History
Greek American Atlas Astoria, formally New York Greek American Atlas Astoria Soccer Club, was formed in 1941. The club was founded by Greek-American Tom Laris and would go on to become one of the most successful and longest continually operating teams in American soccer history. The club has a long-standing rivalry with New York's Cyprian team and fellow multiple National Cup champion, the Pancyprian Freedoms.
The Greek Americans have won America's nationwide domestic soccer tournament, the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, formerly the National Challenge Cup, four times in its history, from 1967 to 1969 and in 1974. The club is one of only two teams, alongside the Seattle Sounders FC, to have won the annual tournament on three consecutive occasions.
The team currently plays in the 5th tier of the American soccer pyramid, under the USASA in the Cosmopolitan Soccer League. The club plays out of the Metropolitan Oval in Maspeth, Queens and has been a perennial contender in the league, winning five of the last eleven Eastern New York Championships. While the club had not qualified for the Open Cup since 2005, it returned to the tournament in 2012 but lost in the first round to Reading United of the USL's Premier Development League, by a score of 2-1.
Their reserve team is the Greek-American Atlas Reserves FC that plays in the Cosmopolitan League's Reserve Division.
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“In nature, all is useful, all is beautiful. It is therefore beautiful, because it is alive, moving, reproductive; it is therefore useful, because it is symmetrical and fair. Beauty will not come at the call of a legislature, nor will it repeat in England or America its history in Greece. It will come, as always, unannounced, and spring up between the feet of brave and earnest men.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
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It resembled a mare shuffling on,
dragging its history like saddlebags,
nearing its tomb and the pitch of hell.”
—Adonis [Ali Ahmed Said] (b. 1930)