RICHMOND, VA – (Tuesday, April 14, 2015) – The competition format and pairings for the play-in, first and second round matches of the 102nd edition of the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup are set with the largest field in the modern era (1995-present) featuring 91 teams. The Richmond Kickers enter the tournament in the Second Round, playing host to the winner of the AC Connecticut/Virginia Beach City FC First Round match on Wednesday, May 20 at City Stadium.
The 2015 season marks the 17th time the Kickers have qualified for the U.S. Open Cup over the past 22 seasons, with an overall record of 26-15 during tournament play. The Kickers claimed the U.S. Open Cup title the first year of the Professional Era in 1995 and have since made it to the quarterfinal round five times (1995, 2001, 2004, 2007, 2011) and the semifinal round twice (1995, 2011). Ousting five Major League Soccer teams along the way, including Colorado Rapids in 2000, D.C. United in 2004, LA Galaxy in 2007 and Columbus Crew and Sporting Kansas City in 2011, the Kickers became the first lower division team to defeat back-to-back MLS teams on the road.
The third round match-ups, scheduled for May 27 will be determined on May 14 after first-round results are in the books. The possible fourth round pairings, when Major League Soccer clubs enter the fray, will be announced on May 21 once the second round has concluded. The highly-anticipated round of matches between MLS teams versus survivors from previous rounds is set for June 16 and 17.
Matches from the beginning of the tournament to the fourth round are determined on a geographic basis within certain parameters. Those parameters include arranging pairings to prevent a lower division team from playing a parent club. Teams playing in their first Open Cup match also cannot be paired against another club from the same qualifying pool (the all-MLS fourth round match is the lone exception). In the event that three or more teams are within the same proximity, pairings for these teams are made by random selection.
New in 2015, the pairings for the fifth round (June 30 and July 1) will be determined after dividing the 16 fourth-round winners geographically (regardless of league affiliation) into groups of four, with teams that have a shared-ownership relationship precluded from being in the same group. A random draw, scheduled for June 18, will determine the pairings within each group. The two fifth-round winners from each group will subsequently face each other in the quarterfinal (sixth) round July 21-22. Each group will also be paired geographically with another group to pre-determine the pairings for the semifinal round August 11-12. Should two ownership-affiliated teams reach the semifinal round and be scheduled to face each other, the matches will be re-drawn to avoid this outcome.
The Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, recognized as U.S. Soccer’s National Club Championship, is an annual competition open to all amateur and professional soccer teams affiliated with U.S. Soccer. The tournament has crowned a champion for 101 consecutive years dating from 1914. In 1999, the competition was renamed to honor American soccer pioneer Lamar Hunt.
This year’s winner will earn $250,000, a berth in the 2016-17 CONCACAF Champions’ League and have its name engraved on the historic Dewar Challenge Trophy, one of the oldest nationally contested trophies in American team sports. The runner-up will take home $60,000, while the team that advances the furthest from each lower division will earn a $15,000 cash prize.
