Imagine the St. Peter’s Peacocks bracketed in a months-long basketball tournament that included not just Duke and North Carolina, but also the Boston Celtics and Golden State Warriors.
Or, say, the old Triple-A Tucson Sidewinders engaged in a massive, coast-to-coast baseball tournament with the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees.
You could call it the Field of Dreams Tournament.
Ladies and gentlemen, start dreaming. On Wednesday night at Kino North Stadium, FC Tucson begins what U.S. Soccer refers to as “a mouth-watering possibility of Cupsets.”
The Men in Black are part of the six-month, 103-team Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup that encompasses America’s vast soccer community, from the Major League Soccer’s LA Galaxy and Seattle Sounders to the amateur D’Feeters Kicks SC of Farmers Branch, Texas.
It’s a lose-and-go-home format — knockout rounds, as U.S. Soccer likes to call it — and FC Tucson gets its first shot Wednesday, when it plays the Las Vegas Lights of the next-level-up USL Championship division. In effect, it’s like a Triple-A baseball team, Las Vegas, playing at Tucson’s Double-A USL League One franchise.
“It’s massive, one of the foremost and greatest traditions in competitive soccer in the United States,” says Jon Pearlman, head coach of FC Tucson. “It’s your shot to go all the way, a very unique opportunity for your Cinderella story to happen.”
This isn’t just a marketing director’s 21st-century idea of making an extra buck and increasing visibility for teams in the MLS, USL Championship, USL League One, the National Independent Soccer Association, the National Premier Soccer League and assorted semi-pro organizations.
This is the 107th U.S. Open Cup, dating to 1914, and Pearlman isn’t the only coach eager to make the most of such opportunity.
Pearlman was a first-year head coach during the Men In Black’s 2017 U.S. Open Cup run. He was unable to coach FC Tucson’s match against the USL’s Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC, a 2-0 loss. The opportunity lost still bites at him.
“We won at home a few days earlier, but I was ejected from the game and thus unable to coach in the next game,” he says. “It’s one of my great regrets. We went to the second round and lost in a game we had a chance to win.”
Given a second chance Wednesday against the Las Vegas Lights FC, Pearlman has an advantage — a home match — that doesn’t often arise in the U.S. Open Cup. The game was moved from Las Vegas’ Cashman Field, a dual facility also used as a Triple-A baseball ballpark since the 1940s, after it wasn’t deemed a suitable soccer facility for the U.S. Open Cup. The pitch at Cashman Stadium is often chewed up by the transition from soccer to baseball.
“They’ll give concessions to a lower league,” says Pearlman. “It’s not unusual in the early rounds for an amateur team to host a game. It’s a great opportunity to grow the game, draw more fans. That’s how I look at being able to play at Kino on Wednesday.”
The original field of 103 has already been reduced to 62. Of that group, 25 MLS teams have yet to play their first match. For USL League One teams, the dream of playing the country’s top teams can be realized when MLS teams join in the next round.
To add to the difficulty, there is no pause in the regular season. U.S. Open Cup games are squeezed into mid-week slots. It’s almost like Pearlman doesn’t have time to fully stop and soak in the opportunity.
He was up early Tuesday, cutting up and studying video from Saturday’s season-opening loss to the Richmond Kickers. It didn’t help that Pearlman and his team got stuck in the Denver airport for eight hours Sunday, stalled by a canceled return flight from Virginia following their season opener.
“We got smashed (4-0) by Richmond,” he says. “I don’t think I’ve slept since, but I’ll fix it.”
FC Tucson will play the Las Vegas Lights FC of USL Championship on Wednesday, 10 days before the Men in Black’s home opener against Forward Madison FC.
Not only is Pearlman tasked to prepare for the Las Vegas Lights, but for FC Tucson’s April 16 home opener against Forward Madison FC of Wisconsin. Not that he’s ducking the opportunity.
“It’s always fun to play the team above you,” says Pearlman. “The Open Cup is a tricky one for the pros. Teams like us have nothing to lose. We try our best to win and then get back to the regular season. Las Vegas also has a league game this weekend.”
Let it rip, right?
It’s no secret that FC Tucson would someday like to climb to the next level, to the USL Championship neighborhood, where it would be part of a flourishing western division that includes regional franchises such as Phoenix Rising FC, New Mexico United, El Paso Locomotive FC, the Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC and the Las Vegas Lights.
It seems like the next logical step given Tucson’s growing interest in soccer and FC Tucson’s success in USL League One. The Men in Black reached the league’s Final Four last fall.
“What we keep in mind at all times is that this is a very long season; our last regular-season game is Oct. 15,” Pealman said. “We have 29 games left plus the Open Cup. I’m super-bullish about this team.”
If FC Tucson defies the odds Wednesday and beats Las Vegas in this charming all-comers tournament, U.S. Soccer will randomly reshuffle the 32 surviving teams. If Tucson wins twice, it could likely play an MLS team like Sporting KC or the Houston Dynamo in soccer’s version of the Sweet 16.
All it takes is one goal, right?
