Season 2015 Champion Portland Timbers Goals scored 937 | Champions League (Canada) Vancouver Whitecaps FC Dates 6 Mar 2015 – 6 Dec 2015 Matches played 340 | |
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MLS Cup Portland Timbers (1st title) Supporters' Shield New York Red Bulls (2nd shield) Champions League (United States) FC Dallas
New York Red Bulls
Portland Timbers
Sporting Kansas City Top goalscorer Sebastian Giovinco
Kei Kamara
(22 goals each) Similar 2016 Major League Soccer se, 2014 Major League Soccer se, 2012 Major League Soccer se, 2008 Major League Soccer se, 2017 Major League Soccer se | ||
The 2015 Major League Soccer season featured 20 total clubs (17 based in the United States, 3 based in Canada). The regular season was held from March 6 through to October 25, whereas the MLS Cup Playoffs began on October 28 and ended with MLS Cup 2015 on December 6. The defending MLS Cup champions were the LA Galaxy, while Seattle Sounders FC were the defending Supporters' Shield winners.
Contents
- Overview
- Franchise changes
- Realignment and playoffs
- Television
- Personnel and sponsorship
- MLS Cup Playoffs
- Average home attendances
- Highest attendances
- References
It was the first season for expansion teams Orlando City SC and New York City FC, who both joined the Eastern Conference, while both the Houston Dynamo and Sporting Kansas City moved from the Eastern Conference to the Western Conference. Chivas USA folded at the end of the 2014 season.
At the end of the regular season, the New York Red Bulls of the Eastern Conference won the Supporters' Shield, while the team on top of the Western Conference was FC Dallas. The Portland Timbers won their first MLS Cup, winning 2–1 at Columbus Crew SC.
Overview
The 2015 season began on Friday, March 6. The opening weekend saw an average attendance of 25,838 — buoyed by strong attendances in Orlando (62,510), and Seattle (39,782) — with seven of the weekend's ten matches selling out. Additionally, MLS saw strong TV ratings on ESPN2 (539,000 viewers), Unimas (341,000 viewers), and Fox Sports 1 (289,000 and 278,500 viewers).
Franchise changes
The 2015 MLS season features the addition of two expansion teams, New York City FC and Orlando City SC. New York City FC became the second MLS team in the New York metropolitan area (joining the New Jersey-based New York Red Bulls), as well as the first based within New York City itself (the team will play its inaugural season at Yankee Stadium). Orlando is a new market for MLS, which returns to Florida for the first time since folding their Miami and Tampa Bay franchises before the 2002 season; the Lions' ownership previously owned Orlando's team that played in the league then known as USL Pro from 2010–2014, a team that relocated to Louisville for the 2015 season of the rebranded United Soccer League.
While MLS added two teams, one team closed down. Chivas USA, which had called the Los Angeles area home since 2005 and shared the StubHub Center with the LA Galaxy. Chivas had been owned by Mexican club, C.D. Guadalajara, who sold the club back to MLS in 2014. The league folded Chivas in October 2014, after the conclusion of the regular season, though it plans to add a second LA-area club, Los Angeles FC, in 2017.
Realignment and playoffs
With the addition and subtraction of the above-mentioned teams, the 2015 season saw a realignment of MLS's Eastern and Western conferences, which each have 10 teams: NYCFC and Orlando City joined the East, while Houston Dynamo and Sporting Kansas City moved from the East to the West.
Each team plays 34 regular season matches: two or three against conference rivals and once against teams from the opposite conference.
The MLS Cup Playoffs will have 12 teams, up from 10 the last 3 seasons. The top six teams per conference will qualify. The first round per conference has the third-seed hosting the sixth-seed, and the fourth hosting the fifth. In the Conference Semifinals, the top seed plays the lowest remaining seed and the second plays the next-lowest.
The regular season will conclude with all teams playing at the same scheduled time, a league first.
Television
The 2015 season saw the launch of a new United States television and media rights deal with English-language ESPN and Fox Sports and Spanish-language Univision Deportes. The deal continues MLS's relationship with ESPN and Univision, while it reestablishes one with Fox Sports, whose Fox Soccer channel carried MLS games until 2011 (NBC Sports carried MLS broadcasts from 2012–2014). The deal, formally announced in May 2014, sees regular weekly game broadcasts on ESPN2 (Sunday afternoons) and Fox Sports 1 (Sunday evenings), as well as a regular Friday night match on UniMás and/or Univision Deportes Network. The networks will share coverage of the MLS Cup Playoffs, while ESPN and Fox will alternate English language carriage of the MLS All-Star Game and MLS Cup championship match each year. The 2015 MLS all star game will be on Fox Sports, and MLS Cup 2015 will air on ESPN. As part of the deal, the networks also share coverage of the US Soccer men's and women's national teams.
The league reached a four-year agreement with Sky Sports to televise league matches live in the United Kingdom and Ireland. At least two regular season matches each week, the MLS All-Star Game, and every MLS Cup Playoff match was aired on the Sky family of networks. MLS also reached a four-year agreement with Eurosport to air live matches in many other European countries.
Personnel and sponsorship
Note: All teams use Adidas as kit manufacturer.
MLS Cup Playoffs
Source:
Average home attendances
Ranked from highest to lowest average attendance.
Highest attendances
Regular season
Updated to games played on October 25, 2015. Source: MLS Soccer