LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) — The final whistle blew, and there was no need to wait, calculate the math, or look around for help.
On this red-letter day for Racing Louisville FC (but make the ink lavender, please) there was only history.
Racing didn’t just qualify for the NWSL playoffs for the first time Sunday night. It earned it. Owned it. Claimed it.
A 1-0 Decision Day victory over Bay FC at Lynn Family Stadium didn’t just send the club into the postseason for the first time. It validated the long, slow climb that began in 2021.
For four straight seasons, Racing finished ninth in a league that only needed eight. After a while, you stop feeling like you’re knocking on the playoff door, and start feeling like you’re camped on the porch. Eight golden tickets, and you keep finding wrappers.
But this season, it wasn’t just a club that was rebuilt. It was a club that was reimagined. After all those years of ninth, this was a club that emphatically shouted, “Next!”
“This group is special,” head coach Bev Yanez said, her voice cracking slightly. “And they deserved every ounce of joy that they received today, and I'm just so proud. … We’ve trusted the process the whole time, and believe that we’ve really put our stamp on the season in regard to our identity and the character that we’ve shown.”
Racing controlled play from the opening kickoff, outshot Bay 24-6, and generated over four times the penalty box entries (32 to 8). The only surprise was that it took 48 minutes to score.
That’s when Katie O’Kane, a rookie, slipped a sharp through ball to another rookie, Ella Hase, who outran the back line and finished her first professional goal with equal parts grit and grace.
“I kind of just closed my eyes and shot it,” Hase said. “It ended up going in.”
It ended up sending Louisville into a place it had never been. From rookie touch to rookie finish — the kind of moment that writes its own future.
A season defined by turning points
For a club that had never beaten Bay FC in three previous tries, the breakthrough was no fluke. It was forged.
In the words of Yanez, the season turned after a 4-1 loss at home to San Diego in April. It was a wake-up call. And the first thing the coach thought as she walked off the pitch was – “Nope.”
“Walking off that field and thinking, 'This ain't going to happen. This is not going to happen to us. We're too special. We're too good. We had too great of a preseason. We're too bought into the process.’ We had some tough conversations as a group.”
Tough conversations, and a big response.
The club lost just one of its next six matches, and climbed into contention. It lost three straight to start September, including a match in Seattle in which star midfielder Savannah DeMelo suffered a medical emergency that left both teams so unsettled that the game was suspended.
But Racing has roared back. It ended the regular season with five straight unbeaten results. Its final totals: 37 points, 10 wins, are both club records.
But this leap was not just statistical. It was spiritual.
Bev Yanez gets a lift from a player while celebrating Racing Louisville's 1-0 NWSL playoff-clinching win over Bay City FC in Lynn Family Stadium on Nov. 2, 2025.
“We have a great staff, and we really are a family,” said veteran Lauren Milliet. “I know that’s kind of cliché to say, but we really do have each other’s backs … regardless of win, loss, or draw.”
That showed Sunday. Every player owned their role in a high-press system that gave Bay FC zero shots on goal — the first time in its history the California club failed to put a shot on frame
The players wanted to clinch on their own terms. And they did. A Gotham FC loss helped seal it, but Racing didn’t need the assist. As it is, they finished seventh in the league standings, avoiding a quarterfinal against league-leader Kansas City.
“We said it all week — let’s control our controllables,” Yanez said. “Let’s stay in.”
Yanez, who persevered through a miscarriage during the season, and showed tremendous leadership in helping the club through the loss of DeMelo, becomes the first woman to reach the NWSL playoffs as both a player and a coach. She’s also the first American female coach to reach the playoffs in a dozen years.
“It means more to me to do it with this group,” Yanez said. “I’ve had some tough times for me personally this season, and to have the support that I had from all of them, it made me realize that there's a lot of good in life. To be standing here now and be able to reflect on that and know that this is part of me, and it will carry with me forever, I hope to pay that forward at some point. I'm just grateful.”
And now, she has carried them, to a first postseason appearance, to a matchup with the Washington Spirit next week, and to a belief that this isn’t the summit.
Just another step.
“We really wanted to take this as not making the occasion bigger than the game itself, and still continuing to trust our process,” Yanez said. “And they did just that today. Everything that we've built up the past several months is what's led into this opportunity. We just needed to execute one more game. And we did.”
The crowd stayed. The players circled the pitch.
It wasn’t the loudest game Racing has ever hosted. It wasn’t the most dramatic, either.
But it may have been the most meaningful.
Milliet, the club’s original ironwoman, soaked it in.
“This city has been bought in from the beginning,” she said. “I think we've obviously been through some ups and downs, but to be honest, there's been so many Ride or Die fans for Racing. This was for them. This is for this city. We love Louisville, and we want to represent who they are on the pitch. And I feel like we did that – this was a perfect example of what Louisville is tonight.”
Scrappy. Gritty. Resilient.
And still climbing.
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