"The more success the U.S. has, it will bring soccer to the front of our sports mecca here instead of football, baseball and basketball." Patrick Burnette, co-owner of a Columbia-area soccer club, said that watching a packed watch party at Carolina Ale House while the USMNT faced Belgium in the round of 16. He's not wrong — and the numbers back him up.
South Carolina already has 25,000 registered youth players. The University of South Carolina leads college soccer nationally in home attendance, averaging over 4,300 fans per game at a 5,700-capacity stadium. The Charleston Battery — founded in 1993, making it the oldest continually operating professional soccer club in the United States — is posting attendance growth this season, one of only seven clubs out of 25 in the USL Championship to manage that.
A State That's Produced Real Players
This isn't just casual fan energy. South Carolina has quietly been producing elite soccer talent for decades. Clint Dempsey came out of Furman. Clint Mathis and Josh Wolff played at South Carolina. Brad Guzan was a Gamecock. Clemson has won four NCAA titles, including 2021 and 2023, and produced U.S. internationals Oguchi Onweyu and Stuart Holden, who spent this tournament on the broadcast team covering the very country he once played for.
Dempsey, still the benchmark, shares the all-time U.S. scoring record with Landon Donovan at 57 goals. That came from a Furman striker. South Carolina isn't a soccer afterthought — it just doesn't always get credit for what it's built.
University of South Carolina coach Tony Annan, in his sixth season with the Gamecocks, runs summer camps that pull in young players hungry for more. "Without a professional soccer team around, this is how they get their fix," he said. With no MLS club in the state, the Battery and the Gamecocks carry that weight — and both seem to be handling it.
What the World Cup Momentum Actually Means
The U.S. went out 4-1 to Belgium in the round of 16. That stings. But three weeks of competitive football, packed watch parties from Columbia to Greenville to Daniel Island, and the kind of genuine public interest that doesn't come from a marketing campaign — that's a foundation.
The 1994 World Cup on home soil directly triggered MLS. The league is still running 30 years later, now with Messi drawing crowds in Miami. The 2030 World Cup, celebrating the tournament's centenary, gives the U.S. another shot at that same kind of jolt.
- 25,000 registered youth players in South Carolina
- USC averaging 4,300+ fans per home game, tops in college soccer nationally
- Charleston Battery among only 7 of 25 USL Championship clubs growing attendance this season
- Clemson has won 4 NCAA titles; South Carolina alumni include Dempsey, Mathis, Wolff, Guzan
Annan, an Englishman who attended three of England's World Cup games this summer, put it simply: "It can get better and better here."
If youth participation numbers, college attendance figures, and a 30-year-old professional club all trending upward at the same time is any indication — it already is.
