Kentucky Hosts EKU, Wyoming in Home-Opening Weekend
LEXINGTON, Ky. – The Kentucky women’s soccer team will open its 2017 home slate of matches this weekend, facing in-state foe Eastern Kentucky on Thursday night, followed by Wyoming on Sunday afternoon in week two of action.
Thursday night’s fixture will kick off at 7:30 p.m. ET, and shown live on the SEC Network+, ESPN3 and the WatchESPN app with Dave Baker (pxp) and former Kentucky All-American, Stuart Pope (color) on the call from the Bell Soccer Complex. Sunday’s match will commence at 1 p.m. ET, and will have the same announcing tandem.
Live stats will be available on UKathletics.com and live in-match updates can be found by following @UKWomensSoccer on Twitter and Instagram.
Kentucky faced stiff competition on opening weekend, holding the defending Big 10 champion Wisconsin Badgers to a 1-0 defeat – and dropping a back-and-forth affair with the defending Big East champions, Marquette, 2-1 on Sunday.
Freshman Eva Mitchell scored her first-career goal, and first goal of the Ian Carry era on Sunday at Marquette. The Wildcats will look to add to that total over the weekend, and continue their run of strong home openers. The Wildcats will be facing EKU for the sixth time, having won all five previous meetings. UK and Wyoming have not met before.
It was a young squad that Carry threw out over the weekend, with five freshman cracking the starting XI of the opening match against Wisconsin. Miranda Jimenez, Hollie Olding, Sophie Stewart-Hobbs, Yuuka Kurosaki and Mitchell all made the first starting XI.
On Thursday night in the home opener, the first 250 fans in the door will get a free set of thundersticks as part of Thunderstick Thursday. Sunday is “Dollar Dog Sunday” where fans can bring their dogs to The Bell for $1 tickets and they are welcome to stay for the duration of the match.
Under the direction of second year head coach Nick Flohre, the Colonels enter the second weekend of play with an 0-1-1 record. EKU held UT-Chattanooga to a scoreless draw on Sunday afternoon to pick up its first point of the season. EKU opened the season with a 2-1 loss to Northern Kentucky – with both of those matches coming on the road to begin the season. Eastern Kentucky finished 13-5-1 a season ago in Flohre’s first season, and made it to the semifinals of the OVC Tournament.
Wyoming lost its only match of the 2017 opening weekend to Big XI powerhouse, Baylor, 2-1. The Cowgirls pushed the Bears to overtime, but fell victim to a 100th-minute goal by BU to send them past Wyoming. WU was outshot 27-5 in the match and goalkeeper Georgia Rowntree made seven saves in the match. Brittney Stark, the leading point-getter and goal scorer for Wyoming, returns this season on the heels of a 13-point season in 2016 – (6g, 1a).
For the latest on the Kentucky women’s soccer team, follow @UKWomensSoccer on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, as well as on the web at UKathletics.com.
