San Jose Look Ahead To Inter Miami & Messi After Defeating USL's Sacramento Republic

Jose Rocha
May 9
2 min read

San Jose entered their first U.S. Open Cup match in 2025 riding high from a dominant 4-1 home victory over the Portland Timbers. They aimed to build on this momentum in their opening game against the USL's Sacramento Republic FC.

Sacramento came into this match winning their last two games and looked poised to give a good match to the MLS side San Jose Earthquakes. We have seen these two clubs before in U.S. Open Cup as San Jose and Sacramento have now met six times. San Jose has defeated Sacramento in 2014 (2-1), 2015 (2-2 regulation; 6-5 PKs) and 2019 (4-3), while the Sacramento Republic won in 2022 (2-0) and 2024 (4-3 after extra time).

Images by Jose Rocha of Rocha Multimedia / Rocha Report and Tectonic Takes

The two squads looked different that normal as majority players in the starting 11 for both sides, look to be a mixture of first team, eligible players, along with depth players. Some interesting things of note was to see Aaron Edwards, a former San Jose earthquakes youth Academy player, take the pitch as a member of Sacramento Republic FC, and the fact that Hernán Lopez was eligible to play after recovering from injury.

As the Game started, so did the scoring as the earthquakes were able to get the ball to Amahl Pellegrino very early in the game and score an opening goal within the opening minute. Even with the early the lead, the Quakes did not hold up. There were consistent chances from multiple players to extend the lead. Although the chances came in plenty, eight to be exact, the next chance capitalized was a Niko Tsakiris assisted ball to Preston Judd doubling the lead to 2-0 before half time.

Although San Jose continued to apply pressure throughout, the second half Sacramento started to ramp up their pressure. Sacramento have a few good chances on board but unfortunately were unable to capitalized. The game coasting through the final minutes where are SAP Clemento was able to finally get on the score sheet but it was on fortunate to leak into the game to change things. The final score was 2-1 as the San Jose Earthquakes move on in the U.S. Open Cup and eliminate Sacramento Republic.

As a result of the victory, San Jose advances to the Round of 16 to host the Portland Timbers on May 20th.

Additional Images from San Jose Earthquakes vs Sacramento Republic FC: