Four of the top teams in Major League Soccer — Houston Dynamo, Sporting Kansas City, the Portland Timbers and Seattle Sounders — will play a doubleheader Wednesday night at Kino North Stadium, one of the most highly anticipated dates in the month-long Mobile Mini Sun Cup.
Dynamo will face Sporting KC at 4 p.m., with the Cascadia Cup rivalry match between Portland and Seattle to follow. The Timbers-Sounders game is traditionally one of the highlights of MLS spring training in Tucson. The Cup is given to the best MLS team int he Pacific Northwest; the Sounders won last year's competition, edging out the Timbers and Vancouver Whitecaps with a total of nine points.
Wednesday's match won't count toward the Cascadia Cup standings. But it isn't exactly an exhibition, either.
“Whoever doesn’t understand that rivalry lives in a cave; that’s something that is well known not only in the United States but overseas," Sounders coach Giovanni Savarese told the Star last year. "There is something more that you play for.”
Here's a look at the rest of the Mobile Mini Sun Cup schedule:
Wednesday
• Houston Dynamo vs. Sporting Kansas City, 4 p.m.
• Portland Timbers vs. Seattle Sounders, 7 p.m.
Thursday
• New York Red Bulls vs. Real Salt Lake, 1 p.m.
Saturday
• Seattle Sounders vs. FC Dallas, 10 a.m.
• New York Red Bulls vs. Portland Timbers, 7 p.m.
Feb. 20
• Real Salt Lake vs. FC Dallas, noon
• FC Tucson vs. New York Red Bulls, 3 p.m.
• Portland Timbers vs. Phoenix Rising FC, 6 p.m.
Feb. 23
• New York Red Bulls vs FC Dallas, 11 a.m.
• Phoenix Rising FC vs. OKC Energy, 2 p.m.
• Portland Timbers vs. Real Salt Lake, 5 p.m.
Click on the attached links for more from the Mobile Mini Sun Cup.
