BATON ROUGE, La. — Julia de Souza scored first-half goals, and Luisa Bella and Theresa Wiesiolek shared the goalkeeping Sunday in Xavier University of Louisiana's 2-0 women's soccer victory at NCAA Division I Southern University.
        It was an exhibition for both teams. The Gold Nuggets' other exhibition will start at 11 a.m. CDT Wednesday against Pearl River Community College at Lafreniere Park in Metairie, La. There's free admission at every XULA home game.
        "Exhibition games are great to see what's working for us and what we need to fix before going into the regular season," XULA head coach Ashley Cordeiro said. "There were a lot of positives to take away from today, but still some things we need to clean up before moving into the next game. Our newcomers are all settling in well to the squad, which is great to see."
        Goals for de Souza — XULA's No. 3 goal-scorer a year ago with 10 — included a penalty kick. Bella started the first half, and Wiesiolek started the second.
        Joining Bella and de Souza in the starting lineup were Britni Belmonte, Faye Butterworth, Gabriela Gonzalez, Grete Nelson, Maureen Owusu, Millicent Owusu, Samira Roper, Luci Schroeder and Amelia Thompson.
        XULA's first women's soccer team in 2023 was a first-round winner at NAIA nationals, 13-6 overall and 11-2 and regular-season champion in the Red River Athletic Conference.
        XULA's regular-season opener will start at 5 p.m. next Sunday at William Carey in Hattiesburg, Miss. The Gold Nuggets' first regular-season home game will start at 1 p.m. Aug. 27 against Georgia Gwinnett at Lafreniere.