Racing Louisville spent a few days at home in between road matches before departing for its first West Coast trip of the 2024 NWSL campaign, with a 7:30 p.m. ET Saturday matchup at Portland on deck.
The match will be broadcast over the air on ION and streamed for free on ionnwsl.com. News Talk 1080 AM or online at talkradio1080.iheart.com, and the iHeart Radio app will carry the radio broadcast.
Racing (0-0-2, 2 points) opened the new season with back-to-back draws, first tying Orlando, 2-2, in its home opener at Lynn Family Stadium before settling for a 0-0 stalemate at Houston despite barraging the Dash with 19 shots and a number of clear scoring chances. The Louisvillians head to Portland still looking for their first win in the month of March in the club’s young history.
In years past, Portland’s Providence Park has been an unforgiving venue for Racing, which has lost all three games there with a minus-eight goal differential. Louisville snapped its five-game losing streak against Portland last year with a riveting 2-1 home win over the Thorns in September, thanks to goals from vice-captain Abby Erceg and former forward Thembi Kgatlana.
Portland (0-2-0, 0 points) dropped its season opener, 5-4, at Kansas City despite a furious second-half rally and two goals each from Sophia Smith and Janine Beckie. The Thorns lost, 1-0, against reigning NWSL champion Gotham on Sunday night, the first time Portland lost its home opener in club history after winning the previous 10.
One of the NWSL’s most successful clubs, Portland has made the playoffs in all but one year in its 10 previous NWSL seasons, winning three NWSL trophies. Smith, the 2022 NWSL MVP, led the Thorns to an NWSL championship that same season.
For Bev Yanez’s Racing squad, Saturday offers a big early-season test – a 2,000-mile journey to play in one of the league’s toughest environments. Portland is 20-7-8 in regular-season matches at Providence Park since 2021, averaging 17,231 fans per home game the past two years and setting a new home opener attendance record on Sunday with 19,857 on hand.
The first-year head coach was pleased with her team’s mentality and performance in Houston, the first road trip of the season, but wants Racing to be more ruthless in the attacking third of the field.
Opta Stats expected Louisville to score two goals at Houston, with four big chances and 10 shots on goal. Rookie forward Reilyn Turner matched a club record with eight shot attempts and set a new club mark with six of them on target. Racing produced a strong performance despite missing star midfielders Ary Borges and Savannah DeMelo and forward Kirsten Wright.
Saturday’s game will be the last before a break in NWSL play for a FIFA international window, with no games set for the weekend of April 5-7 before Racing returns home to Lynn Family Stadium for a big matchup against Alex Morgan and the San Diego Wave on April 13.
Follow along …
• For the starting lineup and in-game updates, follow @RacingLouFC on Twitter and Racing Louisville FC on Facebook. You can also find us at @racinglouisvillefc on Instagram.
• The game will be broadcast on ION – viewers can search for the channel number in their area by typing in their ZIP Code here – or streamed free at ionnwsl.com. You can listen to the match on News Talk 1080 AM or online at talkradio1080.iheart.com.
• Racing Louisville’s Pub Partners — participating bars, breweries and restaurants — will feature the club’s away games on TVs (with sound!) throughout the season. For more information on where to watch, visit our Pub Partners page.
Storylines …
Movin’ on up: Veteran defender and team vice-captain Abby Erceg moved into fourth all-time in career minutes played in the NWSL after logging another 90 minutes in this past Saturday’s 0-0 draw at Houston. The New Zealander surpassed retired U.S. Women’s National Team and Gotham defender Ali Krieger on the list and now stands at 15,101 minutes over her decade in the league. Erceg has played every minute of every match (24 regular-season games in total) since joining Racing before the 2023 campaign.
Lund’s run continues: Racing goalkeeper Katie Lund joined defender Lauren Milliet as the only players in the club’s young history to hit 50 appearances when she played in Saturday’s game in Houston. The 27-year-old Lund has started 49 consecutive matches in goal for the Louisvillians, notching 13 clean sheets, including the 0-0 draw with the Dash. She played every minute the past two seasons and was an NWSL Goalkeeper of the Year finalist last season, posting the best advanced metrics of any keeper in the league.
Shots! Shots! Shots! Reilyn Turner barraged Houston but couldn’t quite break through in the Space City, setting a new Racing Louisville single-game record with five shots on goal. The first-round NWSL Draft pick matched former Racing forward Thembi Kgatlana’s club-high mark of eight shot attempts in a game, too. The 21-year-old registered an assist in her NWSL debut, playing the ball into Elexa Bahr for the Colombian international’s season-opening goal against Orlando on March 13.
Bahr none: How about that for an NWSL debut? For the first time in eight years, a player registered an assist and a goal in their NWSL debut, with Racing’s Elexa Bahr matching Houston’s Rachel Daly in 2016 with the feat. Bahr scored a magnificent opening goal in Saturday’s draw vs. Orlando, chipping the goalkeeper from the edge of the box. She added an assist a few minutes later on Uchenna Kanu’s well-taken goal in transition. Bahr, who grew up in Georgia and starred collegiately at South Carolina, joined Racing this winter after helping Colombia reach the FIFA Women’s World Cup quarterfinals for the first time in the nation’s history.
Familiar faces back in lavender: Racing retained 16 players from the 2023 campaign who accounted for 73.5% of the team’s minutes played and 65% of the team’s scoring. The returning group is led by NWSL Best XI selection Savannah DeMelo and captain Jaelin Howell, Racing’s 2022 NWSL Draft first-round picks who’ve established themselves as two of the top midfielders in the league alongside Brazilian star Ary Borges. Returners also include Racing’s three iron women who played every minute last season: goalkeeper Katie Lund and defenders Abby Erceg and Lauren Milliet, who is the club’s all-time appearances and minutes leader.
DeMelo’s record book chase: Racing Louisville’s history is obviously short, with just three years of NWSL play. That means we’re witnessing history as it’s made, from Lauren Milliet’s pace-setting in appearances and minutes to Katie Lund’s 49 consecutive starts. This could be the year that Savannah DeMelo puts a significant stamp on the Racing record books, too. The third-year midfielder is a goal away from matching Nadia Nadim’s 10 scores in a Racing uniform, and her four assists put her in a tie as the club’s assists leader.
Key NWSL experience added: Louisville has grown into an experienced squad over the past two years, and that process continued in the offseason with the additions of Taylor (Kornieck) Flint, Marisa (Viggiano) DiGrande, Ellie Jean and University of Kentucky legend Arin Wright. The four accomplished NWSL veterans bring league shields and championships, Best XI selections and multiple playoff appearances between them.
Global Racing: Racing Louisville became the first club in NWSL history to feature players from six different continental confederations on its roster in 2023, and that hasn’t changed despite roster turnover this offseason. Louisville’s 26-player roster consists of two players from Oceania Football Confederation; one from Asian Football Confederation; two from Confederation of African Football; one player from Union of European Football Associations; two from CONMEBOL (South America); and the remaining 18 from the U.S. (Note: Forward Elexa Bahr was born and raised in the U.S. but competes for the Colombian national team.)
More Racing NWSL Draft success: Racing once again found quality in the NWSL Draft, selecting UCLA star Reilyn Turner and Ohio State standout Emma Sears in the first two rounds of the event. Turner, the No. 6 overall pick, signed a three-year contract with Racing amid a standout preseason. She enters the professional ranks after an immense collegiate career that saw her win a national title and be named the most outstanding player of that NCAA Tournament while also collecting All-American, All-Pac-12 and Pac-12 Forward of the Year honors over the course of her four years with the Bruins. Sears, 28th overall, inked a new deal with Louisville after starting both of The Women’s Cup Colombia matches. The Ohio native was an All-Big Ten forward with her home state Buckeyes, guiding them to multiple NCAA Tournaments.
