It was October 24, 2002, and the Columbus Crew defeated the LA Galaxy, 1-0, at Historic Crew Stadium to win the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup. Amidst the Crew’s celebrating players and coaches was Lamar himself, beaming as if he’d just won a second Super Bowl ring to match the one worn on his right hand that night.
What a night it was. The club he founded won the first trophy in its history, in the tournament re-named in his honor, and did so in the first soccer-specific stadium in Major League Soccer, which he built as a show of faith in the sport, the league, and the city. Anyone who was there that night will never forget the emotion of that moment.
It’s hard to believe it’s been 24 years.
On Wednesday night, looking to build upon Sunday’s 2-0 Hell is Real triumph in the heat of the playoff chase, the Crew will host St. Louis CITY SC at ScottsMiracle-Gro Field with a chance to claim the second Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup title in club history. The opportunity to win a trophy, especially at home, should never be taken for granted. The anticipation when walking through those gates, knowing that a life-long memory is within reach, is as special as it gets.
Crew fans know a thing or nine about that. After winning the Open Cup in 2002, the Crew finished the decade strong, winning an MLS Cup in 2008 and three Supporters’ Shields for being top of the table in league play. Then, after the saving of the Crew in 2018, the 2020s have become a second golden age under the investment and stewardship of the Haslam, Johnson, and Edwards families, with a downtown stadium and four additional trophies this decade, including two MLS Cup titles and the club’s first international hardware.
And now the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup beckons once more. Twenty-four years is a long time, and the circumstances of the 2002 Open Cup champions and the 2026 Crew are an interesting contrast that makes Wednesday’s game all that more intriguing.
By 2002, the Crew had developed a reputation as a consistently good-but-not-great team. Titles were heartbreakingly elusive, with many near misses. In MLS, they’d lost four conference finals in the span of six years, dropping three straight to dynastic D.C. United from 1997-99, and losing to New England in 2002.
The U.S. Open Cup offered little relief. In 1998, Hurricane Bonnie wiped out a neutral site final in Virginia Beach. The game was rescheduled as a home game for the Chicago Fire, who beat the Crew, 2-1, in golden goal overtime. The next year, with Columbus being awarded hosting rights to the final, the Crew squandered an 86th minute lead in the semifinal and lost to the second-division Rochester Raging Rhinos. That one hurt.
After seven seasons of heartbreak, the 2002 Open Cup final was one more chance at first-time glory. The pressure was immense to finally break through and deliver a trophy to Columbus.
The 2026 squad has the opposite kind of pressure. The Crew are now one of the most successful clubs in MLS history, with nine trophies in the case. This is a club ranked number one in Concacaf two years ago. This is the first MLS club to compete in three major tournament finals in a span of only nine months, lifting the 2023 MLS Cup and 2024 Leagues Cup trophies at ScottsMiracle-Gro Field, and reaching the Concacaf Champions Cup final for the first time in club history in 2024.
Attaining success and sustaining success are different but equally difficult pressures. Competing for the tenth trophy is just as hard as competing for the first.
Here is an astonishing fact: In their run to the 2002 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup title, the Crew played a total of 18 players. With one game yet to play, the 2026 Crew have used thirty-one different players in Open Cup games, with lineups made by two different head coaches. Taking it even further, the 2026 Crew have gotten Open Cup goal contributions from fifteen different players so far. It boggles the mind.
2002 featured a core of players that went back to 1996: Brian McBride, Brian Maisonneuve, Mike Clark, and Robert Warzycha. A fellow 96er, Todd Yeagley, retired mid-season to join the front office, as did Mike Lapper, who had joined the Crew in 1997. Jeff Cunningham and Brian West were in their fifth seasons and had been through all but one of the prior near-miss heartbreaks. Even the influx of younger talent had at least one full season to coalesce prior to the Open Cup final. This was a team of known quantities, many of whom were beloved, foundational pillars of the club.
The 2026 Crew, on the other hand, have rebuilt the airplane mid-flight. General Manager Issa Tall has overseen this Open Cup marvel, even switching pilots while airborne. Somehow, the altimeter has remained steady and the wings level, round after round of the tournament.
This year’s Crew team is the first Columbus squad to reach the Open Cup final since the sunset days of the Schelotto-Hejduk empire in 2010. That Crew core won a Supporters’ Shield-MLS Cup double in 2008, and another Shield in 2009. Their quest to earn domestic Grand Slam in the span of three years was derailed by a 2-1 loss in the 2010 Open Cup final played on plastic grass in Seattle.
Since then, the Crew’s Open Cup success could be charitably described as muted. For 16 years, the Black & Gold didn’t beat a single MLS team in the tournament. On six occasions, the Crew were eliminated early by lower-division clubs.
Finally, those trends have been obliterated. Hugo Picard produced a pair of two-goal performances to defuse those lower-division landmines for former head coach Henrik Rydström. Now, interim head Coach Laurent Courtois has helmed quarterfinal and semifinal victories over MLS foes.
The pace of change has been staggering. To give just a few examples, Max Arfsten, who scored the lone goal in the quarterfinal win over New York City FC, is now at Middlesbrough in England. Leading scorer Diego Rossi is in Monterrey. Picard, slayer of Richmond and Knoxville, is on loan in France’s Ligue 1.
The new arrivals haven’t skipped a beat. New designated player Santi Rodríguez dished two assists in the semifinal win over Orlando. Brais Méndez arrived from Spain and can’t stop scoring across all competitions, including a goal in the semifinal. Newly acquired Josef Martínez, former MLS Golden Boot and MVP winner, scored the other semifinal goal. All in all, there were ten new additions during the transfer window. These players came to Columbus because they believe in the club and want to continue the tradition of winning.
One thing that made the 2002 Open Cup final so special was that the title was the culmination of years of hard work building the club in the city, and it was essentially a last hurrah for most of the remaining 1990s core.
What makes the 2026 Open Cup so interesting is that a win would make one heck of a first hello from a significant swath of the roster. Immortality has no mandatory waiting period.
Part of the appeal of any championship final is the opposition. Think of how much sweeter the trophies this decade have tasted after prevailing over LAFC (twice), Cruz Azul, and a Seattle Sounders team trying to cement dynasty status. And back in 2002, the Crew beat an LA Galaxy squad seeking to clinch a domestic treble, having already won that year’s MLS Cup and the Supporters’ Shield for the league’s best regular season record. All were daunting opponents. St. Louis continues the trend, having just concluded a 21-game unbeaten streak across all competitions, setting an MLS record. Championships require challenges.
Another alluring aspect of the matchup is that St. Louis has a long and storied soccer history. For much of the 20thcentury, it was the center of American soccer. Five members from the 1950 World Cup lineup that rattled the globe by upsetting mighty England hailed from St. Louis. The Gateway City has also claimed ten U.S. Open Cups, spanning from St. Louis Ben Millers winning in 1920 to St. Louis Busch Seniors winning in 1988. St. Louis CITY SC will be playing for the club’s first domestic title since their 2023 on-field debut, and it’s only fitting that it’s the U.S. Open Cup. As if the stakes weren’t high enough already.
In different eras, St. Louis and Columbus are two cities that have had an outsized impact on American soccer. Come Wednesday, one city will add new lore to its proud historical tradition.
How can you not be romantic about that?
Lamar Hunt passed away in 2006, four years after that wonderful night in 2002. So much has happened in Columbus since Lamar passed. In 2023, his son, Clark, reflecting on his father’s ties to the Crew and the state of the club in the 2020s, said, “I think Lamar would be so excited for passionate Crew fans to have a state-of-the-art stadium in the heart of their city.”
That state-of-the-art stadium in the heart of the city is ScottsMiracle-Gro Field, built a generation later with the same faith and commitment to the sport, the club, and Columbus. On Wednesday, the heart of the city will be the heartbeat of passionate Crew fans.
If you saw Cucho Hernández and Jacen Russell-Rowe score in stoppage time of the 2024 Leagues Cup final, or the Malte Amundsen wonder-assist in MLS Cup 2023, or Jonathan Mensah putting the 2021 Campeones Cup out of Cruz Azul’s reach, or 19-year-old Aidan Morris wrecking the Seattle Sounders in MLS Cup 2020, or Guillermo Barros Schelotto’s scoop to Frankie Hejduk’s head in MLS Cup 2008, or Robert Warzycha’s dramatic goalmouth clearance to preserve the 1-0 stoppage time lead in the 2002 U.S. Open Cup final… or if you wish you’d had the good fortune to personally witness any of them… Wednesday night at ScottsMiracle-Gro Field is another potential opportunity to experience a moment or an emotion that will live forever.
A cup is there for the taking. Memories are there for the making. There’s no place I’d rather be.
