On the late week edition of The Third Half:

We look at Birmingham Legion 0 Rhode Island FC 1. We also review news from the week.

* USL announces a franchise in North Jersey. We look at where they play and the ownership.

* LouCity and Racing Foundation awarded a key grant from US Soccer. We dive into what the grant will be used for.

* The Tampa Bay Rowdies announce a summer reading program for kids.

* Orange County move game to be their game on May 24th for broadcast on KCAL 9.

* We look at signings and the discipline report along with the one game we’re looking forward to this weekend.

As always, thanks for listening to The Third Half.

The quick collapse of the Tampa Bay Rowdies from top three side in the USL Championship at the end of July 2024 to being at the foot of the table ten months later (and looking increasingly uncompetitive) is fully discussed. Is it the fault of ownership? What about injuries? Roster construction? Management?

We go through it all on this week’s podcast.

Another week of USL Championship action is in the book and we deconstruct it all.

On the late week edition of The Third Half:

I’m sure some have been waiting for one but after Tuesday and Wednesday I let loose on the USL and USL Championship and how poor they were in the US Open Cup Round of 32.

USL Dallas has a name. We take a look at the announcements made at their unveiling.

USL’s League Discipline Committee came out with upgrades to red cards and suspensions from last week’s games.

We look at the recent signings around USL and community initiatives from New Mexico United and Sacramento Republic.

As always, thank you for listening and your support of Beyond the 90.

New Mexico United’s ALS Kit

Sacramento Republic’s Mental Health T-Shirt

While there were two snoozers on this second day, we had moments where the USL Championship sides did threaten MLS teams, including the last third division team in AV Alta FC of USL League One. El Paso had a lead, but sadly lost it late in the back end of the second half to Austin FC.

Only the Pittsburgh Riverhounds are the sole surviving lower division side advancing to the next round. But once again, there was plenty of action in this round,`` with a few poor ones.

While there were no cupsets on the first day of the fourth round of the 2025 US Open Cup, three of the five matches nearly had some, as the first two matches were pushed into Extra Time. One barely edged the other in the Tennessee Derby, the visitors dominated the home side in the Rocky Mountains and in the final one of the night a penalty thwarted the last MLS Next Pro side in the Pacific Northwest.

It was great action from all five matches on day one and we are previewing the second day as well.

On the early week edition of The Third Half:

Mark Briggs was announced Head Coach for Birmingham Legion. We talk about the hire and the draw in St. Pete with the Tampa Bay Rowdies.

Rhode Island finally has their first home game at Tidewater Landing, at least the opening ceremonies were good?

El Paso Locomotive and North Carolina run their opposition off the pitch.

Sunday was not a good day for the officials. Let’s talk about how Oakland Roots and Miami FC were robbed.

The video gives details about a prospective project that we’ve been floating to a number of people in the game.

Chalk this one up to constantly learning things and seeing new things happen when actions are taken. We’ve theorized for years about how promotion and relegation would help the game in the United States, but one piece that I never thought about was the potential consolidation of independent youth clubs, and strong standalone academy structures to professional clubs in their area to create a direct pathway to pro with increased resource resources for facilities, tactical training, tactical, teaching, and coaching excellence.

This appears to be happening in USL already.

Beyond the 90 is a reader supported publication where the majority of our community members have significant involvement in the domestic game here in the United States.

We never had problems until the last few weeks in our comment section and unfortunately I’ve had to take action as a result. I’m very sorry I dropped the ball on this- I should be monitoring the comments more carefully I admit.

Please watch this video and understand the ground rules for commenting in the future.

Thank you for your continued support of BT90.