![\"Darius](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/fa1909cd-528d-4232-9793-9dd39c6d8e05_1788537094.file.png\")
<\/a>SACRAMENTO, Calif. \u2014<\/p>\nSacramento Republic FC is gearing up for a win-or-go-home playoff match against El Paso Locomotive FC in the Western Conference semifinals of the USL Championship. <\/p>\n
The team earned this opportunity thanks to Sacramento native Blake Willey\u2019s game-winning goal against FC Tulsa in a 1-0 win in the quarterfinals. <\/p>\n
This will be the third matchup with El Paso this season. <\/p>\n
\u201cBoth teams have changed, and I think just how he said, like the experience that we\u2019ve had in the second half of the season, the maturity we\u2019ve shown in terms of just seeing out games has been the difference, and we just have to execute that again,\u201d said Sacramento Republic FC midfielder Danny Crisostomo. <\/p>\n
In the first matchup on March 28, Republic FC lost at home 2-1. In the second match, Sacramento topped El Paso 1-0 at home on October 17. Head coach Niell Collins thinks there will be a lot of familiarity between the sides since the last matchup was the second to last of the season, which was a confidence booster. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think the game in El Paso was really just a sign of the team\u2019s togetherness, their belief in being patient, staying in the game, trusting it. And we got a really late goal,\u201d Collins said. \u201cWe\u2019re going to need all the same things this Saturday. It\u2019s going to be a tight game. There\u2019s not going to be much between the teams, so we\u2019re going to need every inch of that.\u201d <\/p>\n
El Paso led the Western Conference for a large part of the season, before Sacramento jumped ahead in the standings. Republic FC defender Jack Gurr expressed a respect for what the Locomotive do but a confidence in his own club. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re a really good side, but like I said, I put us up against anybody and us as a collective,” said Gurr. “I think we have the best team, but it\u2019s down to us to show it.\u201d <\/p>\n
Including the quarterfinals win, Republic FC is on a 14-match unbeaten streak. <\/p>\n
\u201cAt the end of the day, it\u2019s a game like no other. So we\u2019re going to continue to try and do what we do best and hope to come out on top,\u201d said Republic FC forward Cal Jennings\/ <\/p>\n
Saturday\u2019s game will take place at Heart Health Park at 7 p.m. on November 7.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sacramento Republic FC is gears up for playoff match against El Paso in the USL Championship Western Conference…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":520079,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[199174,67998,130182,423,115545,1073,199176,8841,49558,14639,14642,121,123,199175,122,14618,199173,278,1435,427,160855,16179,124247],"class_list":["post-520078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-confidence-booster","tag-el-paso","tag-el-paso-locomotive-fc","tag-game","tag-game-winning-goal","tag-home","tag-opportunity-thank","tag-playoff","tag-quarterfinal","tag-republic-fc","tag-sac-republic-fc","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-native-blake-willey","tag-sacramento-news","tag-sacramento-republic-fc","tag-sacramento-republic-fc-prep","tag-season","tag-side","tag-team","tag-togetherness","tag-usl-championship","tag-western-conference-semifinal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/520078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=520078"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/520078\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/520079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=520078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=520078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=520078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}