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Lower90 Weekly Newsletter for October 26, 2026
There is something about this time of year, with shorter days but thrilling scorelines. Lots of late game winners and stoppage time equalizers across USL Championship and Super League.
Full match reports as always at https://fn365reports.com/
This Week in US Soccer
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Late October delivered the goods across all three USL divisions, with stoppage-time drama, rivalry grudge matches, and scorelines that looked more like basketball scores than soccer results. The USL Championship was the loudest room in the house — from a five-goal NorCal derby to a Rio Grande rivalry settled in the fourth minute of added time — while the USL Super League showed it can match the men’s game for late-game heartbreak, with Brooklyn FC and Lexington SC each delivering memorable moments at opposite ends of the drama dial. If your blood pressure can handle it, this was a very good week to be a lower-league fan.
Match of the Week: USL Championship — Loudoun United FC vs Brooklyn FC | 2026-10-24 | USL Championship
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Editor’s pick: Seven goals, a 3-1 halftime deficit, and a winner in the 88th minute — Loudoun United’s comeback against Brooklyn FC is the kind of match that gets talked about in supporter sections for years. Nothing else this week came close to this level of pure, sustained drama.
There are comebacks, and then there is whatever Loudoun United did on Saturday night. Brooklyn FC arrived at Segra Field looking entirely in control at the break, sitting on a 3-1 lead that looked comfortable enough to start thinking about the drive home. Whatever was said in that Loudoun locker room at halftime deserves to be recorded for posterity, because what followed was one of the most remarkable 45 minutes the USL Championship has produced this season.
Loudoun came out of the tunnel a different team. They pressed with urgency, pulled one back to make it 3-2, and suddenly Brooklyn’s cushion felt a lot thinner. The equalizer followed, and what had been a routine away win was now a genuinely terrifying evening for the visitors. The Segra Field crowd — which had surely gone quiet at the break — was fully invested and making itself heard.
Then came the 88th minute. Liam Butts, cool as you like, drove home the winner to complete the turnaround and send Loudoun into full pandemonium. A 4-3 final scoreline that flatters neither side’s defense but does complete justice to the sheer entertainment on offer. Brooklyn will be furious at how they let this one slip; Loudoun fans will replay that second half for a long time. This is exactly why you watch minor league soccer.
This Week’s Highlights
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USL Championship — El Paso Locomotive FC vs New Mexico United | 2026-10-24
There is no crueler way to lose a derby than a goal in the 90th-plus-four minute, and El Paso Locomotive found that out the hard way on Saturday. Valentin Noël, with the clock deep into added time and the Rio Grande faithful likely already planning their commute, produced the gut-punch to end all gut-punches — sending New Mexico United home with a rivalry win that will sting in El Paso for weeks. These two teams never need extra motivation to bring the heat, but a last-gasp winner of this nature writes its own chapter in the fixture’s history.
USL Super League — Brooklyn FC vs Tampa Bay Sun FC | 2026-10-24
Brooklyn FC’s women’s side showed they can deliver late drama of their own on the same weekend their Championship counterparts were melting down in Loudoun. Catherine Zimmerman found the net in the 90th minute to give Brooklyn a 1-0 win over Tampa Bay Sun FC — a single goal, a single moment, the entire match decided in the final seconds. For Tampa Bay, it is exactly the kind of result that haunts a squad; they did enough to earn at minimum a point and came away with nothing. Zimmerman’s finish was the difference between a good weekend and a painful one.
USL Championship — Monterey Bay FC vs Las Vegas Lights FC | 2026-10-24
Sebastian Lletget — yes, that Sebastian Lletget — wrote the final word in what sounds like an absolutely feral closing stretch at Monterey Bay. His 88th-minute winner gave the home side a 2-1 victory over Las Vegas Lights, but the scoreline barely hints at the chaos surrounding it. Five yellow cards were distributed in stoppage time alone, which is the kind of statistic that tells you everything about the temperature inside the stadium. Monterey Bay dug in, kept their heads just long enough, and Lletget delivered the moment that mattered.
USL Super League — Lexington SC vs Sporting JAX | 2026-10-23
Six goals and no winner — sometimes that is the most honest result a match can produce. Lexington SC and Sporting JAX traded blows throughout Friday night, momentum swinging back and forth with neither side able to hold a lead long enough to see it out. A 3-3 draw is not a consolation prize when the match genuinely earned it, and by all accounts this one did. Both sets of supporters probably left the ground exhausted and vaguely satisfied, which is about as good an outcome as a draw can offer in a match of this quality.
Results Roundup
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USL Championship — Phoenix Rising FC vs Lexington SC | 2026-10-24 — 3-3. A free-flowing six-goal affair in Phoenix where the lead changed hands and neither side could land the decisive blow — pure open-play entertainment with not a card in sight.
USL Championship — Hartford Athletic vs Rhode Island FC | 2026-10-24 — Hartford win. Sadat Anaku leveled before Emmanuel Samadia buried the winner in the 78th minute to complete a feisty second-half comeback over Rhode Island FC.
USL Championship — Sacramento Republic FC vs Oakland Roots SC | 2026-10-24 — 3-2 Sacramento. The NorCal derby delivered a five-goal thriller as the Republic held on while Oakland mounted a dramatic late comeback that fell just short.
USL Championship — Tampa Bay Rowdies vs Sporting JAX | 2026-10-24 — 2-0 Tampa Bay. Ten yellow cards and a Florida derby atmosphere that was anything but friendly, with Marco Micaletto sealing the points shortly after flirting with a red card of his own.
USL Championship — Pittsburgh Riverhounds SC vs Birmingham Legion FC | 2026-10-24 — Pittsburgh win. Trevor Amann scored and assisted in a stunning 70-second burst across the 55th and 56th minutes to flip the match, and Birmingham’s late Damus goal proved too little, too late.
USL Championship — Brooklyn FC vs Birmingham Legion FC | 2026-10-21 — Birmingham win. Sebastian Tregarthen delivered a match-winning brace — equalizing in the 18th and finishing the job in the 63rd — to hand Brooklyn a home defeat.
USL Championship — San Antonio FC vs Orange County SC | 2026-10-24 — 2-1 San Antonio. Christopher Hegardt pulled one back for Orange County in the 86th minute but San Antonio held the line and saw out a nervy win.
USL Championship — Sporting JAX vs Louisville City FC | 2026-10-21 — 2-0 Louisville. Louisville City made a road statement with two late goals in the final 15 minutes, outmuscling Sporting JAX when it mattered most.
USL Super League — DC Power FC vs Dallas Trinity FC | 2026-10-25 — 1-0 DC Power. Emily Colton’s early goal held up as DC Power navigated a second-half yellow card storm — four bookings — to squeeze out a disciplined home win.
USL Championship — Charleston Battery vs Indy Eleven | 2026-10-24 — 1-0 Charleston. Colton Swan’s 78th-minute strike was the lone moment of quality in a tightly wound affair, giving the Battery all three points in a match decided by fine margins.
USL Championship — Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC vs FC Tulsa | 2026-10-24 — 2-0 Colorado Springs. Khori Bennett and Sam Williams netted in a controlled, commanding shutout that underlined the Switchbacks’ authority at home.
USL Championship — Louisville City FC vs Detroit City FC | 2026-10-24 — 0-0. Six yellow cards and a playoff-intensity atmosphere produced a physical deadlock between two sides that may yet meet again in the postseason with even higher stakes.
USL Super League — Fort Lauderdale United FC vs Carolina Ascent FC | 2026-10-22 — 0-0. A clean but goalless tactical stalemate between Fort Lauderdale and Carolina Ascent that left both teams with a point but plenty of questions about their finishing.
Until next week — keep watching the beautiful game
Originally published by Lower90 on Substack.
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