Fansided · Jul 20, 2016
USOC: Meet the Fort Lauderdale Strikers
Going into the U.S. Open Cup quarterfinals tonight, there is one name on the fixture list that MLS fans may not know much about.
Just eight teams remain in the 2016 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, and one of those teams is not like the others.
That team is the Fort Lauderdale Strikers, this year’s flag bearer for the NASL, who enter the quarterfinals fresh off two upsets over MLS opponents in DC United and Orlando City. The NASL, widely regarded as the second tier of the American soccer pyramid, has never put a team into the USOC semifinals since the league’s founding in 2009. The last time a non-MLS team made it that far was in 2011 when the Richmond Kickers of USL Pro made the semifinals.