MLS Cup returns to Cascadia as Seattle Sounders defeat Toronto FC at home

Seat­tle has anoth­er championship!

The Seat­tle Sounders brought a sec­ond MLS Cup home to Cas­ca­dia this after­noon in front of a sold-out crowd at Cen­tu­ryLink Field, defeat­ing Toron­to FC 3–1 to become Major League Soc­cer’s 2019 champions.

It was the third cham­pi­onship match played between the two teams.

The Sounders defeat­ed Toron­to in 2016 to secure their first-ever MLS Cup, then lost a rematch to Toron­to one year lat­er, in 2017.

Today, the Sounders avenged that loss on their own home turf.

It was the most sat­is­fy­ing win in fran­chise his­to­ry, one that will be savored and remem­bered for a long, long, long, long time.

“Walk­ing out, I got a lit­tle teary-eyed, because it’s a huge moment. You real­ize this before the game starts, the few pre­cious moments before and you’re lit­er­al­ly inside the pow­derkeg – it’s incred­i­ble, it’s a dream come true,” goal­keep­er Ste­fan Frei said in com­ments reflect­ing on the sig­nif­i­cance of the game.

The team scored all three of its goals in the sec­ond half.

Kelvin Leer­dam scored the first goal, with a lit­tle bit of help from Toron­to (the ball zigzagged into the net thanks to a deflec­tion gone wrong).

Vic­tor Rodriguez scored the sec­ond goal with a pic­ture-per­fect shot past Quentin West­berg, the Toron­to keep­er, into the corner.

Raul Ruidi­az scored the final goal not long after, putting the game out of reach from the vis­it­ing team. Toron­to did man­age to answer with one goal, avert­ing a shutout, but by that point, the Sounders’ vic­to­ry felt all but inevitable.

Since its found­ing in 2009, this team has become one of Major League Soc­cer’s most dec­o­rat­ed fran­chis­es. In ten years, the team has accom­plished all of this:

• MLS Cup cham­pi­ons (2): 2016, 2019
• MLS Cup run­ners-up (1): 2017
• MLS Cup Play­off berths (10): 2010–2019
• Sup­port­ers’ Shield (1): 2014
• U.S. Open Cup cham­pi­ons (3): 2010, 2011, 2014
• U.S. Open Cup run­ners-up (1): 2012
• Con­ca­caf Cham­pi­ons League berths (5): 2010–2012, 2015, 2018

In addi­tion, Seat­tle has won six Cas­ca­dia Cup titles (in 2006, 2007, 2011, 2015, 2018, and 2019). Seat­tle is tied with Van­cou­ver for the most Cas­ca­dia Cup titles over­all. The MLS incar­na­tion of the Sounders has the most Cup titles (four).

NPI con­grat­u­lates the Sounders on their sec­ond MLS Cup vic­to­ry. It was no easy feat, but they pulled it off and gave their fans the best hol­i­day gift imag­in­able. Thanks for lift­ing every­one’s spir­its, Sounders. We’ll trea­sure this championship.

Now it’s time to cel­e­brate. See you at the vic­to­ry parade on Tuesday!