• James Madison is coming off of an impressive 2023 campaign in which the team went 9-5-8, making an appearance in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2015 where it lost in the first round to South Carolina. The Dukes made it to the Sun Belt Conference Final, falling to Old Dominion 2-1 in overtime. 
• This season, JMU was selected to finish second in the SBC preseason coaches poll with three first place votes to its name. Three Dukes earned Preseason All-Sun Belt Team honors including forward Amanda Attanasi, midfielder Lexi Vanderlinden and Preseason Defensive Player of the Year Soleil Flores. The trio started in a majority of the team’s contests last season, combining for six assists and seven goals. Attanasi returns as the team’s leading scorer from a season ago, connecting on six goals and adding a trio of assists. Vanderlinden tacked on a goal and two assists while Flores added an assist while anchoring a backline that recorded 11 shutouts. 
• As a whole, JMU led the Sun Belt in shot percentage (.508) and was 36th in the nation with a .500 shutout percentage, good enough for fourth in the league.
• Thursday is the 12th all-time meeting between the ‘Cats and Dukes with James Madison leading at 2-8-1. The last time the two sides battled was August 22, 2018 with Villanova winning 3-2 at Higgins Soccer Complex.
• This is the first time the teams have met since the Dukes joined the Sun Belt Conference after leaving the CAA. Villanova is 4-0 against the SBC since 1989.

• Temple welcomed first year head coach Chris Shaw to the program in January after a four-year stint at Robert Morris. He takes the helm of a Temple program that was slated to finish 11th in the American Preseason Coaches Poll after a 2-13-3 showing in 2023.
• Defender Phoebe Hollin and midfielders Carly Steinberg and Yao Zhou all landed spots on the AAC Watch List. Hollin was a consistent starter for Temple last season, clocking 1,558 minutes throughout all 18 contests. She landed four of her eight shot attempts on frame, leading the team in corner kicks. Steinberg Zhou comes in as a graduate transfer from Tennessee Tech where she was a two-time Ohio Valley Conference Midfielder of the Year and OVC First Team pick. She tallied a team-high seven goals and 20 points last year, also leading the conference in both categories.
• Temple was the AAC’s leader with 6.06 saves per game last season and was third with a .497 shot percentage.
• Sunday will be the 12th all-time meeting between the Wildcats and Owls with Villanova leading the all-time ledger 8-1-2. Villanova has won four of the last five duels by a scoring margin of 14-5. The last contest came last year at Temple with Villanova leaving Philly with a 3-0 victory.
• Temple hails from the AAC, a conference the ‘Cats are 2-2 against all-time.

Home Sweet Higgins: Thursday is the first of three straight home contests to open the season. Villanova is 1-0-1 in home openers since Samar Azem took the helm in 2022 and 27-11-3 overall since 1983. Season-opening matches have gone 21-16-4 in favor of the ‘Cats with a 1-1 standing in Azem’s tenure.

A Balanced Slate: Ten of Villanova’s 18 matches this season will take place inside the friendly confines of Higgins Soccer Complex, brining in opponents from six different conferences including the Sun Belt, American, Ivy, ACC, Patriot League and, of course, the BIG EAST.

Back Again: Villanova lost 10 players from the 2023 squad with five of those being starters. Of the 16 point scorers from last year who totaled 57 points, 10 are back on the roster this year, accounting for 24 points on four goals and 16 assists.

New ‘Cats on the Block: Villanova welcomes 10 newcomers to this year’s roster. Three of the new faces come in as transfers: junior netminder Hannah Dickinson (USC), graduate defender/midfielder Caitlyn Leffler (South Carolina) and graduate defender Olivia Neal (Campbell). The seven freshmen span all ends of the pitch with a class that includes a midfielder, three forwards, two defenders and a keeper.