A handful of members on Minnesota United’s current Under-19 academy team have been through a lot.

During the pandemic in 2020, MNUFC shut down its entire academy system — while other MLS outfits kept going — leaving its rostered players in a lurch. Some players exited for other MLS academies, while others played for high school or local club teams for a year.

A portion of the band got back together in 2021. Together, they have taken their lumps, but now come out the other side.

The Loons’ U19s have advanced to the MLS NEXT Cup Playoffs this week in Murfreesboro, Tenn. They will play FC Dallas in a round of 32 knockout match at 11:45 a.m. Sunday.

The Loons’ current U19s are only the second MNUFC academy team to qualify for the MLS NEXT playoffs since it launched in 2020. The Loons’ 2022 U19 team did it first.

Amos Magee, MNUFC’s vice president of youth development, credited a “good core of that group” who came back to the academy after the pandemic shutdown.

“That’s actually the really exciting, sort of heartwarming piece to it,” Magee said. “(They have) really led the group not only with their play, but with their leadership and commitment to the club and sense of professionalism.”

One recent example of how far the U19s have come: the team suffered a 4-0 loss to FC Dallas’ U19s at MLS NEXT Fest in Arizona in December. Magee rates the Dallas team is one of the three best in that age group this year.

“I’m actually excited about it,” Magee said of the draw. “I think our group is far better than it was then.”

To advance to the playoffs, the Loons’ U19s won all three group-stage matches at MLS NEXT Flex in Maryland in May.

“They did it in three different ways that show, I think, sort of the toughness of the group and the growth of the group,” Magee said.

The U19s beat PA Classics and New England FC each 1-0 and topped Tampa Bay United 5-4. Coached by Alex Morawiecki, the team is undersized but showed mental toughness while other sides had disciplinary incidents in two of the three matches.

“We’re finding that the group’s a pretty good soccer-playing team,” Magee said. “They like to keep the ball. … We had teams who weren’t able to get the ball, but then tried to impose themselves physically on the group, so they just started kicking the crap out of them. (We) just kept (our) heads and still tried to play the way that they wanted to play, still found chances and still kept the ball out of the net.”

The U19s have had players move up to play with MNUFC2, the club’s developmental team, but don’t appear to have a top prospect headed toward a first-team contract. When players come back from MNUFC2 to the U19s, they don’t look at it “like a demotion,” Magee said.

“This is not like sort of fluff: I’m really impressed with this group in terms of the way they’ve been able to kind of bounce back and forth and just plot a steady course ahead,” Magee said.

The U19s have also dealt with a coaching change — from Fanendo Adi, now with the MLS side, to Morawiecki — and have had players coming and going in and out of training. Sometimes they have to practice with fewer than 10 players.

When Julian Banks was in eight grade, the current U19 forward saw friends leave the Loons’ system for other academies during the pandemic shutdown, but his parents said that wasn’t going to happen for him. He instead spent a year at Edina High School’s program.

It’s worked out for Banks, who is headed to the University of Washington on a soccer scholarship. He scored his first goal for MNUFC2 against Whitecaps FC 2 on Thursday, then headed to Tennessee to join the U19s this weekend.

“I think it’s big for a lot of us because a lot of us have played together for so long,” Banks said. “A few of us are going to college next year. I kind of consider this our last hurrah.”

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