When you ask Sebastian Guenzatti his favorite soccer memory, there’s zero hesitation in his answer. For a player who holds single-season and career franchise scoring records, is one of the top goal scorers in USL history and has helped lead teams to numerous league finals it might surprise you that he was able to pick one so quickly.
What might surprise you even more, though, is that his favorite moment involves none of those things.
“Playing in the streets with my friends back home,” Guenzatti says. “My neighborhood changed a lot over time. I always have those memories of my childhood playing with all my friends and yeah, I still keep in contact with them. Whenever I go to the neighborhood a lot of people still remember me and they know I was always that kid that was hitting the ball bothering the neighbors… so those are probably my favorite moments.”
Guenzatti moved to the United States from Uruguay when he was 10. He didn’t speak English, and his mom didn’t speak much more than that. However, she was determined to find a place where he would feel comfortable. That place was Metropolitan Oval Academy in Queens, New York, because of its Argentinian connection.
He played for the local Academy and was a standout at Francis Lewis High School. Then, after graduation, it was back to Uruguay looking to start his career as a professional soccer player. Guenzatti played for Peñarol out of Montevideo and started his senior career at Huracán in 2013. The stay at home would be short lived, though.
There are those who say life is all about relationships, and it was a previous relationship that brought Guenzatti back to the United States in 2013. A team with a storied history was ready to make a comeback, and it was announced that the team’s head coach would be Giovanni Savarese. Guenzatti’s relationship to Savarese, he had played for him at Metropolitan Oval Academy during his early years in America.
On August 10, 2013, Guenzatti made his NASL debut with the New York Cosmos against the Tampa Bay Rowdies, a team he would later rewrite the record books for. From then on, success piled on for Guenzatti and his Cosmos teammates. The squad won the 2013, 2015 and 2016 NASL Soccer Bowl and made an appearance in the league semifinals in 2014. All was good.
Until it wasn’t.
On October 9, 2016, Guenzatti tore his ACL and was rehabbing during the season’s championship run. Then, in December of 2016, it was announced that the Cosmos would not field a team in 2017.
“Obviously, when you get injured it’s a tough moment, and when the club is about to fold you don’t know your future,” Guenzatti remembers. “But New York Cosmos helped me with my recovery and then Tampa Bay Rowdies contacted me and gave me an opportunity and told me to go tryout to see how I was.”
With the help of the Cosmos staff, Guenzatti went to Tampa. It was about eight months into his recovery and Tampa Bay gave him an opportunity to start again. The rest was literally history.
Guenzatti played over 11,000 minutes for the Rowdies, starting 126 of 158 matches played, and scored 65 goals over six seasons. He still ranks in the top three of appearances, games started and minutes for the club, and holds franchise records with his 65 career USL Championship goals and the 22 goals scored in 2021.
It was all good, once again, for the Tampa Bay captain. A title he didn’t take for granted.
“It meant a lot. For a team that came back from the 70s, 60s, knowing about them and knowing that Cosmos was a rival, and coming from the Cosmos to Tampa for me it was very special playing for two of the biggest clubs at the time. Starting again in my career from a tough injury when I thought I was in the best shape of my career… I was 26 at the time, the age where you are usually at the top level.”
The captain helped lead his club to the conference semifinals in 2017, its first season since moving from the NASL. In 2020 and 2021 Tampa Bay advanced to the league final, while 2019 and 2022 produced conference quarterfinal and conference final appearances, respectively. So, when it was time to look at his future following the 2022 season. The choice was his to make.
“I had a talk with coach [Neill Collins] and we both thought it was best for me to move on and find a new chapter in my career,” Guenzatti said. “The decision is never easy… I decided what I wanted to do at that moment.
“Obviously I thank them all the time. I still talk to Neill Collins and keep up with him. It was just a chapter in my career where everything went right. From starting in 2017 to becoming the captain and taking them to two finals and giving it all, and I think those memories I will forever cherish.”
Another past relationship would help open the next door for Guenzatti. A player turned coach who knows a thing or two about rewriting some history. Guenzatti and Ayoze Garcia were teammates with the Cosmos from 2013-16, and now Ayoze was on the coaching staff at Indy Eleven after his illustrious playing career in the Circle City. The decision came quick and came easily for both sides.
“Seba can fit into any team,” said Ayoze. “He’s a great player and I wanted to bring him to Indy because I knew he was a person with a lot of values and was going to give everything to be successful with the team.”
Guenzatti signed with the Boys in Blue on December 12, 2022. His first game was a trip back home to Tampa Bay to face his former team as a captain in his next chapter.
“It was huge,” Guenzatti said of his return. “Obviously, after spending a lot of my career there… leaving a lot of friends, family, my parents live in Tampa. It was really tough at first. But Indy gave me a huge opportunity to keep going and achieve new things. Going back was very emotional, [seeing] fans that were there since the beginning. We had a real close connection. I can never talk badly about them because they always gave me everything.”
Guenzatti’s impact was felt immediately in Indy. That season, Guenzatti paced Indy with 11 goals and helped the club to its first playoff appearance since the 2019 season. All while wearing the armband.
“You always want to prove yourself and coming to a new club was a huge change for me after being in Tampa for so long and being the top goal scorer,” Guenzatti said. “It was a tough decision (to come) because I could have kept breaking records and kept going, but I wanted something new and to come here, talking to Ayoze it was huge for me to come here, having the support of him and getting to know Indy.”
In year two, Guenzatti has three goals and an assist in 18 appearances for an Indy side that sits fourth in the USL Championship Eastern Conference thanks to an eight-game win streak, a franchise best, and has reached as high as third. The veteran has also helped lead Indy to Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup history for the club, advancing to the Semifinals for the first time and defeating MLS-side Atlanta United on the way.
The Uruguayan has settled in nicely with the Boys in Blue and when asked what’s different about the Circle City from his previous stops, “It’s real calm. Living in Westfield, Carmel… definitely the calmest place I’ve lived in my career.”
Guenzatti as a teammate, “Is incredible,” Ayoze said. “Very professional, humble and respectful. Always with a great attitude and always wanting to help and improve.”
Guenzatti as a leader, “Is an example for young players and veterans. He leads by example,” Ayoze added. “Always working hard and giving the best for the team.”
Change is a part of life, whether you choose it for yourself, or it chooses you. Leaving the Cosmos for Tampa Bay wasn’t initially up to Guenzatti, but leaving Tampa Bay was a decision he had to make for himself. With each change came a lesson for him.
“It taught me a lot. First of all, to never give up. I have always had that in me,” he thought. “Hopefully I can prove that again as well. I always give it all and I think the Cosmos era was the start of my career where I learned a lot. I played with players that won Champions Leagues, that played in World Cups, so having that so early gave me the maturity to move on and to play with Rowdies and become the captain.”
For someone who doesn’t list any of the goals, records or championships among his favorite moments, he isn’t numb to the significance of any of it.
“It means a lot because it shows that hard work and dedication pay off,” Guenzatti said “When I was with the Cosmos, I wasn’t the same player, playing a different position and then trying to prove myself and that I was a forward, that I could get the team goals, that I could help the team that way.
“When the opportunity came and I started scoring, my eyes just lit up and I knew that’s what I wanted. Then I got the chance in Tampa Bay, and it was huge. Every goal you celebrate like it’s your first one. You never lose that joy of scoring and I think just the hard work and dedication in my career got me there.”
The name Sebastian Guenzatti is written in the history books of every club he’s played for and every league he’s played in since coming back to the United States in 2013, but that three-year-old playing in Uruguay wasn’t always scoring goals for his team.
His earliest soccer memory? His first game.
“I think I scored an own goal, my mom said I scored an own goal… I don’t remember that,” he laughed as he told the story, “but I remember images in my head running around chasing the ball. Every day in Uruguay it was playing in the streets. That was where I learned most of my stuff.”
