Indy Eleven

The running track around the pitch at IU Michael A. Carroll Track & Soccer Stadium cuts the seating bowl off from the field, so even though the stands hold 12,111, only 10,524 are sold for Indy Eleven matches — the club has played on the Indiana University campus in Indianapolis since it took the field, and the largest crowd the club has drawn at home was 30 March 2019, when 20,251 people found room for the visit of Hartford Athletic.

Indy Eleven came into being on 16 January 2013, when the North American Soccer League announced it as an expansion side, and it settled on navy and gold — colours lifted from the Indianapolis city flag rather than chosen for their own sake. The name reads two ways at once: eleven players on the pitch, and the 11th Indiana Volunteer Infantry Regiment, which fought in the Civil War under Colonel Lew Wallace. The crest carries that same layering — Lady Victory, taken from the Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument downtown, a white star lifted from the city flag, and a red-and-white checkered ground nodding to Indianapolis's motor-racing identity.

The club's one league title came on 16 April 2016, when Indy Eleven took the NASL Spring Championship ahead of New York Cosmos on the head-to-head record, having beaten them 2-1 on goals from Justin Braun and a late Eamon Zayed double. The rematch, in November's Soccer Bowl, went the other way — a scoreless final decided by penalties in the Cosmos's favour. Zayed left as the club's leading scorer with 27 goals. The women's side has since added its own line to the record: the 2023 USL W League title, won 2-1 over North Carolina Courage U23 in the final.

Plans for a 20,000-seat home of its own, Eleven Park, stalled in 2024 after crews found a historical cemetery on the site, leaving the club at Carroll Stadium for now. Head coach Sean McAuley took over in 2024; among those who have worn the shirt, the one they point to when the subject of longevity comes up has made more appearances than anyone else in the club's history.