A little less than 12 years later – Gerrard’s magnificent strike occurred on December 8, 2004 – McCarthy isn’t just a fan anymore. In August he became part of the new ownership group for Arizona United SC, led by Kona Grill CEO Berke Bakay, which aims to take the professional game in the state to the next level.

McCarthy’s involvement in the group came at a relatively late stage, with Bakay and other leading Phoenix-area business leaders at the forefront of the acquisition of the team. But when the opportunity came along, presented by a mutual friend of his and Bakay’s, McCarthy saw a great opportunity.

“I know that he’d reached out to Berke saying ‘I might have a good fit for this group,’” said McCarthy. “It kind of blindsided me. It wasn’t something I had considered, or considered to be a possibility, and then once he mentioned it to me I really started weighing it and then talked to Berke and talked to some other members of the group, and it was like, this makes a lot of sense. This is where I live, this is something I’m passionate about. It’s a perfect fit.”

A Phoenix resident in the offseason, McCarthy was on hand on August 31 when the new ownership group was introduced at United’s game with the LA Galaxy II, and is now looking forward to learning from co-owners of the likes of Mark Detmer, the Managing Director of JLL, Tim Riester, the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of RIESTER Advertising and Dave Stearns, the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Connect Wireless.

“For me it’s like a little bit of a college course, watching businessmen work, how they make it happen,” said McCarthy. “I think the fact that there’s such a breadth of knowledge, and it’s so wide, there’s marketing to business to restaurants to all sorts of different avenues that it makes for a great learning environment for me.”