Snowligan

Heard of the US Open Cup ? It's the only tournament for which every club or franchise in US soccer can qualify. I'm not gonna explain that here, read about it on thecup.us The rules are so convoluted that Minneapolis City were unceremoniously kicked out of last year's tournament because they moved leagues after they'd started the qualification process. In similarly ridiculous fashion they are back in the qualification process, not through their league placement in the NPSL (a league which offers some automatic qualification spots) but through their founder Stegmans Soccer Club , a much harder qualification path. US Soccer then made it even harder by scheduling them for an away game in Aurora, IL (they won) and now they play in Rochester, this weekend.  Unfortunately the Rochester in question is upstate NY rather than 'med city' two hours away in MN. City/Stegmans are the only amateur team to be trying to qualify in the entire state of Minnesot...

As FC Fargo, we set ourselves up as a partner to all the local youth soccer clubs, rather than just a senior team for one. When Dakota Fusion were founded a year later, they took the more direct route of affiliation with Tri-City Storm, including even their color scheme. Nonetheless, Fusion and FCF are/were geographically distant from anything like a pipeline for a league like NPSL where amateur status doesn't just mean "not yet in college" (see Fargo Force for a model of the latter). The clubs in the Twin Cities metro, on the other hand, have all partnered up with teams from the local amateur MASL structure. Two are direct relatives (Stegmans/Mpls City and VSLT squared) and the TwinStars have joined them in affiliating to Fire SC. City have also consciously promoted the ideal of local players on their locally owned club, whereas the Fusion are thus far a melting pot of varied roots. I have no info on Med City or Sioux Falls. It will be interesting to s...