Match Preview: KC Current at Racing Louisville

The Kansas City Current’s most difficult stretch of the regular season concluded with a home draw to Gotham FC last weekend, and now the team turns their attention to the sprint to the finish line. Each team has four remaining regular season matches and a lot to play for. While the playoff picture is starting to take shape (for example, it would take a minor miracle for either Utah Royals or Houston Dash to jump into the top eight), there is definitely some shuffling still to come.

Take, for example, KC’s opponent this Saturday. Racing Louisville has spent much of the season in a playoff spot but lost that last weekend when they dropped their game to Utah and Bay FC defeated the Seattle Reign. The standings now have Louisville in 9th place, three points behind both Bay and the Portland Thorns (a team in full swan dive mode) and just four points back of the Chicago Red Stars. So, needless to say, Racing comes in to this home match against Kansas City highly motivated to earn as many points as possible.

Several spots higher up, Kansas City still has its sights set on earning home field advantage throughout the playoffs. The Orlando Pride are out of reach, but the team sits a single point behind Gotham and four back of the Washington Spirit. By the way, the Spirit travel to Orlando on Sunday putting KC fans in the uncomfortable position of probably rooting for the Pride as the Current attempt to leapfrog Washington.

KC’s remaining schedule consists of the teams in 6th, 8th, 9th, & 10th. These are each winnable games (despite three of them being on the road) against teams the Current are better than, but they are also matches against teams perhaps even more desperate for points than KC.

If the season were to end today, Kansas City would get to host the quarterfinal round, but then would likely have to go on the road for the semis–potentially to Orlando. Each team is looking at a maximum of 12 more points this regular season. If Kansas City can earn all 12 by winning against Louisville, Bay, the San Diego Wave and Chicago they would put themselves in a very good spot to finish the season in second place. Helping KC is that Gotham also has to play against Orlando. If Kansas City climb to second, they are guaranteed of not having to travel at all during the playoffs thanks to CPKC Stadium hosting the Championship match. However, any ties or defeats make that climb much less likely.

First up is the team that is the closest thing the Current have to a regional opponent–Racing Louisville FC. After several games in which opposing rosters looked like a who’s who of national team stars and some of the biggest names on the planet, on paper, Racing’s roster is much more modest. They do feature Savannah DeMelo and Taylor Flint who have both featured for the USWNT and Uchenna Kanu who represented Nigeria in the last World Cup, but again it’s not an overly intimidating squad. Plus, Flint is suspended.

That's Taylor Flint's fifth yellow this #NWSL season. She'll miss next weekend's home match against the Current#RacingLou #NWSL #KCBaby

— Taylor Vincent (@tayvincent6) September 28, 2024

With that said, this is the same team that first spoiled Kansas City’s perfect home record this season with a 3-3 draw back in May. In that game, KC seemed destined for the W only to have DeMelo strike for the equalizer in the 13th(!) minute of second half stoppage time. For the curious, there was an announced eight minutes of stoppage time, so why the match continued long enough for Louisville to knot it up is anyone’s guess (Editor: the math actually adds up and stoppage time was correct).

Speaking of questionable officiating decisions, many around the heartland were again frustrated by the head ref’s choice to allow play to continue after she was involved in a successful basketball pick play on Michelle Cooper that led to Gotham’s lone goal last Saturday.

Gotham capitalizes to take the lead in KC 💥 pic.twitter.com/hePbxqoEze

— Attacking Third (@AttackingThird) September 28, 2024

Kansas City was able to battle back through, who else, Temwa Chawinga and walk away from the game with a point.

17TH GOAL OF THE SEASON ‼️

Golden Boot Leader Temwa Chawinga gets KC Current on the board to make it 1-1! She is assisted by Debinha 🤩@nwsl | @KCBABY pic.twitter.com/Wr1LTKP7HT

— KC Current – x (@thekccurrent) September 28, 2024

Speaking of Chawinga, she seems destined to win the NWSL Golden Boot this season having already scored 17 regular season goals and with a four-goal lead over second place Banda. Might she also be in line for the league’s MVP (despite having middling stats on the new EA FC 2025 game)? If Chawinga can tally one more goal in the final four matches (a likely event), she would equal the single season NWSL record of 18 held by Sam Kerr. And if the team as a whole can score sevel additional goals (a little less than two per game the rest of the way), they would tie the current single season mark of 54. For what it’s worth, KC has already established a new record of number of different goal scorers in a season at 18 (and counting).

As much fun as rewriting the history books can be, the priority has to be seeing out the regular season with as much success as possible. With the daunting stretch of games against top three teams behind them, KC can now focus on building momentum for a run deep into November and towards the NWSL Championship.

WHEN: Saturday, October 5 at 6:30 PM (Central Time)

WHERE: Lynn Family Stadium, Louisville, KY

HOW TO WATCH: NWSL+ / 38 the Spot

Record:

KC Current: 12-7-3 (43 points, 4th place in NWSL league standings)

Racing Louisville FC: 6-7-9 (25 points, 9th place in NWSL league standings)

Last Match:

KC Current: 1-1 home draw to NJ/NY Gotham

Racing Louisville FC: 0-1 away loss to the Utah Royals