Plainview, NY (June 2, 2010) - The Long Island Rough Riders men’s team qualified for the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup thanks to a 1-1 draw with the Westchester Flames on Saturday. The Cup is the nation’s premier club tournament. It is open to all United States Soccer Federation affiliated teams from the amateur adult club level to the professional ranks of Major League Soccer. It can be compared to the famed F.A. Cup, England’s world-known tournament that is watched throughout the world every year.

The Rough Riders are one of only eight Premier Development League teams to qualify for the tournament of the 69 that entered from the league.

“We are very proud of the fact that we have reached the upper echelon of the PDL,” Team President Peter Zaratin said. “It is a tremendous accomplishment in itself, and we hope to keep progressing to the later stages of the tournament.”

Started in 1914 as the National Challenge Cup, the tournament’s objective was to help promote soccer in the United States. The Cup helped the sport’s growth by allowing winners of regional competitions to face each other.

The lack of a stable professional league in the country caused the United States Adult Soccer Association to run the competition until 1995, when it ceded control to the USSF in anticipation of the birth of Major League Soccer.

Eight teams from each level of the American Soccer Pyramid take part in the competition each year. The most successful clubs in history are Bethlehem Steel and Maccabi Los Angeles, with five titles each. MLS clubs have won the cup in all but one of the years since the league joined the competition in 1996, when the Rochester Rhinos stunned four MLS teams along the road to the championship in 1999. The defending champions are the Seattle Sounders.

The Rough Riders’ opening round fixture is on Tuesday, June 15, with the opponent and location yet to be determined. If they win the first game, they advance to play in the second round on June 22 (opponent and location yet to be determined) to compete for the chance to face an MLS team.

“We are excited to play in one of the oldest cup competitions in the world,” General Manager Flavio Ferri said. “The club is looking forward to reaching the later rounds of the tournament to face an MLS opponent.”

Since 2008, the champion of the U.S. Open Cup has earned the right to play in the CONCACAF Champions League; the international tournament featuring clubs from North America, Central America, and the Caribbean.