FC Tucson looks to build on its historic achievement of making its first USL League One playoff appearance by defeating the Richmond Kickers on Saturday night in an opening-round match at Kino North Stadium.
The match starts tonight at 7 and will be streamed on ESPN Plus.
The winner secures a trip to Omaha or Greenville to take on Union Omaha or Greenville Triumph SC in the semifinals.
Richmond’s Emiliano Terzaghi led the league with 18 goals to earn the USL League One Golden Boot for the second straight season. Teammate Jonathan Bolanos is Richmond’s second highest goal scorer with five goals.
Charlie Dennis leads FC Tucson with nine goals followed by Shak Adams with eight and Deri Corfe with seven.
The Men In Black have made it this far after starting the season 2-6-3 and 11th out of 12 teams in the USL League One at the start of July.
They finished the season with a 11-10-7 record, a No. 4 playoff spot and a home match in the opening round against the Kickers, the No. 5 seed who are also 11-10-7.
The turnaround for FC Tucson happened following the hiring of Jon Pearlman as FC Tucson’s interim head coach after Jon Galas and the team parted ways. Pearlman was named FC Tucson permanent head coach on Oct. 7.
FC Tucson beat the Kickers last week in a gritty 4-2 win to clinch the No. 4 seed.
FC Tucson is 1-1 against Richmond. The first time the two clubs played was July 31, when Pearlman was just four games into in his tenure. Richmond took the win with a 1-0 score.
The Kickers opted to stay in Tucson the entire week rather than returning to Richmond and flying back.
Richmond, coached by former FC Tucson coach Darren Sawatzky, took advantage of the stay to go for a hike at Sabino Canyon.
“There’s all these big cactuses, which is something that a lot of these guys probably haven’t seen before,” said Sawatzky told the Richmond Times-Dispatch. “So it was an opportunity for us to re-gen[erate] and get to see the natural area.”
FC Tucson has experienced its share of playoff runs since becoming a club in 2011 and joining the Premier Development League in 2012.
Since joining that league, FC Tucson has made the playoffs every year except for 2013.
FC Tucson’s first playoff match was the PDL Western Conference championship semifinal against the Seattle Sounders FC U-23. They fell to the Sounders by a score of 2-1.
Donny Toia, who played soccer at Canyon Del Oro High School and Pima Community College, scored the lone goal for his team that night. He now plays in the MLS for Real Salt Lake.
The Men in Black won their first playoff game in 2014, proving that they can be a legitimate club in the postseason. They beat the Los Angeles Misioneros by a score of 2-1.
FC Tucson moved on to beat the Vancouver Whitecaps U-23 at Kino North in the Western Conference semifinals. Sebastian De Rada was the star of the match, scoring the only goal in the final minute of stoppage time.
They lost the next day in the Western Conference finals to the Kitsap Pumas by a 3-0 score.
The following year, FC Tucson made it to the finals again. This time it was the Sounders U-23 who would get the best of them, winning at Kino North by a 4-1 score.
Edgar Reyna, who was highly touted as a Tucson soccer legend, was the difference in the playoff run. He netted a game-sealing goal to beat the Albuquerque Sol FC in the first round of the playoffs. He scored again in a 2-1 loss to Seattle at home.
FC Tucson’s dreams of making it past the Western Conference finals were shattered again in 2016. After beating the Burlingame Dragons by a 3-2 score in the first round, the team fell short to Calgary Foothills FC. They lost the Western conference finals match 2-1.
FC Tucson would lose to the Fresno Fuego in the Western Conference semifinals match by a 1-0 score in 2017, snapping their streak of making it to the finals.
FC Tucson was purchased by Phoenix Rising FC in 2017 and was moved to the USL League One in February of 2018, making them a professional team.
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Nathaniel Martinez is an aspiring sports journalist who is a Sahuaro High School graduate and Pima Community College student. He has written for the Aztec Press at Pima. While at Sahuaro, he played football for longtime coach Scott McKee and he wrestled for the Cougars.
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