Santa Ana Winds FC
Southern California soccer club
Santa Ana Winds FC, also known as Winds FC, is a soccer team founded in Santa Ana, California, and a founding United Premier Soccer League club currently playing at the Lake Forest Sports Park, with occasional matches played at Championship Stadium at the Orange County Great Park. The club takes its name from a Southern California weather condition known as the Santa Ana winds. Santa Ana Winds FC, an elite amateur and professional development club, has played international development squads in the past, namely matches against a Club Atlas U-20 squad in March 2011, and a Chivas de Guadalajara U-20 squad in November 2011. On November 18, 2017, the club made history by qualifying to the 2018 U.S. Open Cup for the first time. On Tuesday, June 5, 2018, Winds FC winger Juan Arellano became the first player to transfer directly from Santa Ana Winds FC to an international professional club.
Santa Ana Winds FC was founded in 2006 by Leonel López and brothers.
History
SoCal Premier
Santa Ana Winds FC played in the SoCal Premier League from 2006 to 2011 before joining the National Premier Soccer League West Region-Flight Southwest Conference, also in 2011. The club played in the 2006–07 Raúl Briones Cup, Group B, that they shared with Morelos, PSA and OC United. Winds FC finished third behind Morelos and PSA.
2006–07 Raúl Briones Cup, Group B
NPSL
Winds FC finished second in the NPSL Southwest Conference during their sole NPSL season, made the playoffs and fell in the first round to Hollywood United Hitmen, a national finalist that year, by a score of 3–1.
The club left the NPSL after one season due to a split between owners.
The public source identifies “Santa Ana Winds FC” as southern California soccer club. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Santa, Winds and Southern.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Nov 17, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q7419176. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2011, 2017, 2018 and 2006.
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This entry incorporates text from “Santa Ana Winds FC” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.