There are scary moments, when the ball goes into the box, during set pieces. That’s what we needed coming into tonight. Not just performance wise, but emotionally in the locker room,” Mertz said. Mertz gave credit to his goalkeeper, calling him a steady presence. “So, being able to follow the ball and not let it out of your sight, see their players and communicate to the guys where they need to be, it’s a lot of focus, but we work on it in practice. You have to be focused, switched on all the time,” Waite, who represents the Jamaican national team, said. “It’s difficult, but that’s part of the job as a goalkeeper. The goalkeeper had to be alert, with Columbus recording a whopping 75 percent of possession. Waite - who earned his fourth clean sheet of the season - made three saves against Jacen Russell-Rowe, Thomas Roberts and substitute Gibran Rayo. You go out there and stick to the game plan, play as a team and compete, and then good things will happen.” “At the end of the day, they have 11 guys against our 11 guys. “You can’t think too much about the opponent,” goalkeeper Jahmali Waite said. However, before coming out to face Columbus, the Riverhounds didn’t put too much pressure on themselves - or think too much about facing “an MLS team.” Pittsburgh got to the Round of 16 after a road win against the New England Revolution. In fact, only two lower division clubs have ever shutout multiple MLS teams in a single tournament (1999 Rochester Raging Rhinos, 2022 Sacramento Republic FC), but the Riverhounds are the first to do it in consecutive games.
The Riverhounds are the first lower division club in the Modern Era (1995-present) to accomplish that. This is the second-straight shutout win against an MLS side in Lamar Hunt US Open Cup action.
That’s something we talked about, in this competition and the league, that we want to avoid being under a ton of pressure at the end of games … At the end of the day, you need to do what you’ve got to do. “It was natural for us to come under a little bit of pressure during that point of the game. “In the second half, we started to tire a little bit,” Mertz continued. But we did say that we wanted to give pressure when it made sense. We weren’t under any illusion that we would be an exception to that. “They out-posses teams in MLS 60, 65 percent of the time. “I think we knew coming into the game that they’re a possession-oriented team,” he explained. Columbus did out-posses the Riverhounds, but that was to be expected, according to Mertz. Pittsburgh didn’t park the bus, or let off the gas at all. Pittsburgh, PA = Cupset City, USA | #USOC2023 ? /yin6DcoFTr- U.S. In those situations, it happens very quickly. “I was concerned about offsides when I initially left my foot, but he wasn’t offside. “I kind of hesitated, because I was looking for … Then I saw the secondary run from Dikwa,” Mertz said.
Mertz said he was a bit worried about a potential offside call, but the goal was ruled fair. Dikwa slotted the ball low to the corner of the net, past Crew goalkeeper Evan Bush, after Mertz found him between two Crew defenders. It will be the Hounds’ first trip to the Quarterfinals since 2001.Īlbert Dikwa supplied the game-winning goal, assisted by hometown kid Robbie Mertz. The USL Championship club - who currently sit in fourth place in the Eastern Conference - upset the Columbus Crew SC at their home, Highmark Stadium, on Wednesday night. For the Pittsburgh Riverhounds, that’s all they needed.īob Lilley and company are heading to the next round, the Quarterfinals, of the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup. There was a record breaking crowd and one magical goal.
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