Cup competitions make soccer the most democratic of the major team sports. There is no equivalent in hockey of the NHL playing meaningful games against AHL or ECHL teams, NFL playing CFL, or the NBA playing the G-League or CEBL.
The 2023 Canadian Championship for the Voyageurs Cup began Tuesday and Wednesday across the country with the opening round concluding tonight as Pacific FC hosts Canadian Premier League-rival Cavalry FC of Calgary at 7 p.m. at Starlight Stadium.
The 14-team single-loss elimination Voyageurs Cup tournament features Canada’s 11 pro soccer teams — the three in Major League Soccer and eight in the CPL — and the defending champions of the semi-pro League1 Ontario, Ligue1 Québec and League1 B.C., the latter which includes the Victoria Highlanders.
The 2023 Voyageurs Cup champion will earn a berth in the 2024 CONCACAF Champions League.
Giant-killing is a big feature of soccer cup competitions and PFC and Cavalry FC have both beaten the Vancouver Whitecaps of MLS in Canadian Championship play.
“Forge FC, Cavalry FC and ourselves have had great games against MLS teams,” noted PFC head coach James Merriman.
The Island-based CPL club defeated the Whitecaps in the 2021 Canadian Championship quarter-finals before going down 2-1 to Toronto FC of MLS at BMO Field in the semifinals.
Last year, however, PFC wasn’t as successful as the favoured and then-defending CPL-champion Tridents lost in the first round to CPL-rival York United on penalties in a nail-biting affair at Starlight Stadium.
“Cup games are one-offs. You advance or you don’t. That brings a lot of intensity and focus to cup games,” said Merriman.
This year’s draw was kind to PFC in one respect but not another. The Tridents will be at home as long as they last in the tournament, but the opening match drew them against one of the CPL’s traditional powers.
“We’ve never come out of a match against Cavalry FC saying that was easy,” said veteran PFC midfielder Manny Aparicio.
On the flip side, Merriman said: “Playing at home is a huge advantage, and opportunity to start on the right foot, and we have to turn this place into a fortress.”
Among the historical matches in the cross-Rockies rivalry, Cavalry FC ousted PFC in the first round of the 2019 Voyageurs Cup while the Tridents returned the favour in 2021. In another memorable one-off elimination game between the clubs, Kunle Dada-Luke’s off-the-end-line hustle goal in extra time in Calgary gave the Tridents a 1-0 victory in the 2021 CPL playoff semifinals en route to the league championship that year.
Cavalry FC is also scheduled to meet PFC in a league fixture Sunday afternoon at Starlight Stadium. The hand of fate in the Canadian Championship draw brings them together twice in four days.
It will be a homecoming for new Cavalry FC defender Callum Montgomery, the 25-year-old Nanaimo product and former Victoria Highlanders star, who went fourth overall in the first round to FC Dallas in the 2019 MLS draft. The St. Michaels University School graduate was tournament MVP in leading the Blue Jags to the 2014 B.C. high school Double-A championship and represented Canada in the CONCACAF qualifying tournament for the Tokyo Olympics.
“Callum is wearing the wrong [Cavalry] colours,” quipped PFC bench-boss Merriman, who mentored Montgomery in Nanaimo youth soccer.
“But that is the decision he made. He is a very mature player and a good addition for Cavalry.”
The 2023 Voyageurs Cup tournament opened Tuesday night with host CF Montréal of MLS blanking League1 Ontario-champion Vaughan Azzuri 2-0 at Stade Saputo and defending CPL-champion Forge FC easily pushing aside Ligue1 Québec-champion FC Laval 3-0 at Tim Hortons Field in Hamilton, Ont.
Playing on Wednesday night were Winnipeg’s Valour FC of the CPL against League1 B.C.-champion TSS Rovers at Swangard Stadium in Burnaby, expansion Vancouver FC in Toronto against York United in an all-CPL match-up, and the HFX Wanderers of Halifax meeting Atlético Ottawa in another all-CPL tournament opener.
The winners advance to the Canadian Championship quarter-finals May 9-11, where they will be joined by last year’s all-MLS Voyageurs Cup finalists, the champion Whitecaps and runner-up Toronto FC, who received first-round byes.
