Asheville City Soccer Club will be participating in the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup for the second year in-a-row, drawing USL League One outfit Greenville Triumph SC in the first round of the tournament. The Blues will host the Triumph at UNCA’s Greenwood Field on March 18th at 7:30 PM, tickets for the match will be on sale soon to watch your Blues try to pull off a famous #cupset. This match is included in the ACSC season ticket package and UNC-Asheville students can get a discount at the gate for tickets by showing their student ID. 

But you may ask, what exactly is the US Open Cup? Well we have got you covered.

The Cup

The Lamar Hunt US Open Cup (USOC) is the biggest soccer knockout tournament in the United States. 96 teams are competing in the tournament in the 2025 edition, with 9 leagues being represented: MLS, USL Championship, USL1, USL2, MLS Next Pro, NPSL, UPSL, USSSA, and USASA. Los Angeles FC was the last edition’s champions as they claimed their 1st title in club history, defeating Sporting Kansas City in the Final.

History

The USOC was founded for the 1913-1914 season, to try and promote American soccer. It was originally named the National Challenge Cup, which stuck until 1989 when it was then renamed the US Open Cup. In 1999, it was renamed again, this time to the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup. This was to honor Hunt, an American businessman, who did a lot to promote soccer in this country. 

Brooklyn Field Club was the first team to ever win the tournament in that 1914 season. Since then, Bethlehem Steel FC and Maccabee Los Angeles led the way with 5 Open Cup titles. Unfortunately, those two teams have dissolved, leaving the Chicago Fire, Seattle Sounders, Sporting Kansas City (MLS) and Greek American AA (EPSL) as the active championship leaders with 4 each. 

MLS teams first entered the competition in 1996, and have dominated the winner’s podium since their introduction to the tournament. The last lower division team to win the USOC was the Rochester Raging Rhinos (now named Rochester New York FC) in 1999. Only three lower divisions teams have made the USOC Final since then, the Rhinos in 1996, the Charleston Battery in 2008 and most recently Sacramento Republic FC, who fell to Orlando City by a score of 3-0 in the 2022 edition. 

This year is the third year back for the tournament after the COVID-19 pandemic caused cancellations to the 2020 and 2021 editions. Before that, the tournament had been played for 106 straight years. It is considered the nation’s oldest ongoing national soccer competition.

The state of North Carolina has never had a team qualify for the finals of the tournament. North Carolina will have 6 teams competing in the tournament looking to buck this trend, with the other 5 besides ACSC, being Charlotte FC from MLS, the USL Championship’s North Carolina FC, USL1’s Charlotte Independence, MLS Next Pro’s Carolina Core FC and the NPSL’s Appalachian FC. The last lower-division team from North Carolina to make the quarterfinals of the tournament was the NASL’s Carolina Railhawks, now known as North Carolina Football Club, who defeated the MLS’ Chivas USA and LA Galaxy before eventually falling to FC Dallas 5-2 back in 2014. The furthest a North Carolina team has made it since the introduction of MLS teams in 1996 was also the Railhawks, when back in 2007 they defeated the MLS’ Chicago Fire en route to the final four where they fell in extra time to the New England Revolution 2-1.

Asheville City SC is 1 of 9 USL2 teams to qualify for the tournament and the only South Central Division qualifier. Only 2 of the 11 USL2 teams made the 2nd round last year and no clubs qualified for the 3rd round. However, USL2 clubs have experienced recent success as the last USL2 team to qualify for the round of 32 was FC Golden State Force in 2018, who defeated two USL Championship teams in Orange County SC and Las Vegas Lights FC on their way to that round, before falling to Major League Soccer’s LA Galaxy 3-1. The furthest a USL2 team has advanced since the league’s inception was when the Richmond Kickers won the 1995 Open Cup, in their only season in USL2, which back then was named USISL Premier League, on penalty kicks against the El Paso Patriots.

Format

There are eight rounds to the USOC, the first of which happens from March 18th-20th. The first round consists of 32 amateur teams matched up against 32 professional. These matchups are typically regional games with teams usually matched up against other teams in their area. The 32 winners of these matches will then be pitted up against each other in the second round which happens from April 1st-2nd. The 16 winners then move on to the third round, where they are joined by the 16 highest-ranked teams from the USL Championship. These matches take place from April 15th-16th. Then, the 16 MLS teams participating (up from 8 in 2024) in the tournament then enter in the quarterfinal round and face off against those 16 winners from the third round. These matches will take place from May 6th-7th.

This is where the tournament becomes more straightforward, as all participating teams that have not been eliminated yet are now in the field of play. It becomes like a typical 32-team knockout tournament from this point on (think March Madness if it started from the second round) with the amount of teams left halving with each round. That means it will drop to 16 (May 20th-21st), then to 8 in the quarterfinal round (July 8th-9th), down to 4 in the semifinals (September 16th-17th), and finally down to the final two teams where the champion will be crowned on October 1st. 96 teams from all across the country will be dwindled to 1 over a period of about 7 months, with there usually being a fair amount of (C)upsets sprinkled in along the way. Cupsets are when a lower-division team upsets a team in the tier above them, which helps make the USOC magical and one of the most exciting sports tournaments to take place in America every year.