When was your club founded, by whom, and what is the mission?
It all started in Early 2020 when the pandemic started and we were not allowed to leave our homes. Auston Bruder was sitting at home with his wife Tori discussing when he got out where he was going to play and with whom. All there was locally was the Sunday Hispanic league, and if they wanted to travel there are some regional indoor tournaments that they could possibly play in. Up to this point the teams he had played on post college never created a real identity and he wanted to change that. The two of them were brainstorming names and nothing really stuck and matched the energy they wanted the team to have. The guys that were playing with him were high energy and all between the ages of 20-30 so a younger core of guys and not all from one exact town or area. Tori at this time said “we’ll you guys are just a bunch of Hooligans” and bam they had the name. They decided to go with Midwest instead of just a town name since many of our players at the time are not tied to the specific city and at that time, they had no idea how big the team could or would get, and for them at this time the team was just a Sunday team. Auston wanted a way to communicate all the information about games and results to the guys on social media so he created a Facebook page and Tori made a Crest for them to use. Unknowingly to anyone the page got a little bit of traffic from people in the community and all credit for that goes Tori for making the team at that time seem 10x bigger than it really was. So much traffic that they were approached by a local youth club Indiana Fire South Academy owner Jack Strassweg and his team about acquiring the team and taking it to the next level. They came to an agreement and starting 2022 the Midwest Hooligans would play in the UPSL making them the first official outdoor semi pro soccer team in Evansville, Indiana.
With the Hooligans now being apart of the youth club the mission went from a group of guys just looking to continue playing after college to become what it is today, “Here at the Midwest Hooligans we provide a professional environment for players to develop their game at the highest level and become professionals on and off the field. While teaching the youth of the community the game that we love. With Passion, Pride, and Purpose we continue to grow the game of soccer in our community.”

Tell us about your badge and colors – what inspired the choice or did it just fall into place?
We picked the colors navy blue and neon green as our colors for our team and we picked these to stand out from the local high schools and colleges. The badge was just created to look cool more than anything and at the current moment does not have any deeper meaning with it.

What league do you play in? Why did you choose that league and how often does the club re-evaluate that?
We play in the UPSL. We thought this was a great starting point for the team and our views for the future. It was cost effective to join and did not involve any crazy travel. Regionally we only travel about two and half hours one way to a game. We will re-evaluate in 5 years to see if we are still a good fit for this league.

Do you sell merch or have plans to?
We do sell merch. We sell merch at the games and have a site during the season. It will be linked to our website closer to the new year. www.mwhooligans.com

How did you finish last season? How do you plan on improving for next year?
Last season we went 3-5-2. We did not qualify for our UPSL divisional playoffs. With this being our first official semi pro season we did not know what to expect and every game was a surprise. We plan to grow with more players in the community wanting to be involved and working with a few local colleges to help get some of their players in the team as well. This will help us have more depth and increase the overall talent of the team.

If there was one or two teams, within a 100 miles of you, to play a friendly against – who would you play and why?
We are really close to 100 miles from Louisville City so I would have to say them. Especially if we could play in that new stadium of theirs. I think this experience for our players to play one of the best USL teams in the country would be a once in a lifetime experience. A lot of us travel over to watch them play a few times every year and the game day atmosphere is top notch.

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