The USL Jägermeister Cup is dead, long live the Prinx Tires USL Cup.

Birmingham Legion are set to play in the newly-renamed USL Cup this Saturday when they travel to San Antonio FC. Though the tournament is mostly the same despite the name change, here’s a run down of the details ahead of kick-off.

What is the USL Cup?

Formerly sponsored by Jägermeister and now named after Prinx Tires, the USL Cup is an inter-league cup competition pitting every side from USL Championship and USL League One against each other. It started in 2024 with only USL League One sides and expanded to the Championship in 2025.

This year, it comprises 42 teams. Hartford Athletic are the reigning champions after defeating Sacramento Republic FC in last year’s final.

The competition functions in a similar format to the FIFA World Cup, where an initial group stage is followed by a knock-out tournament. Teams are divided into seven groups based on geographic proximity, with the top team from each group advancing to the quarter-finals.

One wildcard team, the best second-place finisher across all seven groups, will also advance to the knockouts in order to have eight teams in the quarter-finals. This is a change from last year, when two wildcards advanced (one of them Legion).

How does it work?

The USL’s 42 teams are divided into groups of seven, six or five (that last one due to Tormenta’s last-minute hiatus). However, due to the unbalanced team numbers, not every team faces each of its group opponents.

Each side will play four group games, two at home and two away. The top team is the one who accumulates the most points across those four games.

There are two key differences between the USL Cup and most cup competitions.

First, while the traditional three points for a win and none for a loss apply, ties face a special stipulation. While any team that ends a game level with its opponents after 90 minutes will receive the customary one point, the two sides will also face off in a penalty shoot-out to determine a winner. That team will receive one extra point, for a total of two.

Second, the USL Cup aims to encourage attacking play. As such, goals scored are the first tie-breaker, ahead of both head-to-head or goal difference. This applies for both the group standings and the wildcard table.

Quarter-final ties will be drawn at random, with the only rule being that the wildcard team has to play on the road and cannot face the winner from its original group. Semi-finals will be drawn at random once again with no restrictions, while a draw will also take place to determine the host for the title game, scheduled for the weekend of October 3-4.

What does this mean for Legion?

Birmingham Legion are in Group 3 for this year’s USL Cup. The group is perfectly split between Championship teams (San Antonio FC and FC Tulsa join the Three Sparks) and League One teams (One Knox, Chattanooga Red Wolves and Corpus Christie).

Legion’s schedule is equally balanced, with a home and away game against the two Championship opponents as well as two of the three League One foes. For the second season in a row, Birmingham Legion does not play One Knox despite sharing a group with the Tennessee team.

While on paper the three Championship teams are the favourites, they would be wise not to underestimate their League One counterparts. One Knox and the Red Wolves were first and second, respectively, in last year’s League One regular season, with the Knoxville club doing the double and claiming the championship game as well. One Knox haven’t slowed down this season either, currently sitting second on goal difference and having upset MLS-side D.C. United in the US Open Cup.

On the Championship side of things, both teams look a serious threat.

Though FC Tulsa are currently out of the playoff spots in the West, they won the Western Conference regular season and championship in 2025. San Antonio, on the other hand, finished 6th in 2025 but have had a hot start to 2026. The Texas team sit second in the West, a single goal behind leaders Orange County.

Corpus Christie, who Legion host on June 9, look by far the weakest team in the group. The expansion side currently sit bottom of League One and have yet to win a game this season.

What to expect

Legion are still a team looking to find themselves after the offseason appointment of Jay Heaps as head coach.

With just one win in their first six league games, the Three Sparks need to start building some momentum. As such, expect a strong lineup in the cup to try and achieve that while continuing to build chemistry between the club’s starters.

“There’s got to be a little bit of balance,” Heaps said. “But most likely, when you look at the schedule and where we’re at, it’s really in cadence with the current schedules. There’s no fixture congestion.

“It’s a pretty good test for us against a USL Championship team that’s pretty freaking good,” he added. “We’ve got to make sure we’re ready to play against them.”

After being short-staffed the last few games, Heaps added that the Three Sparks are slowly returning to fitness. He name-checked Amir Daley and Sebastián Saucedo as two recent absentees who could feature Saturday, while Nico Brown should also be back following his illness. Samuel Shashoua remains out with a knee injury.

Asked about the potential penalty shoot-out should the game end level, Heaps said the team has been preparing for that eventuality. While the focus is first-and-foremost on winning and bringing the three points home, the head coach said he doesn’t like leaving anything up to chance.

“I’m a big believer from my old Coach K[rzyzewski, Heaps’ basketball coach at Duke University] days where you want to replicate it as best as you can,” Heaps said. “So we go through the whole process of a true penalty shoot-out. Spaced out, walk up, take your ball….

“We did that earlier and we’ll do it again,” he continued. “It’s just really getting the guys ready for that moment.”

He also added that he has an idea who his five penalty takers would be, though substitutions could obviously impact those choices come the end of the game. He did state though that he believes the coach should decided on takers, not the players themselves.

Birmingham Legion take on San Antonio FC at 7:30 p.m. tomorrow. The game will be live on the CBS Golazo Network and My68 WABM.

The Three Sparks’ three other USL Cup games will see them travel to Chattanooga Red Wolves May 16 and host Corpus Christie and FC Tulsa on June 9 and July 11, respectively.

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