September 16, 2022 – National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) – Racing Louisville FC News Release
Racing Louisville FC celebrates win
(Racing Louisville FC)
Racing Louisville FC started fast and turned in a complete performance in a 2-0 win over the Orlando Pride on Friday night at Lynn Family Stadium, snapping a 13-game winless streak.
Nadia Nadim opened the scoring in the 10th minute and Savannah DeMelo added the second in the 50th, while goalkeeper Katie Lund made seven saves for her fifth clean sheet of the season.
Racing (3-8-8, 17 points) pulled back into 10th place in the NWSL with the win, moving within four points of ninth-place Orlando in the standings.
“It’s been a couple rough games, but we want to end this season on a good note,” the rookie DeMelo said. “Playing at home is awesome – the crowd was great. We all just played as a team. We played together. We finally played from the first minute to the 90th minute, so we got a full performance.”
There was a sense of relief for Racing, which bounced back from back-to-back losses to Chicago and North Carolina by scores of 4-0 and 5-1, respectively. The team has maintained through the summer that its performances were good enough to get more results, but the breakthrough never quite came – until Friday.
After a brief spell of Orlando pressure in the opening moments, Racing grew into the game, finding successful passing patterns down both flanks.
In the 10th minute, right back Lauren Milliet passed to the feet of Jess McDonald. With a defender on her back, McDonald let the ball run between her legs and past the defender, then spun around into the ball’s path. The veteran forward’s low right-footed cross slid under Orlando goalkeeper Anna Moorhouse and into Nadim’s path.
It was Nadim’s sixth goal in 10 regular-season appearances this season, with half of those scores coming off McDonald assists. As for McDonald, the helper gave her a two-assist cushion on Sofia Huerta as the NWSL’s all-time assists leader in regular-season games, with 31 for her career.
“(McDonald) makes some really good crosses,” Nadim said. “I ran near post, but I could see her touch was a bit longer, so I just found a second position and it was a very easy tap-in. Happy to be in the right place, and a great, great ball from Jess.”
DeMelo’s fourth goal of the season came five minutes into the second half, with the rookie midfielder collecting a pass from Wang Shuang, taking a touch to her right foot and ripping in a curling shot from 19…