U.S. Open Cup 2012: Quarterfinal Pairings Announced

There is no soccer holy war being waged by Eric Wynalda. The ostensible head coach of Cal FC is not trying to rip down the United States soccer pyramid one MLS team at a time. He is not on a quixotic quest, fighting on the side that represents all that is right and good in the world of soccer.

The National Soccer Hall of Famer, national television pundit and former aspiring head coach just wants to make sure a group of players that no one wanted gets at least one more chance to show they have the goods.

Unfortunately, the way Schmid went about making his point allowed USSF President Sunil Gulati to avoid the issue when he said “Sigi’s comments are completely inappropriate and frankly quite offensive.” The problem was that Schmid’s comments were so personalized that Gulati could kind of gloss over the fact that Schmid kinda had a point.

That point being that the tournament has a perception problem.

As we now know, this is all subject to change, but the pairings for the U.S. Open Cup quarterfinals have been announced. Assuming they hold to form, though, there could be some interesting matchups.

Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup Schedule

QUARTERFINALS - Tuesday, June 26

New York Red Bulls (MLS)/Harrisburg City Islanders (USL PRO) Winner at D.C. United (MLS): RFK Stadium; Washington, D.C.; 7:30 p.m. ET

While Cal FC was able to put away pretty much their only real chance, the Timbers were wasting theirs. The Timbers fired off 37 shots and forced Cal FC goalkeeper Derby Carrillo into 15 saves, including seven in the overtime period.

Cal FC will now advance to play the three-time defending champion Seattle Sounders in the fourth round on Tuesday.

With two games left to play on Wednesday, seven MLS have already been eliminated in their first Open Cup game of the season. The folks on the Twitter are calling it MLSassacre. To be blunt, it was not a good day for MLS.

The more relevant question is, Was it a good day for the U.S. Open Cup?

When the U.S. Open Cup tweaked the format for this year’s tournament, there were hopes that some new life would be injected into the tournament as it entered its 99th edition. Safe to say, Tuesdays action probably surpassed anyone’s reasonable expectations.

Playing in front of a crowd of more than 17,000, RSL fell behind in the 3rd minute and although they were able to equalize relatively quickly, just never seemed to find their footing. The Stars retook the lead on a penalty in the Neil Hlavaty later in the first half and never looked back.