Out west, not far from the famous Vegas Strip, Eric Wynalda’s USL Championship side Las Vegas Lights welcome Orange County FC to Cashman Field [WATCH]. The youngsters from SoCal stunned their near neighbors and full pros Orange County SC in a First Round shootout and have a dangerous attacking weapon in the burly form of target-man Blake Frischknecht. “He’s a pure striker with good height and is a guy who is deceptively fast with technical skills. I like his ideas,” said OCFC coach and former U.S. Men’s National Team hero Paul Caligiuri. “It’s not just having a skill but it’s what you do with it, and he knows.”
Not as dramatic an underdog, the pink flamingo-obsessed first-year Forward Madison are the lone surviving USL League One (third pro tier) club left standing in the 2019 Open Cup. They beat local amateurs Bavarian SC in the First Round in Milwaukee, before flying all the way to El Paso to knock off USL Championship pros Locomotive FC. And now they’re on the road again, this time against Saint Louis FC, with a shot at an MLS team in the Fourth Round on the line. “One of our goals this year was to be the last League 1 team standing, and we did that,” said Forward Madison head coach Daryl Shore. “We also want to play an MLS team. That’s on the line now.”
[WATCH]
A Spate of Eight All-Championship Tussles
The Tampa Bay Rowdies travel to Oklahoma to take on OKC Energy, who beat amateur darlings NTX Rayados in the last round. The Floridians, well out on top of the current USL Championship regular season standings, are led by Open Cup veteran Kwadwo Poku, who broke out in the 2014 edition of the tournament and went to the Quarterfinals two years ago with Miami FC. “We need to approach every game the same way, with the same intensity,” said the Ghanaian midfielder. “If we do that, there’s no telling how far we can go.”
[WATCH]
Pittsburgh’s Riverhounds welcome Indy Eleven to their stunning Highmark Stadium, perched and picturesque on the banks of the Monongahela River, in one of eight all-USL Championship ties in this Third Round [WATCH]. Charleston Battery – the last team from outside Major League Soccer to reach an Open Cup Final (2008) – travel to take on Nashville SC, who put together a solid run last year that ended in the Round of 16 after they beat the Colorado Rapids of MLS in the Fourth Round. [WATCH]
