A Louisville City FC team setting a historic pace within the USL Championship will get the opportunity to step up in class Wednesday when traveling to meet Major League Soccer’s Seattle Sounders FC in the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup.
The Round of 32 game — played as part of U.S. Soccer’s annual national championship tournament — will kick off at 10:30 p.m. ET at Starfire Sports Complex in Tukwila, Washington. Fans can tune into live streaming coverage at USOpenCup.com.
LouCity boasts its best-ever record through seven league games, starting 6-1-0. Last time out, six players scored for the boys in purple in their April 27 victory over the Hartford Athletic, a club that entered holding a playoff position.
City has excelled on both sides of the ball, generating 23 goals for to seven against. Four of its games ended in shutouts.
Seattle, meanwhile, has labored to a 2-5-4 MLS start. The club did, however, go unbeaten in its two most-recent games, defeating Philadelphia Union by a 3-2 score midweek before Sunday’s scoreless draw with LA Galaxy.
Whereas LouCity’s league slate paused last weekend for the Kentucky Derby, the Sounders are amid heavy schedule congestion, playing seven games in 22 days from April 27 through May 18. That includes regularly scheduled games, this Open Cup date and resumption of the Philadelphia match originally abandoned back in March due to weather.
Then and now: LouCity advanced to this point by defeating USL League One’s Greenville Triumph by a 3-1 score in the Open Cup’s Third Round. Eight MLS clubs enter the competition for the Round of 32, with the winner of LouCity at Seattle advancing to play either Phoenix Rising FC or North Carolina FC — both from the USL Championship — in the Round of 16.
Trophy hunters: The Sounders have won the Open Cup four times — a run of three straight titles from 2009-2011 and again in 2014. Seattle also owns two MLS Cups won in 2016 and 2019. LouCity, of course, ranks among lower-division soccer’s most-decorated teams with USL Championship titles in 2017 and 2018 to go with Eastern Conference crowns in 2019 and 2022.
Stumbling block: Going back to 2018’s run to the Open Cup’s Quarterfinal Round, LouCity has upset MLS competition in the tournament, knocking off the New England Revolution. However, City’s recent runs have ended against first-division foes with a Round of 16 loss to Nashville SC in 2022 and Third Round defeat to FC Cincinnati in 2023.
Club connections: Two players on LouCity’s roster will find themselves in familiar territory Wednesday. Goalkeeper Danny Faundez (2015) and forward Ray Serrano (2018-2021) are both from Washington state and played for the Sounders’ development squads before making their way to Louisville.
The stakes: The Open Cup is in its 109th edition with the winner set to earn $300,000 in prize money and a berth in the Concacaf Champions Cup. The runner-up will earn $100,000, while the team that advances the furthest from each lower division will take home a $25,000 cash prize. The Round of 16 is scheduled for May 21-22, continuing toward the final on Wednesday, September 25.
