Flower City Recap 2023

There are the “Cinderella stories” that Hollywood writes, and then there are the ones that are rejected because they are too far-fetched. No one in their right mind would have predicted that from where Flower City Union started the season they would have ended up champions. Their story would have ended up in the rejects pile for being too outrageous. But, here we are, and it happened. Now that the season is over, the party has ended, and the dust is subsiding, it’s time to take a look at all things Flower City 2023 and make an objective review of the season.

On the Field

Overall, it cannot be anything besides positive that FCU won the NISA championship. As was stated in the introduction, there was nobody who could have predicted this or would have believed it. The team started the first 5 games without a win, and it wasn’t until the 5^th game where they even scored a goal. They had a streak of good results in the middle of the season but then did not end the regular season the strongest. I think there were times when it seemed that goals would never come, as they weren’t even getting chances, much less shots on goal. However, they scored the goals they needed at the times they needed to. It’s hard to critique a lack of goal-scoring, when they got enough points to make the playoffs, and then didn’t even let in a goal during the playoffs. I think that if this team could have been able to stick around for another season, they really could have built on the things I saw as negatives for the year.

Offense

The offense was an issue for FCU for a lot of the season. When they played teams lower than them on the table, they did a great job of scoring the goals that they needed. Unfortunately, when they played teams above them on the table, they usually ended up getting zero goals. They made things harder on themselves because of this lack of offense. But, as I’ve already said, it doesn’t matter, they did it, because the goals came when they needed to. Forward Alioune Diakhate’s 10 goals, along with Stephen Elias’ 7, and Luke Ferreira and Malik Stewart’s both with 5, were part of the 38 goals that were enough to not only win the league championship but also the NISA Independent Cup trophy and the first round of the US Open Cup. I think on the whole they could have used more offense at times, but in the end, it ended up being enough.

Defense

If there’s one thing that I complimented the team on the entire season, it was their defense. There were some games where they lost by a goal, and some where they lost by more than a few, but overall, I think the defense was usually pretty solid, and the difference-maker. A lot of the losses by a goal or two would have been helped if FCU could have scored, however, the defense on this team did a great job of winning games by keeping goals out and keeping any losses (aside from Loudoun United) from being a blowout. It also cannot be stated enough how important goalkeeper Michael Mejia was. Throughout the regular season, his keeping was crucial to a lot of FCU’s wins, and he only got better as time went on, having an amazing postseason with not giving up a single goal, including against 4 penalty kicks.

Gameday Experience

The gameday experience for those who made their way to the stadium was generally good and got better as the season went on. There were a few hiccups through the season, most notably on games with larger attendances, which meant the entry gate got backed up and the food truck ran out of food. Barring those, they’ve built on their small presence in a large stadium. Their merchandise is always laid out, and ready to sell, with a large variety of changing items. It would be nice if they could have built on the larger attendance at the end of the summer, but that comes to my biggest issue with the gameday experience: the schedule. And this is the part that was out of their control. The schedule was so spread out with weeks between home games, then game dates changing. For a casual fan, it would have been far too difficult to figure out sometimes. With the rumors of changing leagues next season, the schedule may be far shorter and more compressed, potentially with some friendlies to fill it out. Hopefully, if that is the case, they continue their trajectory of learning and fixing gameday issues, and the main problem of the schedule will mean games closer together to build a larger fanbase.

Salt City Union

I cannot say that the Salt City experiment was anything other than a failure. I do not know the reasoning behind this, but I did not see any reason for it. When Flower City Union was drawing respectable crowds in Rochester, the next game being in Auburn helped to kill any momentum that they had. While I did enjoy visiting Doubleday Field, it did not draw anywhere near enough of a crowd to make it worth it. The crowds at these games were between 75 and 150, far less than FCU was drawing in Rochester at the time, and then the next game in Rochester lost the fans that it had built due to that break. The experience in that stadium was also not great. The refreshments were either non-existent for the first game, candy bars and hot dogs at a later game; and it was cash-only. Sitting in a baseball stadium was interesting, but having to look from behind home plate to centerfield through netting is not a great way to watch a soccer game. There were a few positives to these games though. The most notable positive is that the camera setup for these games was then brought back to Rochester, and their home games were streamed in far better quality going forward. I also loved the look of the Salt City kits. They were just training kits with the logo ironed on, but they were a great design, and keeping the blue going forward would be a neat choice for a third kit. Overall though, unless there is some reason I’m missing about why they split the team as Flower and Salt City, they should just drop this, as it was almost a complete failure.

Flower City 1872

Flower City 1872 you have to look at without looking at just results. The results on the field were mostly poor. A new team, a new squad, a hell of a lot of goals given up, and very few scored. However, I am going to give a lot the credit to FCU player Matt Bolduc for turning their season around, when he started helping with the coaching, the results got so much better. Maybe it was just a coincidence, but it seemed to be a turning point in their season. The season started with some really poor results but then turned around and they became competitive. The team ended up with 1 win and 5 losses, but that win felt like a great accomplishment. I feel like I should write a longer article to recap their season, as they deserve it (however, it was hard enough researching stats by rewatching the 5 games that still exist with video, with a lot of poor camera quality and some lacking any play-by-play). It’s hard to talk positive about a team with a -24 goal difference, however, they were brand new, and teams like FC Buffalo are established and just dominate. Goalkeepers Madeline Pizzo and Amanda Kesler made a lot of saves in every game they played in, even if the overall dominant opponents meant a lot of goals were given up. I thought that game in and game out, Taylor Wingerden was the standout on the team. If this team can retain her along with the Rutlands, Maya and Taylor, and build upon how the season ended, they will be far more competitive next season. I didn’t mention all the players I thought did well, because it’s now been 4 months since the last game and I have a poor memory, and as I stated, rewatching all those games was not an easy experience. But I think this team does have some really good players if they can just get it all to come together. Unfortunately, being in the same division as FC Buffalo is always going to be quite difficult, as they have established themselves as dominant in this league. I had never watched a single second of women’s soccer before watching all of FC 1872’s games, but I am now a convert. There is just a difference in the flow of a game between the way that men play and that women play. And even though the results went against FC 1872 this year, I’m excited to see where they go, and how they build for next season.

Awards of the Season

For my players of the year, I decided to do offensive and defensive, for both Flower City Union and Flower City 1872. I will start with the women’s team and my Offensive Player of the Year, Taylor Wingerden. In a team that only had 6 goals, her 2 made her the leading scorer, but that is not why I think she deserved this. Every single game, to me she was the standout. Even when the team had no offensive presence, she stood out as the one who might make the breakthrough to turn the games around. I don’t think it’s any coincidence that in the first match (6-0) she didn’t play, and in the second match (6-1) she barely played half. Yes, I’m not commenting on the 10-1 FC Buffalo game, but in the final 3 games, she played 90 minutes each time and was a difference-maker, including 2 goals in the slim 3-2 loss on the final day of the season.

For the women’s team Defensive Player of the Year, I am going with goalkeeper Amanda Kesler. It may seem a bit of a cop-out to give a defensive award to a team with a -24 goal difference, but her 4 starts (290 minutes) over the season only led to 9 goals against. In a team that leaked goals, she had a hell of a lot of great and diving saves. It’s gotta be hard to be a defender on a team that just got outclassed by opponents’ offenses, but it’s gotta be even harder to be the keeper and keep the games respectable, and to make some impressive saves on top of that.

For the men’s Offensive Player of the Year, I am giving the award to Luke Ferreira. Fellow writer Bryce, and head of the 585 Supporter’s Group Ryan, and I all had different people that immediately came to mind when we discussed this. Luke was always near or at the top of our lists, and the one we all had no trouble agreeing with would be our choice. His 5 goals were not the top on the team, but he was always a good presence on the attack or in the midfield. He was great at taking set pieces, and it’s a disappointment that a lot of the corners he took were short corners, as he could probably have contributed to some more goals by flying them into the box.

And finally, for the men’s Defensive Player of the Year, I am again choosing the goalkeeper, with Michael Mejia. I will say, before the playoffs, my choice would have gone to Kyle Nelson (who was voted the team MVP by the players of the team). However, with his solid play all year, and the insane 0 GAA in the playoffs, I couldn’t help but change my mind. I know defensive players helped his GAA, but you cannot watch some of the saves in the 120 minutes plus penalties against Chattanooga in the second round of the playoffs and not agree that he was an acceptable choice. 25 games played, 35 goals against, on a team with a regular season losing record and goal difference of -4, I think 1.4 GAA followed by a postseason with 0 is deserving of this award.

As for the moments of the season? For Flower City 1872, there were not a lot of high points, but the moment of the season was the 25th-minute goal by Maya Rutland in the game against Erie. It was the 3rd goal of the season, but the first time 1872 had found themselves leading. It was also a well-deserved lead. While it wasn’t the game-winner, it was the goal that led to the first win in franchise history, which was a moment to celebrate.

Is there any doubt in your mind that the moment of the season for Flower City Union was going to be winning the championship? That’s not fair though, as that’s the entire culmination of the season. The moment of the season that we have voted for is Logan Lee’s 90+7th minute goal against Albion San Diego to tie the game. Before the goal by Matt Bolduc in the 52nd minute of the finals, before the 2 goals in the penalty kicks in the second round of the playoffs, before the 4 goals in the first round, this was the most important goal in FCU’s history. This goal was a monumental moment for the fans and the players as it was the tying goal so late in the game. It was a goal that kept them in the playoff places. It was also the latest goal scored by a professional Rochester team in the modern era. I don’t know about the Lancers or Flash, but neither the Rhinos nor RNY FC had goals more than 6 minutes into stoppage time.

And finally, we have the goal of the season. For Flower City 1872, that goal goes to Taylor Rutland. From somewhat in the middle of the field, she took a shot on goal against BC United from 32 yards out. It flew perfectly over every player, and over the backpedaling keeper, to land just under the bar in the goal. It was a great goal from an incredibly long distance, but it was also much more special, as it was the first goal in Flower City 1872’s history. While they ended up losing their first 3 matches by 22-2, this was the first goal, the first time they led, and it was a beauty.

On the men’s side, it will be no surprise, but the goal of the season goes to Alioune Diakhate for his scorpion kick goal against Savannah (6/24). The goal may not have been as important as some that were scored this season, but it was a first-half stoppage-time goal in a game that FCU would go on to win. It was also the most impressive goal I have ever seen in person. Earlier I mentioned how I wish Luke Ferreira had taken more corner kicks as this was why. Luke’s corner was put into the box on the far side of the goal, where Ali jumped and turned, and was parallel to the ground as his foot found the ball and slammed it into the goal. It was beautiful.

The Future

As of the writing of this, it’s been less than a month since the playoff championship game. I’ve been privy to some inside information about where this team may end up, but last I heard, nothing was finalized. So I will just mention some things about each of the potential offerings. The first option is that Flower City Union stays in NISA. From a fan’s perspective, this is probably the best option. The team would remain a professional team and they would return to the league they just won. However, NISA has a lot of operating issues (see any number of articles I’ve written this year) and I’ve heard that in addition to owing clubs money for winning the NISA Independent Cup, clubs are also owed a lot of other money by the league (and the amounts are not small). NISA is talking a lot about going regional and bringing in new teams, but as a league, they lie about a lot, so I wouldn’t take anything they say without a handful of salt. And even if they do go regional, that’s no guarantee every team will exist when the season starts, or complete the season without financial help (see this season’s Club de Lyon). From a business perspective, from an optimist’s point of view, moving to USL League Two is probably the best option. USL has wanted a piece of the Rochester market ever since the Dworkin’s fucked up the Rochester Rhinos. Being in the USL brand is a name that Rochester soccer fans are familiar with, and would have the potential to move to League One, however, this would need to be sooner, 2025, rather than later, any other time. The casual fan would not understand that moving to USL2 is a drop to amateur status, so it wouldn’t be bad if the team could potentially go to USL1, and the USL is a brand fans are aware of. However, if it’s any more than a season, the club will lose the fans it has built up, as they won’t want to follow an amateur team. The final realistic option is the NPSL, another amateur league on par with USL League Two. The only upside to this league is that the names may be a little more unfamiliar. Instead of being in an amateur league against Buffalo, this would mean maybe Erie or Hartford, or another team that the casual fan wouldn’t know, and would distance themselves from being immediately recognized as being amateur. But this also doesn’t have the upside of the USL name, so it seems like the worst of the options. The final option is none of these, but it would require either an outside investor or working with the owners of RNY FC. At this time, neither of these seems to be something that’ll happen, so I’ll just speculate my dream choice: FCU and RNY FC work together, some sort of merger where they can both get along and decide things and play at the downtown stadium. They then move their Junior Rhinos Academy or whatever it’s called now (Editor: RNYFC Youth) under an umbrella as a pipeline to Roc City Boom in a pipeline to this merger. As I say, it’s a dream, but what a dream that could be.

I don’t know what the future will bring for Flower City Union, but I’ll be there, and I hope the goodwill and positive attention they’ve gained this year isn’t lost because they don’t have a real good option for a league to be in. The US soccer pyramid is awful if you don’t have the money to get into a real league (ie, not NISA) and aren’t happy just being an amateur team.