St. Louis CITY SC Wins the US Open Cup for the First Trophy in Club History

For a young club, the night of 21 October 2026 will be hard to forget. St. Louis CITY SC, in its fourth year of existence, won the US Open Cup at ScottsMiracle-Gro Field in Columbus, beating the home side, the Columbus Crew, in a dramatic penalty shootout. It is the first trophy in the club's history, and it comes with a place in the 2027 Concacaf Champions Cup.

The shootout was a study in nerve. St. Louis converted all five of its penalties, and Ben Lundt, who had come on in goal, saved the Crew's first attempt from Santiago Rodríguez. Daniel Edelman stepped up to score the winning kick. Lundt, a 31-year-old backup, had entered the match after captain Roman Bürki was stretchered off following a collision and taken to a local hospital. "I was very confident in these guys," Lundt said afterwards.

"It's the first trophy for me and for a lot of guys and for the city," said Edelman. For St. Louis, that last part carries history: according to MLSsoccer.com, ten different St. Louis teams won the Open Cup between 1920 and 1988, making the city one of the competition's traditional strongholds. CITY SC has now added a new chapter.

The triumph caps a remarkable turnaround under first-year head coach Yoan Damet. St. Louis had collected just six points from its first ten league matches this season, then went on a club-record 21-match unbeaten run across all competitions, including 19 in MLS, climbing to second place in the Western Conference. "Success is not built overnight," Damet said, crediting the squad for buying into the project. Simon Becher said the whole team had embraced the goal of winning the cup.

For a club still building its identity, lifting a national trophy so early is a powerful statement, and it has earned St. Louis its first taste of continental competition. The next challenge will be carrying this momentum through the rest of the MLS season and onto the Concacaf stage in 2027.