{"id":999545,"date":"2026-08-14T04:23:25","date_gmt":"2026-08-14T04:23:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/999545\/"},"modified":"2026-08-14T04:23:25","modified_gmt":"2026-08-14T04:23:25","slug":"copa-tejas-heats-up-as-austin-fc-host-fc-dallas-on-sunday-night-soccer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/999545\/","title":{"rendered":"Copa Tejas heats up as Austin FC host FC Dallas on Sunday Night Soccer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Copa Tejas takes center stage this weekend, as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/clubs\/austin-fc\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Austin FC<\/a> host rivals <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/clubs\/fc-dallas\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">FC Dallas<\/a> on Sunday Night Soccer presented by Continental Tire.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>14th in Western Conference<\/li>\n<li>17 points (4W-9L-5D)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Austin turned heads during <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/competitions\/leagues-cup\/?utm_source=mlssoccer&amp;utm_medium=comp&amp;utm_campaign=lc\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Leagues Cup<\/a> 2026, earning two wins and a draw. After cruising past Tijuana (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/competitions\/leagues-cup\/2026\/matches\/atxvstij-08-06-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">2-0<\/a>) Puebla (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/competitions\/leagues-cup\/2026\/matches\/atxvspue-08-09-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">3-0<\/a>) to open the tournament, they defeated Club Am\u00e9rica <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/competitions\/leagues-cup\/2026\/matches\/amevsatx-08-13-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">6-5 in PKs<\/a>, following a 1-1 draw.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/players\/myrto-uzuni\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Myrto Uzuni<\/a> netted the goal that sent them into the quarterfinals.<\/p>\n<p>They&#8217;ll look to transfer that good form to MLS play, where they&#8217;ve lost five of their last six contests.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Myrto Uzuni:<\/strong> The Albanian Designated Player has a team-high 6g\/5a in MLS play and is on fire at the moment, netting four goals during Leagues Cup.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Facundo Torres:<\/strong> The Uruguayan international is in his first season with the Verde &amp; Black, and has one goal to go along with a team-best six assists.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Christian Ram\u00edrez:<\/strong> Despite starting just eight MLS games this year, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/players\/christian-ramirez\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ram\u00edrez<\/a> hasn&#8217;t lost his goalscoring touch, with five tallies.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Brad Stuver:<\/strong>\u00a0Austin&#8217;s long-time standout in goal, Stuver was an All-Star in 2025 and leads the league this season with 89 saves.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It&#8217;s becoming make-or-break time for Austin FC, who are led by interim head coach Davy Arnaud and currently sit second-to-last in the Western Conference.<\/p>\n<p>That said, the Verde &amp; Black are only seven points off the Wild Card places, meaning a few wins in a row could get them right back in postseason contention.<\/p>\n<p>Following the conclusion of the 2026 MLS season, legendary former <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/clubs\/philadelphia-union\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Philadelphia Union<\/a> head coach Jim Curtin, who was\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/news\/austin-fc-name-jim-curtin-as-head-coach-following-2026-season\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">hired in June<\/a>, will take over at the helm.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>6th Western Conference<\/li>\n<li>27 points (7W-5L-6D)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Like their Texas counterparts, Dallas have also enjoyed a strong Leagues Cup campaign, picking up two victories. However, they were eliminated from the competition in their third match, suffering a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/competitions\/leagues-cup\/2026\/matches\/tolvsdal-08-12-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">3-1 road loss<\/a> to LIGA MX powerhouse Toluca. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/players\/petar-musa\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Petar Musa<\/a> scored the squad&#8217;s lone goal.<\/p>\n<p>In league play, Dallas drew <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/clubs\/la-galaxy\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">LA Galaxy<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/competitions\/mls-regular-season\/2026\/matches\/lavsdal-08-01-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">0-0<\/a>, in their last match.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Petar Musa:<\/strong>\u00a0The Croatian international represented his country at the 2026 FIFA World Cup and is currently tied atop the MLS Golden Boot race with 13 goals.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Logan Farrington:<\/strong>\u00a0Musa&#8217;s partner up top, the 24-year-old striker is second on the team with 10 goal contributions (6g\/4a) this season.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li><strong>Kaick:<\/strong> The 20-year-old Brazilian patrols the center of the pitch and has developed into a key piece of Dallas&#8217; midfield.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Osaze Urhoghide:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/players\/osaze-urhoghide\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Urhoghide<\/a> has emerged as a standout in Dallas&#8217; backline this season, starting all 15 matches he&#8217;s been available for and adding 1g\/2a.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Sunday night marks the first Copa Tejas clash between these two rivals. Created in 2021, Copa Tejas is a competition that pits all three Texas clubs against one another in a round-robin format, with the team finishing with the highest point total crowned the winner.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Both Austin and Dallas have won the title twice, meaning Sunday&#8217;s match could prove critical for which club is first to claim their third title.<\/p>\n<p>Despite being the away team, Dallas are the favorites heading into Sunday Night Soccer, with 41% of the bets going in their favor. Austin aren&#8217;t far behind, at 34%.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Market insights shared are current as of Thursday, Aug. 13 at 1 pm ET.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Copa Tejas takes center stage this weekend, as Austin FC host rivals FC Dallas on Sunday Night Soccer&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":999546,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5135],"tags":[5229,400324,44466,1596,15519,44204,37638,44203,358,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":["post-999545","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-america","tag-atxvsdal-08-16-2026","tag-austin-fc","tag-dallas","tag-fc-dallas","tag-priority-match","tag-sendtonews","tag-sunday-night-soccer","tag-texas","tag-tx","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117091959159000913","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/999545","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=999545"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/999545\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/999546"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=999545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=999545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=999545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}