What to Watch for with LouCity vs. Loudoun United
September 16, 2022 – United Soccer League Championship (USL) – Louisville City FC News Release
Louisville City FC midfielder Corben Bone
(Louisville City FC, Credit: Connor Cunningham)
A refreshed Louisville City FC hits its regular season’s home stretch at 7:30 p.m. Saturday when hosting Loudoun United FC at Lynn Family Stadium.
The boys in purple most recently capped off a congested run of five games in 15 days with a hard-fought, 0-0 draw at Pittsburgh last weekend, with four of those five matches away. Now, with a full week of recovery and training back in town, LouCity opens the campaign’s final month with four of its last five games at home.
City (18-5-6, 60 points) continues to maintain its place atop of the Eastern Conference standings – and with some cushion. Second-place Memphis 901 FC sits on 55 points, though Memphis has played one fewer game.
Loudoun United (7-18-3, 28 points) is currently in 11th place in the Eastern Conference and has been eliminated from playoff contention. The Red and White won twice in their last five games – including a victory over Memphis – but enters Louisville fresh off a road loss to Sacramento Republic FC.
Here’s more of what to watch for on Saturday…
Follow along
The game will air live locally on WBKI and ESPN Louisville’s 680/105.7, with streaming via ESPN+ and the WDRB Now app.
For Starting XI and in-game updates, follow @loucityfc on Twitter and Louisville City FC on Facebook. Also find the club at louisvillecityfc on Instagram.
Injury report
Cameron Lancaster (Out)
Niall McCabe (Out)
Story lines…
Race to the top: No. 1 in the Eastern Conference, LouCity’s still chasing the USL Championship’s best overall record, too. The boys in purple are three points behind Western Conference-leading San Antonio FC with five games remaining. While City has been to seven consecutive Eastern Conference finals and won two league titles, the club has never claimed the highest regular-season points total in the league.
Record chasers: The boys in purple are eyeing a new club record in points in a regular season. City’s current record was set by the 2018 squad, which put up 66 points in the regular season before lifting the club’s second USL Championship trophy. A win on Saturday would best the club’s other title-winning team, 2017’s 62 points.
Home-field advantage: LouCity is 10-1-2 at Lynn Family Stadium – a league-best home record – with a plus-22 goal differential. Dating back to June of 2021, the club has lost just twice at Lynn since capacity limits were lifted. At 10,318 fans per game, City ranks second of 27 USL Championship teams in average attendance this year.
Last time out: The other meeting between Louisville City and Loudoun United came back on April 10, ending with a 2-0 victory for City. The match included a goal in the fourth minute from Wilson Harris as well as a 53rd-minute strike from Brian Ownby.
See you again? Although Loudoun United FC is an MLS-affiliated team (DC United), the club will not be joining the MLS Next Pro league next year like the rest of its peers. Instead, Loudoun will remain in the USL Championship, the only league declared at the Division II level of the United States Soccer Federation’s hierarchy of professional leagues. Major League Soccer is Division I while MLS Next Pro is Division III.
Back to bagels: LouCity, which had gone four straight games without a shutout going into the Pittsburgh game, recorded its league-leading 14th clean sheet in that performance. The shutout marked goalkeeper Kyle Morton’s league-leading 12th for the season, three away from tying the USL Championship’s single-season record of 15.
An unusual feat: A defensive battle that ended in a 0-0 draw, Louisville’s most recent contest with Pittsburgh was just the sixth time this season that City didn’t score a goal. With 55 goals scored on the season, LouCity only trails San Diego and Tampa Bay for the league lead.
He’s back: Returning from a nine-game absence due to an ankle injury, defender Josh Wynder made an early appearance off the bench in the draw at Pittsburgh. Subbing on in the first half for Wes Charpie, the defender won seven duels and three fouls, passing at a 72% clip. It had been since July 20 that the 17-year-old academy graduate appeared for LouCity.
Milestone man: In his sixth year in purple, defender Sean Totsch appeared in his 200th career USL Championship game in LouCity’s last match against Pittsburgh. The defender recorded a goal-line clearance, won nine duels and made a team-high 44 accurate passes. City’s ironman last season, Totsch – a back-to-back USL Championship All-League First Team selection – played every minute of the team’s 35-game campaign.
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