PHILADELPHIA — Two Liga MX teams remain in Leagues Cup: The most successful team of all time, back-to-back champion Club América, and a team that has never finished in the top half of the league. That team, Mazatlán FC, meets the Philadelphia Union at Subaru Park on Saturday hoping to continue on its quest for a shock Leagues Cup win and the Concacaf Champions Cup place that comes with a top-three finish.
It’s an eyebrow-raiser to see Mazatlán at this stage, preparing for a quarterfinal as one of the last eight teams left in the tournament. Yet, there’s a reason the club turned to Victor Manuel Vucetich this summer.
The long-time Mexican manager is known as “King Midas” since everything he touches turns to gold. It just so happens that his magic touch has Mazatlán closer than it has ever been to silverware.
“Without a doubt, it’s a joy to be here,” Vucetich said at a news conference Friday. “Instead of pressure, it’s a motivation to be able to move on, and I think we have felt satisfaction, realizing as a group that the work we’ve done has been extraordinary. I think the players have shown who they are, and we’re happy to be able to keep advancing but also have the humility that the group works with.”
Perhaps it’s a bit disrespectful to be this surprised, to shake our heads in disbelief that Mazatlan has reached this point. Yet, a review of results since the team kicked off in 2020 helps put the run to the quarterfinals into context. The team has never won more than half of the matches it played in a season. It has never won a playoff match. Its best-ever finish in the table was in the 2023 Apertura when it earned 22 points and finished 10th but fell to Santos Laguna.
In this knockout competition, however, things have turned around - though not right away. Mazatlán hung tough but fell 1-0 to the New England Revolution in its opening group contest, leading some fans to prepare for more of the same. Instead, a double from rising star Ramiro Árciga pushed the club from El Kraken to a 2-0 win over Nashville SC. That proved enough to get into the knockout stage where a strong start saw Mazatlán take a 2-0 lead into the half against D.C. United and see out a 2-1 victory.
It once again had a 2-0 lead at the interval in the Round of 16 against Cruz Azul but ended up in an unwanted penalty shootout after conceding twice to the Mexico City grande in a late flurry. But goalscorers Edgar Yoel Barcenas and Bryan Colula converted from the spot, as did Alan Torres, and a pair of saved shots plus one off the post from Cruz Azul sent Mazatlán to Philly for Saturday’s showdown.
While Vucetich clearly is beginning to earn positive results, even he couldn’t get the pirate ship turned around overnight. Mazatlán entered Leagues Cup still looking for its first win of the Apertura, with a draw and no victories through four matches.
Now just two wins away from a first-ever berth in the Concacaf Champions Cup, Vucetich already is staking a claim to be one of the top managers in the club’s history. Only the late Tomás Boy, who managed the team in the 2021 Clausura, left the team having won more than a third of the matches he managed.
“For Mazatlán, to be in these stages, we’re enjoying every step we’ve taken to the max,” Colula said Friday when asked about potentially earning a CCC place. “We don’t want to put a ceiling on ourselves.
“We know the group is strong, we know what we want and are all going for the same goal. The work is bearing fruit. We were calm in the fact it would come sooner or later and we’re now enjoying all this. We know the rewards that can come, and we’re working for that.”
Colula is a player who represents what has characterized the Cañoneros in this tournament. A product of the Club América academy, he went on six loan stints while making only cameos for Las Aguilas between 2015 and 2021 when he found his home in Sinaloa. Now, he’s hoping to help put the club on the map as a contender for Leagues Cup and the international game.
He’s hardly the only player who has stepped up under pressure during this run. After starting goalkeeper Hugo Gonzalez went down with an injury, goalkeeper Ricardo Gutiérrez has stepped up and backstopped a pair of victories - most notably making a pair of saves in the shootout victory against Cruz Azul - the current leader of the Apertura in which Mazatlán currently sits 17th.
“We’ve made mistakes. We’ve tried to correct them. We’ve had important absences, but the group keeps showing it’s solid and able to keep pushing its limits in this tournament,” Vucetich said.
The manager says the current limits are clear: The team needs to keep growing mentally to protect the leads it has earned in its two knockout matches but later allowed to slip. Still, he said, the fact the team persevered and had character getting to this point and now going toe-to-toe with a Union squad that finished third in last year’s tournament.
“It’s something the team has earned,” he said. “The matches have been really tough from start to finish.
“We’ve been gifted absolutely nothing, and I think the team deserves it. It makes us very happy and gives us a bit of peace that we’re working with a squad that has hunger, desire to keep growing and transcend in a certain way.”
Mazatlán already has transcended expectations. With King Midas putting his touches on a group that refuses to be defined by its history, it once again will hope to raise its Leagues Cup ceiling.
