RCW: Sport Spotlight 4.6 (Soccer)

UPS 

FULLTIME: Jayhawks strike twice in the 2nd half to take down Iowa State, 2-1! Kansas goes to 6-5-2 and 1-1-1 in the Big 12! #RockChalk pic.twitter.com/8XfDjhp77x

— Kansas Soccer (@KUWSoccer) September 30, 2017

 

The team getting some love at #KULateNight tonight! #KUsoccer

A post shared by Kansas Women’s Soccer (@kansassoccer) on Sep 30, 2017 at 4:52pm PDT

This weekend marks a monumental match in the history of the Kansas soccer program as the Jayhawks will take part in the first soccer match in the storied history of the Sunflower Showdown rivalry between Kansas and Kansas State.
 
The rivalry began in 1902 with the first meeting between the KU and KSU football teams, a 16-0 Jayhawk victory. In the 115 years since, the Jayhawks and Wildcats have done battle in hundreds of matchups across several fields of competition.
 
“I think everybody is excited, especially since Missouri has always been a huge rivalry, and (with them) leaving the conference, we haven’t really had that authentic rival anymore,” KU senior and Kansas native Hannah Lukinac said. “So having K-State joining the conference brings that back a little bit, having another Kansas school drives that competition.”
 
In head-to-head competitions in the sports that both schools still currently sponsor (baseball, men’s basketball, women’s basketball, football, women’s tennis and volleyball), Kansas leads that all-time Sunflower Showdown series at 581-454-6.
 
The Jayhawk soccer team will look to add to Kansas’ winning trend when it takes part in its first match with the Wildcats, who are currently in their second year of existence as a program.
 
“I think it is going to enrich soccer in the state of Kansas, because this is going to create a lot of buzz from that game itself,” Kansas head coach Mark Francis discussed in a recent interview. “It will create a lot of buzz because it is the two in-state Division I programs playing each other for the first time.”