MLS announces ‘sprint season’ schedule, with accommodations for cold-weather locales
The short season will begin on 19 February in Miami, with MLS Cup due to be played on Memorial Day weekend
Major League Soccer’s 2027 “sprint season” will begin on 19 February, with MLS Cup taking place during Memorial Day weekend at the end of May.
The stopgap half-season is a one-off, as the North American league inverts its calendar to align with most top leagues around the world beginning with the 2027-28 season. The nuts and bolts of the change were initially announced in March.
For all of the change the league is undergoing, with Larry Berg readying to take over as commissioner after Don Garber’s decades-long reign and the schedule inversion better positioning the league in the global transfer market, there is one bit of continuity. The sprint season will commence as the last three have: with Inter Miami in the opening match, this time welcoming FC Cincinnati to Nu Stadium on 19 February.
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Other marquee matchups include a cold-weather Canadian Classique between Toronto FC and CF Montréal on 28 February, the Cascadia Derby between the Seattle Sounders and Portland Timbers on 4 April, and the Hell is Real Derby between Ohio-based rivals FC Cincinnati and the Columbus Crew on 24 April.
The sprint season will only see teams face opponents from within their conference, neatly resulting in a 14-game slate with an even split of home and away matches. The season will still incorporate some Wednesdays to make the schedule work, and teams will still have the occasional matchday off with 17 matchweeks available. As per tradition, the season concludes with Decision Day as each conference will play its full slate concurrently in consecutive time slots on 8 May.
The top eight teams in each conference will qualify for a single-elimination postseason, with MLS Cup planned to be held during Memorial Day weekend (28-31 May). Every match from kickoff to the championship will be streamed on Apple TV without local blackouts.
The schedule also appears to give MLS a chance to test playing late-winter matches in cold-climate markets at earlier hours. Minnesota United, for example, will open their season a week later than the rest of the league on 28 February, hosting Seattle for a 2 pm local kickoff. CF Montréal will play just one of their first six games at home. Notably, despite a lack of clarity about their long-term future, the Vancouver Whitecaps are involved, with Thomas Müller having announced he’ll remain with the club for the sprint.
