Whitecaps 2020 Schedule Unveiled

The Vancouver Whitecaps, like all Major League Soccer clubs, revealed their 2020 MLS regular season schedule today. The club will open their season on February 29th, at home to Sporting Kansas City, and conclude their season on October 4th, at home to Portland Timbers.

Other Cascadia Cup matches will occur on April 18th (at Seattle), April 25th (at Portland) and June 13th (home to Seattle). Meanwhile, they will play TFC in Toronto on May 2nd and will host Montreal on June 6th.

Because of the unbalanced schedule, the Caps will not play expansion club Inter Miami CF, but will travel to Nashville SC on August 15th. In addition to Miami, Vancouver will not play Atlanta or New England. As the club will be hosting Orlando City SC this season, it means that travel will be significantly reduced thanks to no games in Florida or Georgia.

In fact, the schedule has been quite kind to the longest traveling club in MLS. They have only four Wednesday/Saturday weeks, with the first being away at Columbus and away at DC May 27th and 30th. Their second is home to New York Red Bulls June 17th and away to Sporting Kansas City June 20th. The third is immediately after, with away to Philadelphia June 27th, away to Minnesota July 1st, then home for the Saturday July 4th match against FC Cincinnati. At least they are slowly moving in the right direction across the continent. Their final three-match week is home to San Jose August 22nd, away to LAFC August 26th, then home to Chicago August 29th. That LAFC game sort of sucks, but at least it is not a long flight.

Of course, it is important to factor in the 2020 Canadian Championship into the schedule. Their first match, in the quarterfinals, is July 7th to 9th and July 14th to 16th. That first window will be just prior to playing Real Salt Lake on July 11th, while the second will be jsut before traveling to Houston on July 18th.

If the Whitecaps get to the semi-finals, those will be played on August 11th to 13th and August 18th to 20th. Sandwiched between those two dates is an away match to Nashville on August 15th, while other end of those dates have home matches (Orlando August 8th and San Jose August 22nd).

Being optimistic, if the Caps make it to the final they should be in good shape. Scheduled for September 15th to 17th and September 22nd to 24th, the Caps will have several home matches, so they should be well-rested.

All-in-all, the schedule was quite kind to the Whitecaps this year. Surprising, I know. What are your thoughts?