisville basketball players challenging the Cardinal fan base to support Kenny Payne.

“I’m talking to those who are in here tonight, those who are watching the streaming and those you may talk to.

“Last year was tough. But (Coach Crum) came to every game that he could to support the program. (Health issues limited Crum to two games.)

“Times are (trending) up. We’re going in the right direction. But, please, I say this from the bottom of my heart, because to have Coach Crum witness what we’ve witnessed over the last five years, I just felt for him. I really did.

“But times are changing. We’re on our way. So celebrate Coach Crum’s life. But more importantly, anything he would love, in talking to coach and asking coach, ‘What do you think about the (upcoming) season?’

“He said, ‘The season should be good. I hope the people show up.’

“I’ll leave you with this: For Coach Crum, if you want to be a fan that he created generationally, grandkids, people who are now in their ‘70s and ‘80s, the same years as Coach Crum, people who went through that 30-year process to build this program into one of the top programs in the country — show up from here on out for Coach Crum. Fill the seats up.”

I love Griff and I’ll always love Griff, but people have to stop with the “last five years” narrative.

Five years ago, the preseason projections for Louisville were similar to the ones we saw a year ago, and that team made the NCAA tournament easily as a No. 7 seed. Four years ago, the Cards were the No. 1 team in the country at one point and would have been a top 4 seed if there had been an NCAA tournament. Three years ago, the team appeared to be safely in the NCAA tournament for nearly the entire year and almost certainly would have been had COVID pauses not crushed them. Two years ago was an unmitigated disaster and yet we somehow still won more than three times as many games as we did in 2022-23.

The attendance last season was the lowest in any our lifetimes because the team was the worst in any of our lifetimes. I don’t think we’re ever going to see Cardinal hoops attendance get back to the way it was where every single game was 19,000+ at Freedom Hall or 20,000+ at the Yum Center, but if the team gets back to top 25 good, the attendance will almost certainly return to top three good.

—We have to start recruiting moms better.

—The Brady Allen transfer to Louisville makes sense for a couple of reasons.

—The U of L men’s golf team is in a tie for seventh place after two rounds of the Morgan Hill Regional. The Cards need to finish in the top five in order to advance to the next stage of the NCAA Championships.

—And finally, the Mike Rutherford Show returns this afternoon from 3-6 on 1450AM/96.1FM The Big X. You can stream it here.