MLS Decision Day: We Have Playoffs! | OneFootball

Saturday was the final game day of the 2025 MLS season. Fifteen games were coordinated to kickoff at either 6:00pm or 9:00pm ET, giving the Eastern and Western Conferences zero chance to know or otherwise strategize their game plans. Here’s a summary of what went down and how it impacted the upcoming playoff picture.

Eastern Conference

We already knew the nine playoff teams before any kickoff; all that was decided here was the order.

The bottom-table battle between Atlanta and D.C. United ended in a 1 goal draw, which was fitting. D.C. will “win” the Wooden Spoon Award for the worst MLS record: 26 points (5W, 11D, 18L) and a -36 goal differential. The Five Stripes pipped them with two extra draws, but the same number of wins.

The two Canadian sides split their respective games. CF Montréal was blanked 3 – 0 by FC Cincinnati, putting them just above D.C. and Atlanta. But Toronto delivered a resounding win over visiting Orlando City. Their 4 – 2, behind Djordje Milhailović’ s brace, dropped the Lions from 7th to 9th place. Orlando City will now have to play a mid-week play-in at Chicago on Wednesday. The winner will take on conference winners Philadelphia Union on Sunday the 26th. The win couldn’t save Toronto’s season, but it did elevate them to 25th overall (12th in the East).

The only other change from the previous week happened to Columbus Crew. Their 3 – 1 win over the New York Red Bulls allowed them to swap places with Orlando and avoid a play-in. Sure, they face FC Cincinnati in the ensuing first round, but they’ll do so without having an extra game in their legs.

Final Eastern Conference Table

Source: Sofascore

Western Conference

We referred to the Wild West scenarios in a previous article. And it sure lived up to the expectation!

Conference leaders Vancouver Whitecaps simply needed a point against FC Dallas to retain the title. But Mathías Laborda, who took down Sam Sarver in the 8th minute of the game, got his yellow card upgraded to red after a VAR review determined it to be a denial of a goal scoring opportunity. This put the hosts down a man with over 80 minutes to play. Despite entering halftime level at one goal apiece, Dallas struck early in the second half and parked the bus, denying all of Vancouver’s offensive efforts. FC Dallas won the game 2 – 1.

Meanwhile, 315 miles to the south in a rain-slicked Providence Park, Portland Timbers were hosting San Diego FC. After Amahl Pellegrino gave them a goal in the  first half, SDFC emerged from the locker room on a whole different level. League MVP candidate Anders Dreyer scored twice in the first five minutes to put the visitors up three, then Pellegrino sealed the deal with his second in the 69th.

These two results flipped all four teams. FC Dallas moved up to 7th; Portland down to 8th. The Timbers will host Real Salt Lake in the play-in on Wednesday. It also inverted Vancouver and San Diego’s position, handing the expansion team the conference title. It’s only the second time ever that an expansion team has won their conference in MLS history (St. Louis did it back in 2023).

Other Results

And there was other drama afoot. My colleague the Qooligan attended the San Jose Earthquakes game and provided this report. tl;dr, they won but didn’t get the results from other games to qualify.

LAFC, Minnesota United, Seattle Sounders and Austin all finished 3rd through 6th as expected. But in a most bizarre twist, LA Galaxy, who occupied the 15th rung of the table for ALL 33 matchdays prior, defeated Minnesota and managed to leap above Sporting Kansas City into 14th place. After starting the season with fifteen games without a win, not finishing dead last (or eating off the wooden spoon), is a major achievement.

Final Western Conference Table

Source: Sofascore