Update: Sacramento Republic FC defeated Sporting KC Wednesday night to advance to the US Open Cup final Sept. 7 at Orlando City FC. They are the first non-MLS team to reach the final in the tournament since 2008.
A classic “underdog story” is set to play out Wednesday night at Cal Expo’s Heart Health Park.
That’s when the Sacramento Republic FC soccer team will take-on Sporting Kansas City in front of a sold-out crowd for a chance to advance to the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup finals.
The Republic is in the USL Championship league, a division lower than Major League Soccer. The team had to beat not one but two MLS teams to get to this point.
"Our guys have done a great job of taking that sort of underdog mentality and bringing it forth," said Sacramento Republic FC President and General Manager Todd Dunivant. "That's really what Sacramento is about. That's who we are as Sacramentans, that's who we represent. And I think that's something that everybody here can kind of identify with, that we're not the first city that's thought about when you talk about California, but we're the capital."
The semi-final match kicks off Wednesday at 7:30 p.m.
Fans hope the team's surprising run may also help jumpstart its efforts to join MLS themselves. The league announced in 2019 that Sacramento would get an MLS franchise, but that plan was disrupted when billionaire Ron Burke pulled out of the deal last year.
CapRadio Insight host Vicki Gonzalez spoke with Dunivant, a former MLS championship player himself, about the team's mindset going into the game and how this experience is different for them.
Interview highlights
On his and the team's energy this week
This is an exciting moment, I think, for all of us at the club. We've been working hard for a long time. And so for things to come together as they have, we're excited for this opportunity. This is not one that comes around very often in anyone's career. So we're seizing it and I think Sacramento is seizing it. And we're going to have a packed house [Wednesday]. It'll be a memorable night.
The energy's been good. I think we're coming off of a game where we played in Phoenix on Saturday. The team sort of regrouped, got back together Monday, Tuesday. And, you know, really you can feel … you got that kind of playoff atmosphere in the air, that little, what I would call kind of a good tension in the air. You know, there's something on the line. You know, you felt that in training and we're looking forward to [Wednesday].
On how the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup is different from the United Soccer League championship
This is a David-Goliath story. This is what's cool about the U.S. Open Cup is that you have an opportunity. There's 103 teams that started, that entered the tournament, all the way from amateur teams, all the way up to MLS Cup champion teams. So everywhere in between, you know, there's teams involved. So from that 103 now we're down to four. Sacramento Republic has never made it this far. And quite frankly, this is a rare thing to have a non-Division 1, non-MLS team advance this far in the tournament.
It only happens, I would say once or twice a decade historically. So this is a very rare thing. And you know, we've now knocked off these five games that we've won, single elimination games to advance. The last two have been against MLS teams — first the San Jose Earthquakes at home, and then we went on the road and beat L.A. Galaxy in their building, when they're playing their strongest team.
So it's been a great run for our guys. And, you know, we know that our strongest test is going to be coming up against Kansas City, they’re a very strong team that won this tournament four times, more than any other club. And it's going to take our best to beat them.
On if the US Open Cup success could help the team's push to join MLS
We spent the offseason kind of refocusing a little bit as a club and saying, hey, we need to turn the page and move forward. We want to take destiny into our own hands, and there were two main ways to do that. One was to win, plain and simple: Put a winning product on the field. We started off really well in the league. We're in the playoffs, you know, good playoff position there. And then obviously the Open Cup run, I think, has made national headlines. So to your point, you know, once again, Sacramento's on the map nationally. That's a good thing. Only good things happen from that.
I think what you'll see tomorrow night at our game is a loud, full crowd. We're telling everybody, get there very early because of, you know, the mad rush the state fair is going on at the same time. We want to have a packed house when the game kicks off at 7:30 [p.m.]. But to your point, that is going to be good for Sacramento. That's why we got on the map in the first place. We're checking the box and winning. We're checking the box and, you know, doing well in the Open Cup and making national noise.
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