No team outside MLS’ vaunted heights – and guarded walls – can actually win the Open Cup. Right?
“My old coach in Seattle, Nate Daligcon, actually won it with the Rhinos,” said 24-year-old Union Omaha striker and Washington native Noe Meza, referring back to the 1999 Open Cup-winning side from Rochester, NY – who beat four Major League Soccer sides to become the only non-MLS team, since the top-flight league’s founding in 1996, to lift American soccer’s oldest prize. “I was joking with him the other day that we’re going to take that title away and do what they did this year.”
Those storied Rhinos of 1999 aren’t alone in their improbable run. In 2008, the Charleston Battery of the United Soccer Leagues reached the Final. Just because it’s unlikely doesn’t mean it’s impossible – even for a team with a dream from the third-division of American soccer’s pyramid.
“We can start to taste it at this point,” said Joe Brito, 23, of Bolton, Connecticut – fresh out of four playing years at UNC Charlotte. He scored his first professional goal to seal a 2-1 come-from-behind win against 2019 Open Cup runners-up Minnesota United in the Round of 16. “We’re a couple of games away from creating history and we can imagine what that history would look like. I think we can do it.”
Brito “couldn’t get to sleep” that night for all the adrenaline caused by his sublime volley that sent the Nebraskans to the Quarters – and made them the first-ever side from USL’s League One to reach so far. Meza, also in his first year as a pro and also undrafted out of college, has begun to believe in unlikelihoods: “We’ve made it this far for a reason and so why not think we can go all the way?”
Coach Mims: Man with a Plan
Mims’ fingerprints are all over this team. The hunger. The belief. The never-ending preparations. “He’s always watching game video,” chuckled Brito about the boss who preaches fitness and recognizes that, when his team is prepared and ready to play, they’re a nightmare for anyone on any day.
It’s all contagious. As is the coach’s love of the Open Cup.
