“We want to compete for trophies,” said Nashville SC’s head coach B.J. Callaghan on the eve of the 2025 Semifinal. “And that’s what this U.S. Open Cup is giving us the opportunity to do.”
Every coach, in his position, would say something similar. A trophy is proof of concept, physical evidence of success for a player, every member of a team’s staff and the fans in the stands. It sits proudly, a symbol behind glass, to tell a shiny story of good days for as long as anyone cares about such things.
But you get the sense, talking to the 44-year-old boss born and raised on the Jersey Shore, that it’s about more than professional status to him. More than a bullet point on a resume. There’s something very human behind Callaghan’s desire to lift a trophy into the air in early October. It’s about the group, about stewardship and those eternal things sport has a way of unlocking.
“These are the games you remember, Championship games and Semifinals, that you, coaches and players and fans, will be talking about years later,” he insisted. “You don’t talk that way about Game 14 of the regular season. These are the moments that matter.”
Callaghan understands the magic of the moment on a cellular level. In his first year in his first head coaching job in MLS, he’s best known – rightly and fondly – for his brief time in charge of the U.S. Men’s National Team in May and June of 2023. With controversy swirling around previous coach Gregg Berhalter, and doubts about how to move the program forward, Callaghan stepped up from assistant to interim head coach for 61 days, with a Concacaf Nations League right smack in the middle.
The team, given the circumstances, had every excuse to fall flat. Instead, the Stars and Stripes rose to the occasion with an iconic win over Mexico in the semis and an epic trophy lift after a 2-0 win over Canada. Callaghan, who finished his tenure in charge of the USMNT without losing a single game, with four wins and three draws from seven, was right there at the heart of it all.
“When it’s going good, it’s easy,” said Callaghan, quick to deflect credit for the Nations League success, claiming “there were a lot of things in place” when he was dropped into the hot seat. “When it’s a little difficult, when you get hit with a little bit of adversity, that’s when you find out what you’re about as a group. What makes me happiest when I think back on it is, when we were called on, in a really difficult time, we responded together and exceeded expectations.”
Callaghan, who speaks often and earnestly about his desire to help bring people together, became a cult hero of American soccer in that summer of 2023. The Nashville coach, he of boyish smile and broad shoulders, laughs off such assertions – but it’s still true. The original team-guy, you’ll not find anyone with a bad word to say about him from his five years with the National Team staff or his six years before that with the Philadelphia Union, where he began his pro coaching career analyzing video.
“B.J. is an amazing guy and I have a lot of respect for him – and he had a lot to say about the way we did things on the field,” said Alejandro Bedoya, who, in the late autumn of his playing career and still with Philly, will go head-to-head with Callaghan in the 2025 Open Cup Semifinal on September 16 at 8pm ET at Nashville’s Geodis Park (LIVE on Paramount+ and on air at CBS Sports Network).
It hasn’t been all glory-days and trophy hoists for Callaghan. After starting out in the college game with his alma mater Ursinus College, where he was a standout DIII goalkeeper, and Villanova’s men’s and women’s programs, he spent six years with the Union as an assistant. There, he was part of a club that reached three Open Cup Finals.
“I was there for all three of those Finals and we lost them all,” he said, of those days working under long-time coach Jim Curtin, who won two Open Cups as a player with the Chicago Fire and “made sure everyone understood the history and meaning” of the tournament. “It was a first taste of how winning trophies is so rare, so difficult, and how, when you have an opportunity, you have to go all-in.”
He still has vivid memories of those three Finals, when it was “right there at your fingertips.” From 2014: Hitting a post late and losing to Seattle in front of a full house at home. From 2015: Again at home, devastated by Sporting Kansas City in a shootout, Curtin swapping out goalkeepers for the post-game penalties, “because you have to expect the unexpected in those games.” Most recently, from 2018: Traveling to Houston “with the whole club staff, all as one” and losing to the Dynamo.
Callaghan draws the nectar of positivity from getting to those Finals. “I think the Open Cup, with all its tradition and energy, just brings something special,” he said. “It can galvanize the fan base, bring a whole squad and a whole club together from top to bottom.”
The coach is looking for more of that, and a bit more still, this year.
In a twist, it’s that very Philadelphia Union that stands between Callaghan and another U.S. Open Cup Final. “Semifinals are always the hardest games to get through,” said the Nashville SC boss, only the second head coach since the club’s founding in 2018. “They take a lot of focus and preparation – the regular season disappears when you step into them.”
“The difficulty is only compounded by the fact that we’re playing Philadelphia,” he said of the upcoming meeting with this old club, and, as it just so happens, the best team in Major League Soccer under new boss Bradley Carnell. “They’re a really good team, a really deep team and one that shares our ambitions of wanting to lift the Open Cup.”
With a squad that tries to “out-team” other teams, the 2025 Nashville SC squad is built in its coach’s image. There’s the talent of former MLS MVP Hany Mukhtar, the goals of league top-scorer Sam Surridge, the elegant wide play of Andy Najar, of course – but there’s also the battle and the togetherness that runs like an artery through the entire squad. “We like to work for a purpose that’s bigger than ourselves as individuals,” Callaghan insisted. “That’s how you achieve things.”
“It’s gonna’ be a heavyweight battle,” Callaghan added. “I’m sure we can’t even dream of some of the things that are going to happen in this one.”
He has a soft spot for the unpredictability peculiar to the Open Cup. The do-or-die energy, whether it's in the early rounds against an amateur team or on the verge of a Final, is something he welcomes. “It’s win or go home – it’s a unique juice and a special kind of energy. You want trophies, you want to compete, no one wants to lose – and everything is on the line no matter who you’re playing.”
On the other side of the final whistle lurks the chance to play for a first title in club history – to lift a trophy up into the air and set the flashbulbs bursting. Don’t think for a minute that the meaning of that is lost on a man like Callaghan.
“We’re two games from a trophy,” he said, a stern look in his eye. “You have to be brave because this is something that can bring everyone together, the whole city. It’s the story you tell your buddy at the bar 20 years from now, the one you share with those who helped.
“Maybe you’re the ten year old kid who falls in love with Nashville Soccer Club that night,” added Callaghan, alive, always, to the joyful possibilities.
Fontela is editor-in-chief ofusopencup.com. Follow him at @jonahfontela on X/Twitter.