The USA's Breakout Player? Malik Tillman Rises To Gold Cup Challenge

ARLINGTON, Texas – Mauricio Pochettino smiled and shook his head in disbelief. He’s been asked about Malik Tillman quite a few times during this Gold Cup, and he’s running out of ways to say the same thing.

"It’s difficult to define him because, what a player, no?" Pochettino said. 

Tillman scored the opening goal for the U.S. men’s national team in what was ultimately a 2-1 win over Haiti to close out the group stage on Sunday at AT&T Stadium. The Americans had already clinched a spot in the knockout round last week after beating both Trinidad and Tobago and then Saudi Arabia. But winning all three games gave the squad nine points and put them at the top of Group D. 

The U.S. will recover for a week before facing Costa Rica in the quarterfinals on Sunday, June 29 in Minneapolis (7 p.m. ET on FOX).

Tillman, who has started in all three Gold Cup matches so far, scored his third goal of the tournament in the 10th minute when he headed home a right-footed cross from Brenden Aaronson.

"One of the scouting reports was that the back door is open," Aaronson said. "We have quality with our wingers and are always dangerous with Jack [McGlynn], Diego [Luna] and then with me today, I just saw an overloaded back post and I just thought, ‘Yeah I’m going to hang it out back there."

Tillman was the most entertaining part of the match and used his finesse to consistently put himself in threatening positions. He could have had more goals had those other chances not been called back in the second half. 

First, there was an unintentional handball in the 64th minute. 

Moments later, Tillman collected a pass over the back line from Tyler Adams, made a 360-degree turn, and finished only to have that goal ruled offside.

And then in the 74th