Goldman Sachs, US Bank & UPS reign supreme at SCORES Cup 2017!
On Saturday, July 8, America SCORES New York hosted its 11th annual corporate soccer tournament, the legendary SCORES Cup! It was hot hot HOT and our 40 corporate teams sweated it out at the Pier 40 soccer complex in the west side of Manhattan as they competed for each of the three championships.
SCORES Cup is New York’s largest corporate soccer tournament, and it is America SCORES New York’s largest fundraiser, with all proceeds going to support our after-school and summer soccer/poetry programming for students in Harlem and Washington Heights.
In addition to our 40 corporate teams, this year’s generous sponsors included Pepsi and Subway, who helped to keep our players hydrated and energized, and the Cooligans (pictured below) and the Red Bulls, who provided energetic music and live commentary the whole day through.
SCORES Cup is divided into three divisions of play: the SCORES Cup, the Challenge Cup, and – new for 2017 – the Kicker! Cup, named for America SCORES’ national magazine, Kicker!.
Each division had a staggered start time to allow the maximum number of games for each team. It was a tough competition this year; almost all of the games were extremely close, with many ending in shootouts!
In the end, Goldman Sachs (SCORES Cup champions), US Bank (Challenge Cup champions), and UPS (Kicker! Cup champions) each took their respective divisional championship titles.
Goldman Sachs were a dominant force in Division 1 Group A winning three from three as they were joined in the quarter-finals by second-placed Thomson Reuters. Bloomberg and Credit Suisse were the Group B qualifiers, Group C produced Verizon and VanEck and Capital One led the way in Group D, just ahead of Morrison Foerster.
High scoring Goldman Sachs marched through to the first final of the day but they met their match in Verizon who held the GS crew to an exciting 3-3 tie which forced a tense penalty shoot out that favored Goldman Sachs.
Meanwhile in Division 2, the competition was even more fierce. US Bank won three from three in Group A, edging out Barclays. In Group B, it was Robert Half and Atletico Fried Frank who emerged while Group C produced CPC and Rabobank. MetLife set the pace in Group D and brought IPC with them.
Both US Bank and MetLife needed penalty shootouts to get through their semi-finals against IPC and CPC before US Bank took the decider 3-1.
And UPS only lost once as they stormed to the Kicker! Cup final, beating a talented CA Technologies team in the last game of the day. UPS and CA Technologies had been joined by Venable and Samsung in the final four.
In addition to our soccer champions, Morrison Foerster blew the opposition away in our Pledge It campaign, where our corporate teams pledged to donate for every goal scored. After donating $111 per goal, with a total of 9 goals, Morrison Foerster raised over $1000 for America SCORES New York, nearly doubling the funds raised by their next closest opponent, IPC, who raised just over $500. Big thanks to all the teams who participated in the campaign!
The day wouldn’t have been possible without the incredible support of our staff, board members, and the 30+ volunteers who worked under the intense sun from 5AM to 6PM, setting up, tearing down, and helping the event to run seamlessly.
We have some fantastic photos (courtesy of Tara Rebuck Photo & Design) available on our Facebook page documenting the events of the day, and they’re conveniently organized by Division; check them out here: Division 1, Division 2, Division 3.
We couldn’t be prouder of how our SCORES Cup was executed, and we’re so thankful to all of our corporate sponsors for their energetic support and participation. We can’t wait to see everyone back next summer for SCORES Cup ’18!
Special thanks to all of our corporate soccer teams:
Division 1 (America SCORES Cup)
Withum - Salesforce - Thomson Reuters - Goldman Sachs - EisnerAmper - Bloomberg Philanthropies - Credit Suisse - Prudential - Societe Generale - Verizon - VanEck - NY Red Bulls - Capital One - AT&T - Morrison Foerster - Latham & Watkins
Division 2 (America SCORES Challenge Cup)
US Bank - CohnReznick -Barclays - Scotiabank - Interbrand - Atletico Fried Frank - Robert Half - Debevoise - CPC - Rabobank - Navigant - MetLife - IPC - HBO - Apollo - America SCORES alumni team
Division 3 (America SCORES Kicker! Cup)
Capital One - Venable - Samsung - UPS - Safra - CA Technologies - Acxiom - Oppenheimer
