Des Moines Menace finding new home digs, 'new' league for 2019 season

Short of the same team name and roster concept, central Iowa soccer fans will be looking at a new sort of Des Moines Menace this spring and summer.

Start with the venue: Drake Stadium, instead of West Des Moines' Valley Stadium, which is undergoing a turf replacement.

Then there's the coach: Mark McKeever, a Scotland native who signed a two-year deal, comes to the franchise with previous experience in the Premier Development League and as a long-time college soccer coach in Georgia. 

Oh, and about that whole PDL thing: That's out. In is the USL League Two, the new name for the league fielding under-23 squads.

So, Year 26 in Des Moines will have some special wrinkles when the USL2 season begins May 11 at Cownie Soccer Park against Green Bay. (The remaining home matches will be at Drake.)

This season will mark the first time since 2004 at Hoover that the Menace will play games in Des Moines proper. Three years in Waukee (2005-07) preceded the 11-year run in West Des Moines. As of now, the Drake Stadium arrangement is for the 2019 season only, team operations manager Evan Janssen said in an email to the Register.

The Menace is coming off a 13-0-1 regular season in 2018 that saw Des Moines advance to the Central Conference championship game (the PDL equivalent of the quarterfinals) before losing to Chicago FC United. Coach Alen Marcina left for an assistant job at San Antonio FC of the USL Championship league (one step below Major League Soccer), which brought about the search for McKeever.

The first match overall for the Menace will be May 8 in the first round of the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, with the opponent and location of the match to be determined.