The Seattle Sounders hope to build on their U.S. Open Cup championship when they return to MLS play.

Freddy Montero and Roger Levesque scored to lead Seattle to a 2-1 victory over D.C. United in the Open Cup final last night in Washington, giving the expansion Sounders their first trophy.

Seattle came in winless in its last three MLS games and is in third place in the Western Conference.

"The team needs to win big games to start believing they can win big games," Sounders coach Sigi Schmid said. "This is the first step in that process."

Montero smashed in a rebound in the 67th minute and Levesque scored in the 85th. Clyde Simms scored for D.C. in the 89th minute.

The Open Cup often suffers from the perception that it is a distant second in importance to the MLS Cup, which crowns the league champion every November. The U.S. Open Cup, which began in 1914, is open to all levels of professional and amateur teams associated with the USSF.

SAILING

CUP GOES BACK TO COURT

America's Cup challenger BMW Oracle Racing has gone back to a New York court in an attempt to stop what it calls the unfair manipulation of the rules by defending champion Alinghi of Switzerland.

The San Francisco-based syndicate is asking the Supreme Court of the State of New York to keep the Swiss from issuing rules that would disqualify the American trimaran. It also is asking a judge to make public a secret agreement the Swiss signed with the International Sailing Federation.

It's the latest action in a bitter, convoluted legal spat that's lasted more than two years. The rivals are scheduled for a best-of-3 showdown in massive multihulls in February in Ras al-Khaimah, United Arab Emirates, for the oldest trophy in international sports.