March 29 (UPI) -- The women's Final Four is set after sophomore Hailey Van Lith scored a game-high 22 points Monday night to lead Louisville past Michigan in the Elite Eight and punch their ticket to Minneapolis.
The top-seeded Cardinals (29-4) shot 43.1% and forced 22 turnovers in the 62-50 triumph at Intrust Bank Arena in Wichita, Kan. The No. 3 Wolverines (25-7) shot just 34.8% in the loss.
"We really focus on [defense]," Van Lith told reporters. "Coach preaches it to us. No matter what happens on the offensive end, if it's the worst night of our lives, we can do down on the defensive end and get stops.
"Defense is something we can always control and we've bought into it this year."
The women's Final Four in Minneapolis -- Louisville, South Carolina, Connecticut and defending champion Stanford -- begins on Friday. Apart from Louisville, the women's Final Four has the same teams it had last year.
The Cardinals will play No. 1 overall seed South Carolina in the first national semifinal, and Stanford will play UConn in the other.
"I thought it was a great college basketball game," Louisville coach Jeff Walz told reporters. "They continued to fight. ... There was never any quit in them. Overall, it was just a great basketball game."
Louisville started the game on a 9-3 run and took a 17-13 advantage into the second quarter. The Wolverines used an 8-2 run to get within one point of tying the game, but still trailed 30-27 at halftime.
The Cardinals answered with an 8-2 run at the start of the third and took a 45-43 edge into the fourth.
Michigan's Naz Hillmon made a free throw to cut the deficit to two points with 5:40 remaining, but Louisville scored 10 unanswered points to end the game and secure the win.
Louisville guards Chelsie Hall and Kianna Smith scored 15 and 11 points, respectively, in the victory. Hillmon totaled 18 points and 11 rebounds for Michigan in the loss.
The Cardinals face the Gamecocks at the Target Center in Minneapolis at 7 p.m. EDT Friday. The 2-seeded UConn Huskies, who beat top-seeded North Carolina State earlier Monday, will play 1 seed Stanford at 9:30 p.m. Both games will be broadcast on ESPN.
The winners will meet in the National Championship game on Sunday at 8 p.m. on ESPN.
