LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A night of firsts helped Racing Louisville top the visiting Chicago Red Stars, 3-1, and move into playoff position on a warm Saturday evening at Lynn Family Stadium.
Bethany Balcer registered an assist in her Racing debut, Marisa DiGrande scored her first goal for the club, Taylor Flint recorded her first assist for Louisville and Kayla Fischer netted the first regular-season goal of her career in the comfortable win. Uchenna Kanu’s 12th-minute goal was the third time this season she opened a game’s scoring.
The game felt exactly like the reset Racing hoped it would be as the team restarted the National Women’s Soccer League regular season campaign with its sights set on the first postseason qualification in the young club’s history. In addition to Balcer starting in her first game in lavender, fellow newcomer Janine Beckie came on in the 69th minute to make her debut.
“Fantastic from the group,” said Racing coach Bev Yanez. “Early on in the first half of season, there was a lot of, ‘You guys start off well. You play well in certain patches of the game. You guys are finishing well.’ For me, that was a complete performance, and I'm very, very proud of the group.”
Racing Louisville (4-6-7, 19 points) entered the match with a golden opportunity to move back into eighth place – a playoff spot – as the NWSL enters its final phase of a long campaign. Bay FC, which claimed eighth place before the five-week break for the Summer Olympics, lost to Utah on Friday night, opening the door for Louisville.
Yanez’s team took advantage. And now, Racing is not only one point clear of ninth-place Angel City, but its goal differential is also seven goals better than any of the other teams in playoff contention, a critical plus in the event of a tiebreaker.
“The sky’s the limit for this group,” said Beckie, who arrived Thursday via trade and trained with the team for the first time on Friday. “… I've had a lot of experience at the international level. I've been in this league for a few years. I've been overseas. I've kind of seen it all. So, what excites me is the potential of this group and the youth. We've got a lot of hungry players who have a lot of potential and a lot of passion to play this game.”
The Louisvillians set the tone early, controlling the game from the outset. In the buildup to Kanu’s goal – her fifth of the year, tying her for the team lead – Flint whistled a line-breaking pass to the feet of Lauren Milliet, who played Balcer a perfectly weighted ball to the end line. Balcer’s low right-footed cross skipped past multiple Chicago defenders, and Kanu slid her shot underneath Red Stars goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher.
Jameese Joseph narrowly missed tying the game midway through the first half, fizzing a shot past the far post. She connected in the 59th minute, smashing her equalizer into the roof of the next from close range.
Before Joseph’s goal, Milliet banged a shot off the crossbar and DiGrande nearly toe-poked a shot past Naeher in a one-on-one breakthrough.
Still, Racing wasted no time rallying after losing its lead. Fischer split two defenders with an angled pass into DiGrande’s run from the left wing, and DiGrande picked out the far post just out of Naeher’s reach for her first goal since October 2022.
Sixteen minutes later, Flint again played a line-breaking pass into a dangerous position, this time finding Fischer, who turned in between two defenders, nudged her second touch past an onrushing Naeher and tucked in the insurance goal Racing needed to put the game away.
The win secured a season sweep for Racing against Chicago this year and was Louisville’s fifth win in the last six meetings across all competitions against the Red Stars. The victory also moved Racing within four points of the seventh-place Chicagoans in the standings.
“I think our game management overall was great,” DiGrande said. “And I think that's something, in the first half of season, maybe we were struggling with a little bit – finishing out the games. We absolutely did that quickly tonight. We just wanted to be calm, controlled on the ball, and throughout the full 90, we had a good amount of possession. We played some really good soccer.”
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