In a country of soccer heroes, Chapecoense was a team of unlikely upstarts.
The club, from the tiny city of Chapeco in the southern state of Santa Catarina, was playing in the Brazilian fourth division — the equivalent of baseball’s low minor leagues — less than a decade ago. But this year it had a breakthrough.
Despite finishing 14th in Brazil’s top league, the Serie A, in 2015, Chapecoense had inexplicably made it to the finals of the Copa Sudamericana, South America’s second-biggest club tournament.
It was on its way to Colombia for the first leg of the two-match final with famed Atletico Nacional when its plane crashed outside Medellin on Monday night, reportedly killing 76 of the 81 people on board the charter flights.