That all came crumbling down when, on the verge of reaching the fourth round, they were hammered 8-1 by Honduras in their last game, allowing the Hondurans to go through in their place.
Our attention now turns to Jamaica, who came second in Group A behind the USA, to reach the next round and they did so with a 4-1 win over Antigua & Barbuda with Dane Richards, then still playing for Vancouver Whitecaps, scoring the last two goals.
The game also gave Richards his 41st game and he'll be hoping to make that 42 this week having been called up for the squad for their first fourth round game against Mexico to be played at Azteca Stadium in Mexico City.
Besides Jamaica and Mexico, along with Honduras and USA mentioned above, the other qualifiers for this round are Costa Rica and Panama.
They will all play each other twice with the last games being played in October.
The top three will win places in Brazil with the country finishing fourth then playing the winner of the Oceania group in a play off game in November. The favourites in that area right now are New Zealand.