Sacramento Republic’s unlikely journey to US Open Cup glory

Sacramento Republic of the second-tier USL are 90 minutes away from a historic trophy and the biggest triumph in a long-overlooked city's sports history

Sacramento, as a city, has always had a chip on its shoulder. Despite its 2.5 million residents and status as the capital of California, it has long been overshadowed by the likes of the Bay Area's Silicon Valley and Los Angeles.

That dynamic inevitably spills over to sports, where its soccer team, Sacramento Republic of the second-tier USL, was infamously spurned last year by Major League Soccer only 17 months after it was very publicly awarded an expansion slot.