{"id":500480,"date":"2026-10-18T22:14:24","date_gmt":"2026-10-18T22:14:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/500480\/"},"modified":"2026-10-18T22:14:24","modified_gmt":"2026-10-18T22:14:24","slug":"san-jose-earthquakes-clinch-audi-2026-mls-cup-playoffs-spot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/500480\/","title":{"rendered":"San Jose Earthquakes clinch Audi 2026 MLS Cup Playoffs spot"},"content":{"rendered":"

The San Jose Earthquakes<\/a> have qualified for the Audi 2026 MLS Cup Playoffs, clinching their spot on Saturday night.<\/p>\n

With four regular-season matches left, San Jose are fourth in the Western Conference (48 points; 13W-8L-9D).<\/p>\n

The Earthquakes last made the playoffs in 2023. They are two-time MLS Cup champions, capturing the title in 2001 and 2003.<\/p>\n

\n Star players<\/p>\n

San Jose made a winter transfer splash, acquiring Timo Werner<\/a> from German Bundesliga side RB Leipzig.<\/p>\n

The German forward hit the ground running, spearheading a record start to the season where San Jose became the first team of the post-shootout era (2000) to win nine of their first 10 games.<\/p>\n

Homegrown midfielder Niko Tsakiris<\/a> (3g\/11a) and forward Preston Judd<\/a> (16g\/3a) have enjoyed career years, with the latter in contention for the Golden Boot presented by Audi.<\/p>\n

Eduard L\u00f6wen<\/a>, who was acquired from\u00a0St. Louis CITY SC<\/a> in late August, is San Jose’s other Designated Player.<\/p>\n

It’s been 14 years since the Earthquakes advanced past Round One of the postseason. But if anyone can guide them further, it’s current head coach Bruce Arena, who has won five MLS Cups during his illustrious career.<\/p>\n

\n Audi 2026 MLS Cup Playoffs<\/p>\n

MLS Cup presented by Audi will be played Dec. 18, while the playoffs begin Nov. 18 with Wild Card matches.<\/p>\n

Seeds 1-7 in each conference qualify for the Round One Best-of-3 Series.
\nSeeds 8-9 in each conference qualify for the Wild Card matches.
\nSeeds 10-15 in each conference do not qualify for the postseason.<\/p>\n

All games can be viewed on\u00a0Apple TV<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The San Jose Earthquakes have qualified for the Audi 2026 MLS Cup Playoffs, clinching their spot on Saturday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":500481,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[193971,66001,193972,88,1084,90,89,6532],"class_list":["post-500480","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-2026-mls-cup-playoffs","tag-league-club-news","tag-playoff-scenarios","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-earthquakes","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-sendtonews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500480","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=500480"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500480\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/500481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=500480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=500480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=500480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}