Some rivalries are born on the pitch.

Others, as one might expect in this digital age, are born on the web. And that’s exactly how the Four Corners Cup came to be the USL Championship’s newest fan-created competition.

The dominoes started to fall into place last June when the USL awarded an expansion franchise to New Mexico, ensuring that each state within the Four Corners (Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah) was equally represented in the 2019 Championship campaign. The announcement also sparked Phoenix Rising FC fan Michael Vanderplas to begin turning his long-standing idea into a reality.

“I knew it was something that we wanted to do when New Mexico came into the league,” said Vanderplas, a leading member of Rising FC supporters’ group, the Red Fury. “We thought it would be a cool idea…so we found all the supporters’ groups from all the different teams, got them together and started discussing a cup competition.”

The conversation, like much of the banter that typically takes place between the groups, happened on Twitter. Vanderplas organized a direct message thread between the Red Fury, Wasatch Legion (Real Monarchs SLC), Trailheads (Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC), Sandianistas and the Curse (both New Mexico United) to discuss ideas and logistics.

The result was a round-robin tournament with a similar format to the Southern Derby, which annually crowns a champion amongst Eastern Conference sides the Charleston Battery, Charlotte Independence and North Carolina FC. In this case, the club that finishes with the best record in its six regular-season matches against its Four Corners Cup rivals will be the winner.

“We love the idea of having an added level of stakes on a handful of matches,” said Nic Osterhout, President of the Wasatch Legion. “A little friendly competition can only be a good thing, really. We’ve always been against forced rivalries so to speak, but we feel like this is more of a friendly competition between groups who just love the game and want to have some extra fun with it.”