So that’s what it feels like to have your heart ripped out.
The Portland Hearts of Pine on Wednesday night took the first-place Charlotte Independence to the brink. On the road. And after an eight-game winless streak.
Yet there the Hearts were, 95 minutes through, holding a 2-1 lead. Three minutes later, the referee blew the whistle, and Portland had lost 3-2.
Here are three instant observations:
The Hearts had the best team in the USL League One down and almost out. But Charlotte, the league’s top goal scoring club, kept pushing Portland deeper. A header was missed. Hearts goalkeeper Hunter Morse made some wild saves. A shot whizzed by the post.
And then in a moment that represents the entire Hearts’ season to date, Charlotte scored twice. Stefano Pinho, a 35-year-old whose fascinating career has led him to be both a star and a journeyman and whose stat line coming into the game looked like binary code, scored on a pair of stunners in the 96th and 98th minute.
The first was a left-footed scissor kick that beat a leaping Morse while the Brazilian’s second was a reactive right-footer that slid the ball into the back of the net. And once again, the Hearts had failed to hold a lead.
Following a year of such excitement, the 2026 campaign has been filled with calamitous failure.
The biggest problem Wednesday night? Poor marking repeatedly. Too many people left open and not enough pressure on passers outside of the box. Trouble began with 15 minutes left in the second half when Charlotte seemed to turn on its jets.
But what a second 30 minutes for Portland. After a tepid first half where Portland came out lucky to only be down 1-0, the Hearts attacked relentlessly. The hard work paid off in the 59th minute when Matteo Kidd was first to a loose ball, touched it past a defender to himself where he then beat the goalkeeper between the legs.
Shortly after, Ollie Wright went down in the box from a lunging Charlotte goalkeeper. The referee called for the penalty, much to the Independence’s dismay. They cheered moments later when Wright’s penalty kick was saved but Michel Poon-Angeron pounced on the rebound and scored a rare goal.
Wright nearly scored late in regular time but his left-footed shot just missed the upper post.
This one is going to hurt the Hearts’ players for a while. Instead of a chance to knock off the first-place Independence, Portland has now gone winless for nine consecutive matches.
Afterward, team captain Mikey Lopez posted this apology on Portland’s Instagram page. It comes as no surprise, given his stewardship as captain over the past two years. But it’s an example of the pain the players have got to be enduring.
Screenshot by George Watson/The Hearts’ Beat
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