CHICAGO, Ill. (June 22, 2022) – Only five teams remain alive in the 2022 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, U.S. Soccer’s National Championship, after the first two game days of the competition’s Quarterfinal round. A hard-won cupset in Los Angeles by Division II club Sacramento Republic FC and a Hudson River Derby win for the New York Red Bulls highlighted the results, while Sporting Kansas City cruised past valiant underdogs Union Omaha.
The remaining Quarterfinal match between Div. I (MLS) combatants Orlando City SC and Nashville SC will be played at Exploria Stadium in Orlando, Fla. next Wednesday, June 29 at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN+. The winner of that game will know where they stand in the Semifinal and Final hosting priority order ahead of kickoff as the tournament’s Final Draw will take place this Thursday, June 23.
The Final Draw, which will air during the second half of the ESPN+ soccer discussion show, Futbol Americas (8:30 p.m. ET), will determine which of the final four teams will host an Open Cup Semifinal at the end of July and the Final in September.
Sacramento Republic (Div. II USL Championship) was the first team to book a place in the 2022 U.S. Open Cup Semifinals as they memorably dispatched two-time Open Cup champions LA Galaxy 2-1 on the road in Carson, Calif. on Tuesday evening. Sacramento, which has reached the Semifinals for the first time in club history, wins the $25,000 prize awarded to the Div. II club to achieve the best results in the competition.
Tonight, Div. I clubs Sporting Kansas City and New York Red Bulls joined Sacramento in the final four. SKC ended the run of tournament giant killers Union Omaha (Div. III USL League One) with a 6-0 win in Kansas City. Omaha had previously defeated two Div. I clubs (Chicago Fire and Minnesota United) en route to the Quarterfinals. The Owls claimed the $25,000 prize as the Div. III with the best results in this edition of the Cup. For its part, Sporting returns to the Semifinal stage for the first time since 2017 – the year the club won the most recent of its Modern-Era-record four Open Cup titles (tied with Chicago Fire and Seattle Sounders FC).
In the second straight round to feature an intra-city rivalry match, the Red Bulls took down reigning MLS champions NYCFC 3-0 on the west side of the Hudson River in Harrison, N.J. The Quarterfinal run is the farthest stage NYCFC has reached in the Open Cup since beginning play in 2015, while the Red Bulls advance to the Semifinals for the first time since 2017 and sixth time overall.
The Quarterfinal round will conclude next Wednesday, June 29 when either Orlando City SC or Nashville SC move on from their clash at Exploria Stadium in Orlando, Fla. (7 p.m. ET, ESPN+). This is the deepest run in the competition for Nashville since the team began play in the second division back in 2018. For Orlando City, this is the club’s fifth journey to the Quarterfinal round dating back to its Div. II days (2011-14).