Easily the most impressive sight from the first day of the Big East baseball tournament at Bright House Field in Clearwater was boxing legend Muhammad Ali, who watched Wednesday night's Louisville-West Virginia game with his wife Lonnie from a second-level suite behind home plate.

Ali's son, Asaad, is a freshman on the Louisville baseball team, redshirting this season while working as the team's bullpen catcher. The Cardinals have tried this season not to draw huge attention to Ali's presence around the team, wanting Asaad to be able to establish his own identity.

"It's awesome," said Louisville's Ryan Wright, who had a three-run home run and five RBIs in Wednesday's 11-4 win. "Obviously some consider him the greatest athlete ever to live. He's been to a few (games) but it's still very neat. You watch TV, and you almost hear a Muhammad Ali reference every day, and you think 'Wow, that guy has seen a couple of our baseball games.' It means a lot."

The 68-year-old legend, born in Louisville, could have a team to cheer for all week here in Clearwater -- Louisville is the two-time defending champion and the top seed. Cardinals coach Dan McDonnell said it's an honor to have him watching, but he's tried to not let the attention shift away from Ali's son too much.

"Asaad makes a name for himself. He's well-respected, very popular," McDonnell said. "The kids enjoy being around him and he enjoys being in the program. He's worked very hard. He's in bullpen catcher mode, where you have to put your time in and it's a grind. He does it with a smile on his face and has a lot of fun. Our kids have built a relationship with Asaad. Nothing against Muhammad, but our kids like Asaad and are glad they're friends with him."

The younger Ali, from Berrien Springs, Mich., trained at IMG Academies in Bradenton last summer and said there that one of the reasons he chose Louisville was that they recruited him normally, while other programs showed up with his father's face on a T-shirt. McDonnell said if anything, he's probably tried too hard not to mention the freshman's famous father around the team.

"We have a lot of respect for his dad. We talk about great athletes all the time, as examples," he said. "We've used his dad in the past to motivate our kids, but I've tried to stay away from it this year. I've stood up in front of the kids and talked about certain athletes ... Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods or one of those guys ... being the greatest of all time. I've thought afterwards, 'I wonder if he's sitting there thinking, 'No, my dad's the greatest of all time.'"