Hailey van Lith made waves when she decided to enter the transfer portal, later joining the LSU Tigers. But it seems like van Lith has no love lost for her former school, the Louisville Cardinals. During the Sunday Selection show, van Lith caused a bit of an uproar when she smiled and laughed out loud when Louisville drew Middle Tennessee in the women's NCAA Tournament, saying that “Middle Tennessee is gonna whoop they a**.”

Now, van Lith's joking remarks have become prescient; on Friday night, 11-seed Middle Tennessee pulled off a stunning upset victory via a rousing comeback against six-seed Louisville, winning 71-69 despite being down by 18 earlier in the contest.

This comeback from 18 down is tied for the third-biggest comeback in women's NCAA Tournament history, and as a result of Louisville's humongous choke job, many fans are hailing Hailey van Lith as some sort of oracle, foreshadowing what was the Cardinals' eventual demise in the first round of March Madness.

Now that Hailey van Lith has been proven right in her prediction, the goal now for her is to help the LSU Tigers at all costs to win the national championship. At the very least, LSU was able to take the first step in doing so, as the three-seed Tigers took care of business against the 14-seed Rice Owls, 70-60.

Does the LSU star have any beef with her former school?

Hailey van Lith burst onto the scene as a fledging guard for Louisville; in fact, she was committed to the Cardinals' basketball program, spending three seasons there after choosing them over Baylor in what was a heated recruitment process. However, last year, van Lith decided to leave the program as a non-contact transfer, which meant that she could reach out to other schools to try and get them to pick her up from the portal.

van Lith, however, doesn't seem to have burnt any bridges with Louisville. David Suggs of Sporting News outlined three reasons for van Lith's decision to transfer to LSU. First, the 22-year old guard believed that playing for the Tigers represents her best chance at winning the national title. Second, van Lith and Kim Mulkey are closely familiar with one another, with the latter almost recruiting the former to Baylor back in 2020. Lastly, van Lith is set to make more NIL money as a member of the LSU program.

Thus, this lends more credence to the idea that Hailey van Lith was merely playing around when she made that prediction back in the Selection Sunday show.

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Hailey Van Lith in a TCU basketball uniform on right, Angel Reese in a Chicago Sky uniform on left.

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LSU/TCU women's basketball player Hailey Van Lith, with the Texas Christian University campus in the background, and question marks surrounding Hailey

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Louisville vs. Middle Tennessee, a stunning upset

It's not like the Louisville Cardinals program was terrible when Hailey van Lith was playing for them. Over the past three seasons, the Cardinals have at least made the Elite Eight, making it as far as the Final Four in 2022. But the Cardinals have struggled with getting over the hump, which played a part in van Lith's decision to transfer to LSU.

The Cardinals program has been trending down, and van Lith may have merely escaped a sinking ship. Louisville was a one-seed in 2021, a two-seed in 2022, and then a five-seed in 2023; this year, without the 22-year old guard, they have fallen to sixth, and Middle Tennessee promptly sent them packing with a major comeback victory.

For Middle Tennessee, the two-woman punch of Jalynn Gregory and Savannah Wheeler brought them back from the brink of elimination, proving van Lith right.