BEAUMONT, Texas – The 2021-22 Lamar University Athletics season gets underway as the women's soccer program will kick off their regular season at 5 p.m. CT on Thursday afternoon as they will welcome Grambling to the LU Soccer Complex.
Single-game and season tickets are on sale now at LamarCardinals.com. To request more information on regular season single-game and season tickets, please
click here. Parking at the complex is free of charge and on a first-come, first-serve basis. The contest between the Cardinals and the Tigers can be seen on the WAC Digital Network or by
clicking here. Live stats of the contest can be found by
clicking here.
LAST TIME OUT: The Cardinals battled the Rice Owls in a friendly exhibition but fell 2-1 last Saturday. Senior
Christine Kitaru tallied the lone Cardinal goal in the 83
rd minute after grabbing a free ball in the open field from the keeper and was able to put it in the back of the net.
SCOUTING GRAMBLING: The Tigers are under the leadership of second-year head coach Craig Roberts. Roberts led Grambling to an 8-2-2 overall record and second place finish in the SWAC. The Tigers are led by Kailey Pena who tallied 32 points on 16 goals in 2020 while Britt Verhees led Grambling in goal with 870 minutes and 30 saves.
NEW CONFERENCE: This marks the first season as a member of the Western Athletic Conference. The Cardinals will kick off their first season of WAC play on Friday, Sept. 24
th at Abilene Christian.
NEW FACES IN BEAUMONT: The Cardinals and head coach
Steve Holeman brought in a total of nine newcomers with one transfer and eight true freshmen. The lone transfer is
Laura Linares out of Iowa Western Community College.
Filling out a roster of one transfer and 12 returners, the eight freshmen include
Isabel Bassa,
Vivienne Carr,
Eva Karen,
Carina Leal,
Sabrina Lopez,
Marina Mielgo,
Isela Ramirez and
Grace Richard.
2020 SNAPSHOT: The fall 2020 season was postponed by the Southland Conference to the spring of 2021. The Cardinals competed in one fall match with it being a victory at Texas State. LU finished the season 8-4-0 overall while grabbing the two seed in the SLC Tournament with a 7-3-0 conference record.
Esther Okoronkwo earned Player and Forward of the Year honors while
Madison Ledet earned Midfield of the Year honors. Okoronkwo also earned Student-Athlete of the Year honors, United Soccer Coaches All-Midwest Region First Team and became the first All-American in program history with third team All-America honors.
SEASON 15: The 2021 campaign will be the 15
th season in Lamar soccer history. Since 2007, Lamar has amassed a 109-137-19 overall record with two Southland Conference regular-season championships, two SLC Tournament championships and two NCAA appearances.
Most recently, the program has seen success under sixth-year head coach
Steve Holeman, who has helped the Cardinals to a 56-35-6 overall record under his tenure with both the 2017 and 2017 Southland Conference regular-season and tournament championships.
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