Knight Cap: Soccer Teams Capture AAC Wins, Volleyball Falls

This past week of UCF Knights sports saw one team maintain its unbeaten conference-play record, another team pull off an in-conference upset and another team get its first loss of the season.

Plus, we name the Knight of the Week and the Knights Play of the Week in your latest Knight Cap for Friday, October 14th, 2022.

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Women’s Soccer Remains Unbeaten in AAC Play

The UCF Women’s Soccer team remains unbeaten in conference play after picking up home victories against SMU, 1-0, and Cincinnati, 4-0 this week.

The shutouts make it the 6th clean sheet of the season for goalkeeper Caroline DeLisle, who only had to make two saves on the weekend thanks to the work of the UCF backline.

“I think we all just committed to getting stuck in the tackles and I think it showed,” defender Olivia Lewis said after the SMU match.

On the offensive side, forward Kristen Scott doubled her season goal total since she returned from a four-match absence due to injury. She came off the bench to score the only goal of the SMU match in the 36th minute, with an assist from defender Kelis Barton.

“I can’t ask for anything else coming off an injury, to be back out there,” Scott said after the SMU match. “It was fun. Everybody likes stripping the center back and then just putting it away, cherry on top.”

Scott was also responsible for half of the Knights’ goals against Cincinnati, with one coming in the 19th minute with an assist from midfielder Katie Bradley and another in the 51st minute with an assist from forward Dayana Martin.

Forward Mallory Olsson also joined the scoring fest with a goal of her own in the 87th minute, with an assist from midfielder Darya Rajaee. It was her 5th goal of the season, already surpassing her four-goal 2021 season.

The Knights (5-2-4, 3-0-1 AAC) remain unbeaten in conference play, sit atop the AAC table, and are 44th in the RPI Rankings. However, for their last four matches, they have to play against teams that are nipping at their heels for the conference lead. It begins on Sunday at 2 p.m. as the team hits the road to face Tulsa (7-4-3, 2-1-2 AAC).

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Men’s Soccer Upsets FIU

The UCF Men’s Soccer team ended its AAC losing streak on Sunday thanks to a 3-1 upset on the road against FIU.

Despite being vastly outshot overall, 23-11, UCF only had one less shot on goal than FIU, 6-5.

Forward Lucca Dourado extended his scoring streak to seven matches with a pair of goals in the 26th and 78th minutes, tying him for the second-longest scoring streak in the nation.

With his third multi-goal match of the season, Dourado is now at 10 goals overall for 2022, which ties for 2nd in the nation in goals scored, ties him for 9th in the nation in points, and now leads the nation with 1.1 goals per game.

Dourado, with 27 career goals now, is also in a tie for 9th on the UCF all-time goalscoring list with Remi Hariz (1998-2001).

However, while Dourado scored two of the Knights’ goals, it was forward Kevin Andrews, coming off the bench, that got the match-winning goal right before the halftime buzzer in the 45th minute.

The win toppled FIU from the top of the AAC table and brought the Knights up to 7th place. In the national landscape, the Knights vaulted their way up to 57th in the RPI Rankings.

The team hits the road once more to play another new addition to The American this season in UAB. The match kicks off at 8 p.m. on Friday.

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Volleyball Suffers First 2022 Loss, Splits Weekend

The UCF Volleyball Team received its first loss of the season last weekend as it hit the road for the final time in this over-a-month-long road trip.

The Knights (13-1, 5-1 AAC) fell in four sets to Houston, 3-1.

The Cougars limited outside hitter McKenna Melville to a .045 hitting percentage, her lowest in a match since the team’s previous loss to UCLA in the second round of the NCAA Tournament. Though, she still managed to tally 17 kills and 7 blocks for the match to lead the team.

On Sunday, the team rebounded with a 3-0 sweep in New Orleans against Tulane.

Melville led the team in kills once again with 18, while setter Amber Olson tied or outright had the team lead in blocks (3), digs (11), and assists (42).

Despite the team’s unbeaten streak coming to a close and dropping into a tie for second on the AAC Standings with SMU, it remains in the Top 25 AVCA Coaches Poll, sliding down to a tie for No. 24, and sits in 11th in the RPI Rankings.

The team returns home to The Venue this weekend for its first home match since Sep. 11. First, the Knights take on Temple on Friday at 7 p.m., followed by a noon match on Sunday against East Carolina.

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Pair of Men’s Golfers Place Top 10 in Carolina Cup

The UCF Men’s Golf team competed in its penultimate fall tournament, the Carolina Cup, this week in Spartanburg, South Carolina.

A pair of Knights, fifth-year senior Markus Braadlie and junior Egor Eroshenko, finished in the Top 10 individually. The duo both finished in a tie for 10th place at 214 (-2).

As a whole, the team made it into the Top 5, finishing in 5th place at 869 (+5), 25 strokes behind the leader.

For the full individual results of the Carolina Cup, check out golfstat.com.

The Knights will finish off their fall schedule next weekend as they host the Isleworth Collegiate at the Isleworth Golf & Country Club in Windermere.

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Men’s Tennis Duo Play at Illinois State

Redshirt sophomore Quinn Snyder and true freshman Emilio Sanchez of the UCF Men’s Tennis team traveled to Illinois State to compete in the three-day Redbird Invitational last weekend.

The duo went 2-1 in doubles play, beating Illinois State (8-2) and DePaul (8-1), but falling to Western Michigan (8-4).

In singles play, Snyder went 2-1, beating DePaul’s Shourya Verma (7-5, 6-3) and Western Michigan’s Fynn Lohse (7-6, 6-2).

Sanchez also went 2-1 in singles play, beating DePaul’s Jona Gitschel (6-3, 6-1) and Western Michigan’s Jackson Boone (7-6, 6-0).

The Knights are slated to return to competition on Thursday at the ITA Southeast Regional Tournament in Tallahassee.

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Women’s Tennis Trio Compete in Pro Tournament

A trio of athletes from the UCF Women’s Tennis team took the court in Florence, South Carolina this week for the International Tennis Federation’s W25 Tournament there.

True freshman Jantje Tilbuerger got a victory to open the qualifying draw against 14-year-old Shannon Lam (6-1, 5-7, 11-9), but fell short in the next round to former Princeton player Victoria Hu (6-7, 2-6).

Hu was also the one to eliminate sophomore Noel Saidenova from the tournament, doing so in the qualifying draw’s opening round (6-4, 7-5).

Similar to Tilbuerger, sophomore Sophia Biolay opened the qualifying draw with a victory over Auburn graduate Yu Chen (6-1, 6-4), but was defeated in the next round by Winthrop graduate Lauren Proctor (6-7, 2-6).

The rest of the team, Nandini Sharma, Marie Mattel, Jaleesa Leslie, and Anique Kattenberg, are currently competing in Atlanta, Georgia in the ITA Southeast Regional Championships.

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Knight of the Week

Kristen Scott, Women’s Soccer

On top of scoring both match-winning goals against SMU and Cincinnati, Kristen Scott made UCF Women’s Soccer history this week by becoming the 11th player in program history to reach 30 career goals.

She is the first to achieve the feat since Nicolette Radovcic did it in 2012. Scott now joins Radovcic, Michelle Anderson, and Amy Geltz in a four-way tie for 8th on the program’s all-time scoring list.

“I’m just grateful for my teammates,” Scott said. “It’s a lot of assists, 30 assists. I’ve played with some really amazing players and a lot of them are still here and I’m just grateful for everybody that’s had my back.”

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Play of the Week

Kevin Andrews’ go-ahead goal less than a minute before halftime vs. FIU