Last night was the BIG day for Lamar Hunt US Open Cup action all over the US.  I was able to take part in the ‘war room’, helping out behind the scenes as we attempted to gather scores on all of the matches taking place yesterday through our AIM Chat aptly named ‘USOCInsanity’

For the NPSL, the night got off on the right foot, as the Sonoma County Sol advanced to the second round with a 5-2 win over Orange County Blue Star.

Many people logged onto the USOpenCup.com chatroom were touting this as a major upset, but in fact, it could easily be considered a win for the favored team in the match.  Sonoma County Sol are unbeaten this year in all competitions, while Blue Star were struggling after a good start to the season.

I guess this point really surprised me as the common opinion is that the NPSL is simply a rec league, or as someone put it ‘Sonoma needs to play in a league’.  Well, apparently the NPSL showed what kind of league they are in this match.

With the win, the Sol get to host Portland Timbers, who advanced with a 3-0 victory over Kitsap Pumas.  This match will be extremely important to the Sol, who want to keep their dream run in the Open Cup alive.  The match is next Tuesday, June 16th at Santa Rosa High School, kickoff @ 7:00pm.

In the second match of the night Atlanta FC fell to Charleston Battery 2-0.  The game played second fiddle as Atlanta FC were extremely physical all night with their USL-1 rivals, to the tune of three red cards, and a sending off of coach Ricardo Montoya, which left Jason Longshore to direct the rest of the match.

The game was shown live on www.usllive.com, and was a pleasure to see the NPSL on such a big stage.

The last matchup of the night saw Arizona Sahuaros drop a tough game to El Paso Patriots 2-1.  El Paso are no joke, as they sit ontop of Mid-South Division of the PDL this season.  Arizona were down 2-0 and scored to pull within 1, but could not find the equalizer.

One win out of three for the NPSL isn’t exactly the showing we wanted, but it was a good one none the less.  Arizona faced a tough El Paso Team, Atlanta FC played up three divisions, and Sonoma County rolled against Orange County.

Now, onto the next round,  where the Sol host the Timbers in their biggest game yet this season…