Match Day Preview: Kentucky

Friday, October 16

Lexington, Ky.

6:30 PM

Texas A&M

Kentucky

Oct 14, 2015 | Soccer

COLLEGE STATION, Texas – The No. 22 Texas A&M Aggies head to Lexington for a key contest against the Kentucky Wildcats with both squads on the periphery of the SEC title hunt. Texas A&M is tied for fifth in the SEC standings with 12 points (4-3-0), trailing first-place South Carolina (16 points - 5-1-1) by four points. The Wildcats are also in need of a victory in order to keep their league title hopes alive, tied for seventh place with 11 points (3-2-2). The Maroon and White are looking to snap a three-game road losing streak at Kentucky.

FOLLOW THE ACTION
Friday's match is available digitally on mobile devices, tablets, PCs and connect-TVs for SEC Network subscribers whose cable/satellite packages allow access to SEC Network+ through the WatchESPN app and SECSports.com. The match can be heard on the RadioAggieland app, RadioAggieland.com and 12thMan.com. Friday's match may be heard on Fusion FM - HD2 on HD radio at 95.1-2 FM locally.

WEAPONS UPON WEAPONS
Texas A&M boasts one of the largest caches of offensive weapons in the nation. Among SEC teams, the Aggies are the lone squad to boast more than seven players with three or more goals. Haley Pounds (9), Janae Cousineau (4), Mikaela Harvey (4), Emily Bates (5), Kate Hajdu (3), McKayla Paulson (3) and Ally Watt (3) all have three or more goals on the season.

LAST TIME OUT - AUBURN
The Aggies suffered their third consecutive road loss as they dropped a 2-0 loss to the Auburn Tigers. Casie Ramsier tallied two goals for Auburn. On her first goal, Ramsier took advantage of a situation in which the Aggies were playing down one defender for seven seconds after Karlie Mueller was dropped with a vicious elbow to the face on a late challenge. With a gap in the defense, Ramsier found an opening from 23 yards and sent a missile just inside the left post in the 49th minute. Mueller left the match and would not return. With 30 minutes remaining, Ramsier added an insurance goal with a header from the penalty spot off the left post.

SERIES VS. KENTUCKY
The Aggies are 3-0-1 all-time against the Kentucky Wildcats, including 2-0-1 since joining the SEC in 2012. The first meeting came in the second round of the 1999 NCAA Championship as the Maroon and White pulled out a 3-2 overtime victory against the then-No. 9 Wildcats in Lexington. In the initial meeting as SEC brethren in 2012 the teams played to a 2-2 tie in Lexington. The squads did not play each other in 2013. In the lone College Station contest, Texas A&M prevailed 2-1 last season. The most recent meeting came in the championship game of the 2014 SEC Tournament with A&M claiming the title with a 1-0 victory. The Aggies scored on a corner kick in the 30th minute, with Shea Groom scoring on the receiving end of a Haley Pounds corner kick. Jordan Day made six saves in the shutout.

SCOUTING KENTUCKY
The Wildcats enter the fray with a 9-3-3 overall record and a 3-2-2 mark in SEC action. The 11 points has Kentucky in seventh place, five points behind first-place South Carolina. After an 8-1-1 start, the Wildcats have had mixed results lately, going 1-2-2, including losses to Missouri (3-1) and Mississippi State (3-0). Kentucky has SEC wins over Ole Miss (4-2), Alabama (1-0) and Arkansas (2-1) and ties against Florida (1-1) and Vanderbilt (0-0).

The Wildcats offense boasts four players with 10 or more points, including Zoe Swift and Michaela Dooley who both have 12 points on four goals and four assists each. Courtney Raetzman has 11 points on two goals and a team-high seven assists. Kaitlin Miller has 10 points on three goals and four assists. Kentucky has eight shutouts and a 0.83 goals-against average. Katelyn Jensen has started all 15 matches in goal, logging a 0.82 goals-against average and seven shutouts.

TEXAS A&M OWNS LONGEST ACTIVE 15-WIN SEASON STREAK
Texas A&M entered the 2015 campaign with 11 consecutive 15-win seasons, the longest active stretch in Division I. The only other team to enter the season with a double-digit stretch was Florida State with 10 consecutive 15-win seasons. Stanford (9) and Florida (8) were the only other schools with more than five consecutive 15-win campaigns. In their first 22 seasons, the only two years the Aggies have not reached the 15-win plateau are 1998 (14-8) and 2003 (13-6-3). The school record for victories stands at 22, set last season with a 22-3-2 mark.

        CONSECUTIVE 15-WIN SEASONS ENTERING 2015
        Texas A&M            11
        Florida State        10
        Stanford              9
        Florida               8

RETURNING OFFENSE
The Aggies return just seven of 71 goals (9.9 percent) from last season. Janae Cousineau accounts for six of the returning goals and Haley Pounds notched one goal in 2014. A&M returns 14 of 60 assists from 2014. Karlie Mueller had the highest total among the returnees with five. Cousineau, Pounds, McKayla Paulson and Mikaela Harvey each notched two assists in 2014. Cousineau's 14 points last season is the most among the returnees.

Texas A&M's 11 returnees combined for just seven goals and 14 assists (28 points) during the 2014 campaign. Through 15 games, the same 11 returnees have notched 22 goals and 19 assists (63 points).

MAKING ELLIS FIELD A FORTRESS
Texas A&M owns a 214-30-6 (.868) all-time record at Ellis Field (formerly Aggie Soccer Stadium). The Maroon and White have called the field home since the 1994 season, playing the inaugural 1993 season at Old Tiger Field. Since 2005, the Aggies have registered a 114-14-6 (.873) mark on the friendly pitch. Texas A&M is 221-30-6 (.872) all-time in College Station, going 7-0-0 in their one season at Old Tiger Field.

WINNING
With their win against Alabama on October 9, the Aggies guaranteed themselves their 23rd consecutive winning season - the entirety of their life as a program. The closest the Aggies have finished to the .500 mark is the 14-8 (.636) record they posted in 1998.

ELLIS FIELD WIN STREAK
The Aggies own a 13-match home win streak. The stretch includes an 8-0-0 mark at Ellis Field in 2015 and four wins at the 2014 NCAA Tournament. Texas A&M is also unbeaten in their last 16 matches at Ellis Field, going 15-0-1 during the span.

NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK
The Aggies welcomed nine freshmen to the squad this season and they've made the immediate impact that was necessary for a strong start to the season. Kate Hajdu leads the group with 11 starts, followed by Emily Bates with 10 and Ally Watt and Brittany Crabtree with starts eight apiece. Mia Hummel has four starts in goal for the Aggies. Amethyst Kelly, Claudette Lassandro, Kendall Ritchie and Margaret Schmidt have all seen relief action.

Hajdu was named the SEC Freshman of the Week the opening weekend and Bates earned the honor for the fourth week of action. Bates ranks second on the team with 15 points on five goals and five assists. Hajdu has three goals and three assists. Ally Watt has three goals on the year. Crabtree has two goals and one assist. Lassandro has one goal and Schmidt has one assist on the season.

CONFERENCE WINNING
The Aggies have finished with a winning record in league play in all 19 years it was aligned with a conference. The closest the Aggies have finished to the .500 mark in league play is the 5-3-2 (.600) record they posted in Big 12 play in 2003. In 19 seasons of league action, A&M has finished first or second in the conference standings on 17 occasions with the other finishes coming in 1998 (3rd Big 12 - 7-2) and 2003 (5th Big 12 - 5-3-2).

SENSATIONAL SOPHOMORES
After getting a year of seasoning under the auspices of last year's nine-player senior class, Texas A&M's four sophomores came out like gang busters in the first 15 games of the season. The quartet accounted for 17 goals and 10 assists for 44 points through the first eight weekends. Haley Pounds has produced 22 points with nine goals and four assists, including her first career hat trick against Abilene Christian. She was named the SEC Offensive Player of the Week the opening week when she logged one goal and four assists. After going without a goal in her first 22 career matches, Mikaela Harvey has scored a goal in four of the last 12 contests. McKayla Paulson notched the first two goals of her career, both in the win at Rice, and added a goal against Mississippi State and assists against UC Irvine and North Texas. Stephanie Malherbe logged her first career goal in the 2-1 win against then No. 10 Florida and has added three assists. The four sophomores all played at least 1,200 of the 1,369 minutes on the season with Paulson playing every second of the matches.

GUERRIERI REACHES 400-WIN MILESTONE
Texas A&M head coach G Guerrieri ranks among the leaders in winning percentage and victories among active Division I coaches. With a career record of 405-125-29 (.750), he ranks fifth in victories and sixth in winning percentage (minimum five years as a Division I head coach). Guerrieri ranks fifth all-time among NCAA Division I coaches in victories, trailing only North Carolina's Anson Dorrance (790), Connecticut's Len Tsantiris (537), Florida's Becky Burleigh (446) and Santa Clara's Jerry Smith (433).

FILLING THE HOLE IN GOAL
With the exit of Jordan Day and Renee McDermott, the Aggies lost all but 31 of their goalkeeper minutes from the last four seasons. Day and McDermott played every minute of 2012 and 2013. In 2011, Megan Majewski played 17 minutes in goal. Last season, Taylor Saucier played 14 minutes in Texas A&M's NCAA Championship first round win against Houston Baptist, for the only action in her career entering the 2015 campaign.

On the season, the Aggie goalkeepers have combined to register a 0.99 goals-against average and six shutouts. Saucier has started 11 contests, logging 920 minutes. She owns a 1.08 goals-against average, 35 saves and two shutouts. Saucier's goals-against average when PKs are taken out of the equation, stands at 0.88. Mia Hummel has seen action in seven matches, including four starts. She has yielded four goals, made 15 saves and owns shutouts against Mississippi State and Alabama. The pair combined to record shutouts against Northwestern State and UC Irvine.

MUELLER AMONG ACTIVE LEADERS IN GAMES PLAYED
Although her status is in doubt for Friday due to a vicious elbow to the head sustained against Auburn, Texas A&M senior Karlie Mueller ranks ninth in the nation and second among SEC players in career matches played with 83 caps. She trails on Florida's Christen Westphal (86) among SEC players. Mueller has made 71 career starts and owns 19 career assists, including 10 as a sophomore in 2013. Her first career goal came in her 6,047th minute of play, scoring a golden goal in the 109th minute of a 2-1 victory against North Texas.

PAULSON EARNS EARLY IRONMAN HONORS
Defender McKayla Paulson leads the Aggies in minutes played, working the entirety of the first 15 matches for 1,369 minutes of play. Grace Wright (1,350), Ashlynn Harryman (1,293), Haley Pounds (1,280), Mikaela Harvey (1,271), Karlie Mueller (1,229) and Stephanie Malherbe (1,227) are all averaging over 80 minutes per match.

SUCCESSFUL SENIORS
Janae Cousineau, Kristi Leonard and Karlie Mueller represent one of the winningest active senior classes in the nation. The trio have enjoyed a record of 70-17-5 over their four years, the third-best win total in the nation. Florida State's seniors are 77-8-5, followed by Virginia 74-9-4.

NIP-AND-TUCK
Over the last three seasons, the Aggies are 24-6-4 in games decided by one game or less. This season, the Maroon and White are 3-2-0 in games decided by one goal or less. Last season, Texas A&M went 11-2-2 in one-goal games, including a pair of 2-1 victories in their run to the College Cup. The Aggies went 10-2-2 in the nail-biters in 2012, including all three of their wins en route to winning their first-ever SEC Tournament title.

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UP NEXT
The Aggies return to action on Friday, October 23 as the Maroon and White host Arkansas in a 7 pm match at Ellis Field.