The 2018 Major League Soccer season was the 23rd season of

Major League Soccer Major League Soccer (MLS) is a men's professional soccer league sanctioned by the United States Soccer Federation, which represents the sport's highest level in the United States. The league comprises 29 teams—26 in the U.S. and 3 in Canada ...

, top division of soccer in the United States and Canada. The regular season began on March 3, 2018 and concluded on October 28, 2018. The

MLS Cup Playoffs The MLS Cup Playoffs is the annual postseason elimination tournament of Major League Soccer. The final match of the tournament is the MLS Cup, the league's championship game. Under the current format adopted for the 2019 season, 14 teams qualif ...

began on October 31, 2018 and concluded with

MLS Cup 2018 MLS Cup 2018 was the 23rd edition of the MLS Cup, the championship match of Major League Soccer (MLS), which took place on December 8, 2018. It was the final match of the 2018 MLS Cup Playoffs and was contested by Atlanta United FC and the Por ...

on December 8, 2018. The league took a nine-day hiatus in early June for the

2018 FIFA World Cup The 2018 FIFA World Cup was the 21st FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for men's national Association football, football teams organized by FIFA. It took place in Russia from 14 June to 15 July 2018, after the country was awa ...

, reduced from previous breaks.

Los Angeles FC Los Angeles Football Club, commonly referred to as LAFC, is an American professional Association football team based in Los Angeles. The club competes in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member club of the league's Western Conference. The club ...

joined the league as an expansion franchise, while

D.C. United D.C. United is a professional soccer club based in Washington, D.C. that competes in the Eastern Conference of Major League Soccer, the top tier of American soccer. Domestically, the club has won four MLS Cups (league championships), four Supp ...

debuted their new

soccer-specific stadium Soccer-specific stadium is a term used mainly in the United States and Canada to refer to a sports stadium either purpose-built or fundamentally redesigned for soccer and whose primary function is to host soccer matches, as opposed to a multi-pu ...

Audi Field Audi Field is a soccer-specific stadium in Buzzard Point in Washington, D.C. It is the home stadium for both of Washington, DC’s professional soccer teams, D.C. United in Major League Soccer and Washington Spirit in the National Women’s So ...

Toronto FC Toronto Football Club (commonly known as Toronto FC or TFC) is a Canadian professional soccer club based in Toronto. The club competes in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Eastern Conference. The team plays its home matches at BMO ...

were the defending

Supporters' Shield The Supporters' Shield is an annual award given to the Major League Soccer team with the best regular season record, as determined by the MLS points system. The Supporters' Shield has been annually awarded at the MLS Supporters' Summit since 19 ...

champions and defending

MLS Cup The MLS Cup is the annual championship game of Major League Soccer (MLS) and the culmination of the MLS Cup Playoffs. The game is held in November and pits the winner of the Eastern Conference Final against the winner of the Western Conference ...

champions.

New York Red Bulls The New York Red Bulls are an American professional soccer club based in the New York metropolitan area. The Red Bulls compete in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Eastern Conference. The club was established in October 1994 and be ...

won their third Supporters' Shield, with a league record 71 points, while

Atlanta United FC Atlanta United FC, commonly known as Atlanta United, is an American professional soccer club based in Atlanta that competes in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the league's Eastern Conference. Founded in 2014, Atlanta United began pl ...

won their first MLS Cup in their second year in the league.

Teams

Stadiums and locations

Personnel and sponsorship

Note: All teams use

Adidas Adidas AG (; stylized as adidas since 1949) is a German multinational corporation, founded and headquartered in Herzogenaurach, Bavaria, that designs and manufactures shoes, clothing and accessories. It is the largest sportswear manufactur ...

as kit manufacturer.

Coaching changes

Regular season

Format

During the 2018 MLS regular season, each team played 34 games, including 17 home games and 17 away games. Teams faced each of their conference opponents (10 in the East, 11 in the West) twice during the season with one game at home and one game away. Western Conference teams played one additional intra-conference game and Eastern Conference teams played two. All teams faced each non-conference opponent once.

Conference standings

Eastern Conference

Western Conference

Overall table

Aggregate 2017 and 2018 table

Playoffs

Bracket

Knockout round

Conference semifinals

Conference finals

MLS Cup

Attendance

Average home attendances

Ranked from highest to lowest average attendance.

Highest attendances

Regular season

Player statistics

Goals

Assists

Shutouts

Hat-tricks

Awards

Player of the Month

Player and team of the week

* Bold denotes league player of the week. * ''Italics'' denotes

Audi Audi AG () is a German automotive manufacturer of luxury vehicles headquartered in Ingolstadt, Bavaria, Germany. As a subsidiary of its parent company, the Volkswagen Group, Audi produces vehicles in nine production facilities worldwide. Th ...

player performance of the week.

Goal of the Week

End-of-season awards

MLS Best XI The MLS Best XI is an annual acknowledgment of the best eleven players in Major League Soccer. Winners *Players in bold were awarded the Landon Donovan MVP Award for that season. Most appearances by a player The following players have appeared ...

Player transfers

SuperDraft

The

MLS SuperDraft The MLS SuperDraft is an annual college draft for teams of Major League Soccer in the United States and Canada. It takes place in January and is used by teams to select players who have graduated from college or otherwise been signed by the le ...

is an annual event, taking place in January of each year, in which the teams of Major League Soccer select players who have graduated from college or otherwise been signed by the league. The first two rounds of

2018 MLS SuperDraft The 2018 MLS SuperDraft was the nineteenth SuperDraft conducted by Major League Soccer. As customary, the SuperDraft was held in conjunction with the annual United Soccer Coaches convention. The 2018 UCS was held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania be ...

were held on January 19 in

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

. Rounds three and four of the 2018 SuperDraft were held via conference call on January 21.

selected

João Moutinho João Filipe Iria Santos Moutinho (; born 8 September 1986) is a Portuguese footballer who plays as a central midfielder for Premier League club Wolverhampton Wanderers and the Portugal national team. Moutinho began his professional career ...

with the first overall pick.

Allocation ranking

The allocation ranking is the mechanism used to determine which MLS club has first priority to acquire a player who is in the MLS allocation list. The MLS allocation list contains select U.S. National Team players and players transferred outside of MLS garnering a transfer fee of at least $500,000. The allocations are ranked in reverse order of finish for the 2017 season, taking playoff performance into account. As an expansion team, Los Angeles FC took the top spot. Once the club uses its allocation ranking to acquire a player, it drops to the bottom of the list. A ranking can be traded provided that part of the compensation received in return is another club's ranking. At all times each club is assigned one ranking. The rankings reset at the end of each MLS season.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Major League Soccer Season 2018

2018 File:2018 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in PyeongChang, South Korea; Protests erupt following the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives protests take place across the United ...