Apr. 3—The Portland Hearts of Pine have already scored their historic first win and then knocked off a team from a higher division in the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup. Now they get the chance to make a little more history at their home-away-from-home, Lewiston High.
Portland, a first-year franchise in USL League One, will host Rhode Island FC, a second-year USL Championship franchise, in the third round of the 110th edition of the Open Cup, on Tuesday, April 15, at 7 p.m. The game will be streamed live by CBS Sports on Paramount+ and CBS Sports Golazo Network.
The U.S. Open Cup is a men's soccer tournament that features teams from all the pro leagues, as well as some top amateur teams. In the third round, the 16 2024 USL Championship teams enter the tournament, with eight hosting games and the other eight on the road.
Rhode Island FC finished fifth in the USL Championship's Eastern Conference in 2024 and then went on a playoff run, losing in the championship game to the Colorado Springs Switchbacks. This season, Rhode Island is 0-2-1 in Championship play. Portland (0-0-1 in USL League One) and Rhode Island played a closed-door preseason game that ended in a 2-2 draw in Pawtucket, Rhode Island.
USL Championship is the country's lone second-tier league. Major League Soccer, the only first-tier league, will enter 16 of its teams in the fourth round, also called the Round of 32. At that point, the field will be set for the remainder of the single elimination tournament.
Portland has won two Open Cup games in front of crowds of 3,000-plus at Lewiston High. The first was a 4-0 celebratory debut victory against amateur squad CD Faialense of Cambridge, Massachusetts.
In Wednesday's win in penalty kicks — 4-2, after a 1-1 draw — against Hartford Athletic, the Hearts of Pine showed resilience and dogged effort, traits coach Bobby Murphy said he tried to make sure Maine's first professional soccer team would have when he put together his roster. Portland trailed 1-0 and had only 10 men on the field because of a red card when Jake Keegan's chip shot goal tied the game in the 116th minute.
The Hearts were immaculate in penalty kicks, making all four of their attempts. Portland goalie Hunter Morse saved one Hartford bid, and another shot flew way over the goal. That set up Evan Southern's winning kick and a several-minute celebration the team shared with its fans.
"When I took the job and we had discussions about what this was all going to look like, we wanted to reflect the community that we play in," Murphy said. "Maine is notorious for hard-working people who value what they have, and that was a real big part of the recruiting process to find people who had that sort of character that bought into the larger project. We hope we reflect the people in the community and we hope they look on the field and say, 'That's how I'd play if I got a chance.'"
CROSS THE COUNTRY
The Hearts return to USL League One play at Saturday (9 p.m.) at Spokane Velocity FC (1-1-1). It will be the third game in eight days for both clubs. The Hearts flew to Florida and tied FC Naples, then came back to Maine for the Open Cup game, and now will fly roughly 2,300 miles across the country to play at ONE Spokane Stadium in eastern Washington. Spokane, after beating the Greenville Triumph, 4-0, last Saturday, returned to Washington for its Open Cup game Wednesday, losing at Tacoma Defiance.
"We're going to have to rotate, going to have to patch it together," Murphy said. "Some guys who haven't seen a lot of minutes so far will get a chance. ... We felt it was really important to put our best available group out (against Hartford) in front of the home crowd and try to move forward in the Cup, and then we'd deal with ...
