Union Omaha’s Pedro Dolabella: At Home & Thriving Among the Owls
We go deep on Pedro Dolabella’s long road from Brasilia, Brazil to Omaha, Nebraska via Rochester, NY – and how he fell in love with the U.S. Open Cup along the way.
Young Pedro Dolabella was flying high in 2022.
The lanky midfielder from Brazil, possessor of a keen eye for game-changing goals, stood out in Rochester NY FC’s three Open Cup games that year. And his reputation only grew from there, when the MLS NEXT Pro club finished fourth and he was front-and-center in the league’s Best XI.
“Then everything was a bit chaotic,” he said of what came next. “Everything just went dark [in the off-season]. The club stopped communicating with the players. Then one day there was an email from from the president that said, ‘OK, you can all go find another team now.’”
When a team folds, like Rochester NY FC did after just one season, it’s less a collapse and more an explosion. The players were stuck, literally homeless and without jobs, in late February with the lower-league spring seasons soon to kick off. “They left us hanging all that time,” said Dolabella, scattered to the four winds along with his teammates. “Teams are already being built.”
Omaha Calling
When the Rochester club officially folded, on March 10th, it took Union Omaha four days to secure Dolabella’s signature. And what was lacking at the player’s old home (a sturdy foundation, fundamental pillars of support and a way forward) was in surplus supply at his new one.
Founded in 2020, the Owls of Union Omaha have developed into the best-run and most-successful club in USL League One – reaching the national final in their inaugural year, winning it in 2022 and never failing to go past the quarterfinals of the league’s post-season playoffs. They’ve also made a point of causing massive sensations in the U.S. Open Cup.
The Nebraskans’s run to the Quarterfinals in 2022, complete with a pair of road wins over MLS clubs, is the stuff of modern-era legend and lore.
Dolabella celebrates his goal for Rochester NY FC against FC Motown in the 2022 Open Cup
“Pedro brings a lot of quality in a variety of positions,” said Union Omaha coach Dominic Casciato, who moved like lightning to sign the player. “He can play anywhere in the midfield or even as a number-nine, so to have someone as versatile as him with so much quality is a big benefit.
“He’s a threat no matter where he plays,” added the coach, who has his team two points off third place in the league table and, after three wins in Open Cup play that started on a freezing night in Western Massachusetts, now set to meet MLS powers Sporting Kansas City in the Round of 32.
“I’m so thankful to [Coach] Dom and everyone here,” said Dolabella, who had only 16 days to get himself acclimated and ready for 2023 action – and didn’t miss a beat. “It’s a fun environment here – and it always helps when you’re winning.”
Dolabella finished last season tied for third-top scorer in the squad. He’s been embraced by the club’s fans – among the most passionate and dedicated in the U.S.’ lower leagues. “It reminds me of where I come from, these fans,” he said. “It feels the same [as in Brazil].”
Dolabella (second from right in back) with Union Omaha in this year’s Open Cup
It’s easy to imagine players magically appear at their clubs and everything that brought them there is smooth and sorted and without bumps in the road. It’s simply not so, so let’s start at the beginning with Dolabella and his road to Nebraska with stops in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains in Huntington, West Virginia, Upstate NY and Flint, Michigan.
Omaha, Nebraska is a long way from Brasilia, Brazil – where life began for Dolabella in July of 1999. “Your choices in Brazil are soccer or soccer,” he laughed. “There’s such a love for the game and you think about this really big country where every kid wants to be a soccer player.”
São Paulo to the States
It’s with that passion – and amid that competitive cauldron – that Dolabella learned the finer points of the game. He joined the São Paulo academy early and stayed there until he was 15. “I was living away from my parents for the first time and away from home by a two-hour flight,” said the player, elegant with the ball and difficult to knock off it despite his towering 6-foot-4 height and slight frame. He was also playing alongside future world stars like Manchester United’s Antony and Edgar Militao of Real Madrid.
With the competition fierce, and the desire driving young players through the Brazilian academies fiercer still, Dolabella was left with big decisions to make as a teenager. With a firm grasp of English, from his days attending an American school in Brasilia at the urging of his mother, the so-called Land of Opportunity, the United States, beckoned.
Dolabella against a Sacha Kljestan-led Des Moines Menace earlier this year
“First I went to New Jersey for my last year of high school,” he said of the year he spent at the Pennington School. There he terrorized local players and stood head-and-shoulders above the competition. Dolabella chose the Thundering Herd of Marshall University as his next step, and he led the school to a first and only NCAA National title in 2020.
“It wasn’t a well-known program, so to turn something around and achieve the top goal, playing with your friends – was such an achievement,” said Dolabella, whose ready smile and friendly demeanor earned him the nickname The Mayor on campus.
But that itch remained. It was what drove him away from his home and parents at an early age. “I still wanted to be a professional player,” he remembered. The country and the surroundings were different, but for Dolabella the goal remained crystal clear and unchanged.
Summer league experience with the Flint City Bucks (formerly the Michigan Bucks and noted Open Cup giant-slayers) gave Dolabella a sense of the professional pyramid in the U.S. And he was en route to his pro debut in Rochester in 2022 after a brief pre-season stint with MLS’ Charlotte FC failed to lead to a contract.
Still just 24, the road is wide open. A player of uncommon vision, the sky's the limit. MLS is not too far a reach. And what he’s doing now, up among the Owls, can only help his ambitions. His contributions have helped the side to two points off third place in the USL League One standings (at the time of publishing).
And in the Open Cup, Dolabella has found a special affinity. A second home of sorts. Even though his time in Rochester was a mess, he was roared on by fans of the club who still remember winning the Open Cup under their old name, the Rochester Ragin’ Rhinos in 1999 (the year Dolabella was born). And at Union Omaha, known for punching tons above their weight in the historic knockout competition, he likes to show his so-called betters what he’s got.
Dolabella after scoring against MLS’ St. Louis City in the 2023 Open Cup
“I love this competition,” Dolabella said, smiling, about the Open Cup. “I just love knockout games. It’s the pressure-test. The plan is always the same – take care of business and survive and advance.”
He scored the only goal for Union Omaha in the Third Round last year (a 5-1 loss in front of over 22,000 fans at MLS side St. Louis City SC). And this year his well-documented versatility has been on full display again.
In the Second Round, up against amateur outfit Des Moines Menace, packed with recently retired MLS veterans like Sacha Kljestan, AJ Delagarza and Roger Espinoza, he scored an opportunistic first in a 3-1 Union Omaha win. “There was a lot of hype with Sacha there, an you want to test yourself all the time against the best players you can,” Dolabella said. “There were a lot of eyes on this game, but we weren’t holding anything back. If we had to kick someone, we did. At the end of the day, we’re here to take care of business.”
Sporting Kansas City Pt. II
“Sometimes you're the underdog and you have to embrace that,” he said of the next contest against El Paso Locomotive – from a division above in the USL Championship. Omaha won that one on penalties after a goalless draw in which Dolabella’s defensive qualities were the order of the day. “So we just came ready to play.”
And now comes the big one. It’s the game everyone in Omaha – the fans, the players and all who’ve had a hand in building this club – have been waiting for. At home against four-time Open Cup champions Sporting Kansas City of Major League Soccer – the top division in the land, where 25 of the last 26 Open Cup winners call home.
It’s a rematch of the Quarterfinal game that ended Omaha’s 2022 Cinderella Cup run 6-0 and the third time in three years that the third-division Nebraskans have earned the right to meet an opponent from MLS.
For Dalobella, always attuned to opportunities on the field – and in a wider sense too – it will be a moment to not let slip away. “We want to win every game,” he said, his voice suddenly stern. “You prepare. You go full-strength and sometimes, maybe you’re the underdog, and that can be fun. No one, maybe, is expecting anything from you.”
It’s from this precise position that Union Omaha’s Owls, and Dolabella himself, love to strike.
Fontela is editor-in-chief of usopencup.com. Follow him at @jonahfontela on X/Twitter.