It's pretty much impossible for me to keep up with every team USF has because of a) my location (I basically can only watch football and men's basketball games), b) my amount of free time (I have a wife and a career in addition to this), and c) my attention span (not very long). So I'll try and at least sum up what's going on in the other active sports on campus every week.
Since I'm going to be talking about women's sports, now is a good time to remind you that the women's teams are also called the Bulls. No Lady Bulls. A lady bull is a cow. We don't have cows. Good talk.
And I'm not forgetting about baseball. I don't want that to be a sport that gets no attention but it will be hard for me to cover. Trying to find someone who might be able to help with that.
- Women's basketball - USF faces basically an NCAA tournament elimination game at Marquette tomorrow night. At 13-9 and 4-5 in the Big East, maybe every game is an elimination game at this point - there are only 16 conference games in women's basketball. The Bulls lost to Rutgers 60-52 on Saturday. Jessica Lawson went 11-for-14 and scored 33 points; the rest of the team went 6-for-37 and scored 19.
If you want to watch tomorrow night's game, it's on CBS College Sports at 9:00pm Eastern time. I might take a shot at recapping that game, depends on if I feel good enough about my observations.
- Softball - Believe it or not, softball season is upon us, and for over a decade it's been one of the strongest sports on campus. The Bulls start the 2010 season on Friday as they host the USF Wilson-DeMarini Tournament in Clearwater. The Bulls play a total of five games this weekend against Canisius, Illinois State, Florida (Saturday at 3:00pm), East Carolina, and Georgia Tech.
One benefit of being a southern softball team - the Bulls play 32 of their first 36 games at home. And I'm glad that the athletics district is finally going to take care of their stadium situation. It will be built at the same time that Red McEwen Field is being rebuilt. Since it will be on a different site, the team can still use their pitiful current digs for one more year. There are high schools with nicer stadiums than our softball team, and I'm not kidding.
- Track and Field - Not many places to run outside this time of year, so the Bulls went inside in State College, PA at the Sykes-Sabock Challenge Cup. Both the men's and women's team finished fourth in their competitions. The men won the 4x400 relay and several individuals qualified for the Big East indoor championships in two weeks. Then everyone went to shovel snow out from underneath the tires of their bus after State College picked up 14 inches during Snowmageddon. (H/T: USF athletics.)
- Golf - Both teams return to action later this month after the winter layoff. The women head to Miami to take part in the Qdoba Invitational from February 14-16, while the men go to Mobile for the Mobile Bay Intercollegiate tournament between February 21-23.
- Tennis - The men's team dropped a 7-0 decision at Florida State on Saturday. (I understand that the score is how many matches each team wins through some combination of singles and doubles. But I spent a good 15 minutes trying to find the scoring rules and failed. If anyone knows them, send them in and I'll make you as famous as I can for someone with a fledgling blog.) They have a nice tune-up match with unranked UT-San Antonio on Friday, with matches against Florida and Miami looming at the end of the month.
The women also fell 7-0 earlier today against Florida, who is ranked in the top 10. (Tennis rankings are handled for the NCAA by ITA - Florida is ranked #7, while the Bulls come in at #43. If you were wondering, the men's team is ranked 42nd.) The women's team has the week off before hosting N.C. State on February 19.