PITTSBURGH — For the second year in a row, the Crew's U.S. Open Cup run ended at the hands of a lower-division opponent.

In 2022, the Crew lost their opening game of the tournament to USL Championship side Detroit City FC. The Crew found more success in the 2023 version of the tournament, beating Indy Eleven and Loudoun United in the third and fourth rounds, but they were felled by the Pittsburgh Riverhounds on Wednesday in the round of 16.

The Riverhounds opened the scoring in the 23rd minute and the Crew never found a way to break through in a 1-0 loss.

"We were trying to catch up every time, every time, every time," Crew coach Wilfried Nancy said. "They won the battle of the intensity and we were not able to match that. That’s why we conceded the goal like this. Could have done better on the goal, and after that, we were trying to attack but it was too slow because they were compact. When we, in the second half, started to speed up the play a little bit more, it was not enough to score."

The Crew were patient in possession during the game's opening minutes as they looked to quiet the raucous crowd at Highmark Stadium — a stadium-record crowd of 6,107 — and slow the tempo of the game, but an overreliance on that patience was ultimately their undoing.

In the 23rd minute, Pittsburgh defender Arturo Ordonez intercepted a ball intended for Crew midfielder Thomas Roberts, who joined the Crew for Wednesday's game on a short-term loan from Crew 2. Riverhounds midfielder Robbie Mertz spotted forward Albert Dikwa making a run in behind the Crew's center backs and laced a pass across the field to the forward, who was then one-on-one with goalkeeper Evan Bush. Dikwa fired a shot into the bottom corner of the net to put the Riverhounds up 1-0 — Cupset territory, as it's known in the U.S. Open Cup.

The Crew played with slightly more urgency after Pittsburgh's goal, but it wasn't enough to get them on the scoresheet in the first half. They produced just three shots, one of them on target, in the opening 45 minutes, despite holding 74% of the possession.

In the second half, the Crew continued to have the vast majority of the possession but struggled to create opportunities that challenged the Riverhounds' defense.

Roberts was substituted off for forward Gibran Rayo, a fellow Crew 2 player, in the 60th minute to bring a bit more creativity and movement to the Crew's attack, but the chances the Crew created were quickly snuffed out by Pittsburgh's defense.

Nancy rolled out a heavily rotated lineup against the Riverhounds, as he had in the Crew's previous two U.S. Open Cup games, but he nonetheless expected the team he put on the field to compete at a high level and have the quality to win the game.

"I was expecting more, because we know this is a physical team," Nancy said. "But they know that and they faced already this kind of team. We were late. We were (winning the) first ball, but the second ball, no. After that, when we had the ball, we didn’t connect the way we usually do. Yes, the environment. Yes, we can find a lot of excuses with the turf and so on, but at the end of the day, this is for both teams. We were not able to be better on that. That’s why we didn’t score at least one goal."

In the 77th minute, Nancy brought on defender Mo Farsi and midfielder Aidan Morris, leaving Keegan Hughes as the lone true center back on the field as the Crew fought to keep their U.S. Open Cup run going. But even with an additional midfielder and attack-minded wingback on the field, the Crew still couldn't get into the final third with regularity and never really threatened to score the equalizer.

"We weren’t sharp on the day to get that final, final touch with the final ball," forward Christian Ramírez said. "... I think when we reacted instead of just coming out right away and playing like we did in the last Cup game, it becomes difficult. You let a team get confident, and that’s what they showed."

Chants of "Go back to Ohio" began to ring out from the Riverhounds' supporters section around the 65th minute, and they strengthened as the time ran out for the Crew to find a way back into the game.

When the full-time whistle sounded, the Riverhounds erupted, while the Crew stood in the middle of the field and watched the celebrations.

"I think we gave away 45 minutes and like (Nancy) said, in the Cup, you can’t react to something," Ramírez said. "You have to start, because every game is a final. We let a big opportunity pass us by today and I hope that we learn from it, because these opportunities don’t come often."

"It’s a tough one to swallow for sure, because they have nothing to lose and they played like it. Especially in that first half, they made things difficult on us. They were tight in spaces and didn’t give us much. It’s disappointing."

bjohnson@dispatch.com

@BaileyAJohnson_

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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Columbus Crew knocked out of US Open Cup by USL Pittsburgh Riverhounds