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No team in Major League Soccer history has finished atop its conference and then finished worse than 10th place the following season.
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San Diego FC has seven games to prevent becoming the first.
A year after being the No. 1 seed in the Western Conference and coming within a game of MLS Cup as an expansion franchise, SDFC (8-11-8, 27 points) finds itself in 12th place as it returns from a two-week international break for the final month of the 2026 regular season. The top seven teams in each conference make the playoffs; the eighth and ninth enter a wild card game for the right to face the No. 1 seed in the first round.
“Every single one of them is a final,” coach Mikey Varas said of the seven remaining games, “and it’s about accumulating as many points as possible from those.”
“There’s pressure on us,” Danish winger Anders Dreyer said. “It’s nice, we like that. It’s seven games. Then we’ll see after seven games where we are.”
It’s doable, especially with the eighth-place Colorado Rapids and ninth-place LA Galaxy both at 36 points (and the Galaxy having played one extra game). The Seattle Sounders, in seventh place, have 38.
There are three problems:
• The schedule isn’t favorable, with four of the seven on the road, starting Saturday on the opposite side of the country at the New York Red Bulls, followed by dates at first-place Vancouver and second-place St. Louis City. Six of the seven are against teams currently in the playoffs.
• It’s not a case of jumping one team in the standings, but three with easier schedules. The two others sitting on 32 points, Portland and Real Salt Lake, both hold the first tiebreaker (total wins) over SDFC. And Austin is only a point back in 13th place.
• The azul and chrome are not playing particularly well, in the midst of a five-game winless streak after a 3-3 tie at Austin on Sept. 26. They led that match 3-0 with less than 20 minutes to play.
That game, in many respects, has come to define this most confounding of seasons, showing flashes of the group that set MLS records for wins (19) and points (63) by an expansion franchise, then the maddening 2026 habit of surrendering leads, no matter how large or how late.
“At the end of the day, we still take home a point (for a tie),” said Varas, whose team allowed Austin goals in the 73rd, 82nd and 86th minutes. “We can’t lose sight of that. We have to remember that there were 25 minutes there where we were pretty spectacular.
“The group held themselves accountable right away in terms of knowing we can’t give up a three-goal lead. Consistency has been one of the things we’ve battled all year, and we haven’t found it yet. But it’s not too late. If we find it now, we’ll be in the playoffs.”
The good news is the break allowed injured attackers Amahl Pellegrino and Gabriel Pirani to return to training. SDFC also had only three players called to national team duty, and two of them returned early.
Another thing: Unlike most leagues across the planet, where there are no playoffs, it’s more important in MLS to be playing well in the fall than the spring or summer.
Exhibit A is the Red Bulls, who reached the 2024 MLS Cup as the No. 7 seed in the Eastern Conference.
“You learn that this league, it’s about finding your level at the end of the season, and that’s what we’re trying to do,” Dreyer said. “Last year was nice. We were No. 1 in the West after 34 (regular-season) games, and it was nice going into the playoffs, maybe with some more pressure on our shoulders.
“This year, if we reach the playoffs, we’ll be underdogs and we can only surprise.”
Or look at it this way: If SDFC does indeed reach the postseason, it will be playing good soccer given the degree of difficulty in its closing schedule.
An educated guess is the azul and chrome need at least 13 points from their seven games, which likely would require winning four of them.
“That’s why life gives you struggles,” Varas said. “Because if everything was great all the time and easy all the time, I think life would get pretty boring. What life has sent us this year are huge challenges, starting with the beginning of the year and a shorter preseason, having to play in three tournaments, having to do it with a different roster, injuries at times, red card situations at times.
“For us, we just embrace all of it, because we know that these are really important steps in the story that is this season, and in the story that will be the club for the next 50 years.”
San Diego FC’s remaining schedule
SDFC is 8-11-8 with seven regular-season matches remaining. Here’s a look at the rest of their 2026 schedule:
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Saturday: at New York Red Bulls, 4:30 p.m.
Wednesday: vs. Houston Dynamo, 7:30 p.m.
Oct. 17: at LA Galaxy, 7:30 p.m.
Oct. 24: vs. Seattle Sounders, 7:30 p.m.
Oct. 28: at Vancouver Whitecaps, 7:30 p.m.
Oct. 31: at St. Louis City SC, noon
Nov. 7: vs. Sporting Kansas City, 4 p.m.
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This story was originally published October 9, 2026 at 11:28 AM.