If numbers are your thing, get ready for this: There's basically a 50 percent chance you'll see an all-Cascadia matchup in the Western Conference Finals this season. Hold on to your hats, hipsters!
For just the first time since Portland and Vancouver joined MLS in 2011, all three Cascadia teams are in the Western Conference Semifinals. In a penalty shootout that will live on in MLS infamy, the Portland Timbers advanced past Sporting Kansas City in the Knockout Round on Thursday night after a total of 22 penalty kicks. The match solidified the matchups heading into the first leg of this weekend's semis, with Vancouver heading south on I-5 to take on the Timbers at Providence Park and the Sounders in a rematch of last season's semifinal with FC Dallas. The first leg will be Sunday night at CenturyLink Field, with the team traveling to Frisco next week for the second leg at Toyota Stadium.
"It's good for Cascadia," Sounders Head Coach Sigi Schmid said Friday. "It shows that soccer has taken a good foothold in this area and all the fans in this part of the U.S. have to be very proud."
With the regional rivalry in existence long before the clubs faced one another in MLS, these teams are are no strangers to big games. Seattle has only faced Portland once in the postseason. In 2013, the Rave Green fell in the Western Conference Semifinals before the Timbers were defeated by Real Salt Lake in the Conference Championship.
If both the Sounders and 'Caps advance to the finals, it'd be the first postseason meeting between the two clubs in MLS action. The series would be the sixth and seventh time the clubs meet in 2016 across all competitions. Sounders FC reclaimed the Cascadia Cup in Vancouver in September with a decisive 3-0 victory, and then Vancouver by the same margin in the Scotiabank CONCACAF Champions League Group Stage just days later.
