The U.S. men’s national team return to one of the country’s cathedrals of soccer on Friday for the second game of the 2026 World Cup, taking on Australia in a top of Group D clash at Seattle’s Lumen Field.
The venue, which has become known as one of the loudest stadiums in the country for the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks and MLS’s Seattle Sounders, has hosted the USMNT twice before, while the former Seattle Kingdom, Memorial Coliseum and even the Seattle Mariners’ T-Mobile Park have previously hosted matches as well.
In total, Washington has hosted 10 USMNT matches, on par with New York. With the second match of the second men’s World Cup on U.S. soil, the state will move to 11 games, tied with Kansas and Tennessee. The USMNT’s record through those 10 games reads 7-2-1.
Here, Sports Illustrated takes a look at the team’s history in Washington State and how the past could give them a home advantage in a critical matchup.
The USMNT’s First-Ever Match in Seattle
The USMNT’s first game in Seattle was on June 24, 1974, at the downtown Memorial Stadium, which at the time was home to the first iteration of the Seattle Sounders, then in the now-defunct North American Soccer League. The USMNT lost that match 4–0 to Poland, but the result didn’t have any massive implications as a friendly.
The USMNT’s First Win in Seattle
Just two years after their first match in Seattle, the USMNT returned in 1976 for a Concacaf Championship and World Cup qualifying match at the Kingdome. That day, in front of over 17,000 fans, they put down a 2–0 win against Canada, with Miro Rys and Jule Veee scoring to secure the win and punch the team’s ticket to the qualifying playoff.
That match also lives in history as the first-ever FIFA World Cup qualifier played on artificial turf. Unfortunately, the USMNT returned to Canada for the playoff, where they fell 3–0 to the Canadians, who qualified for the Concacaf tournament.
The USMNT’s Most Important Win in Seattle
The 2013 World Cup qualifying win over Panama was a formative one for the USMNT and its fans.
Not only did the 2–0 win with goals from Jozy Altidore and Eddie Johnson help push the team towards the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, but over 41,000 fans at Lumen Field put the city back on the USMNT’s map, while the American Outlaws supporters’ group debuted the “boom-boom-clap,” chant, three years before it reached peak fame as Iceland’s Viking Clap at the 2016 European Championship.
When the USMNT Last Played in Seattle
The USMNT’s last game in Seattle came just over 10 years ago. It was a part of the Copa América Centenario, the 100th anniversary of the South American tournament, which the U.S. hosted and leaned on as part of its bid to co-host the 2026 World Cup.
Unlike its group stage exit at the 2024 Copa América, the most recent South American tournament hosted in the U.S., the USMNT found relative success in 2016. Under then-manager Jürgen Klinsmann, the team advanced from the group stage and knocked out Ecuador in the quarterfinal in front of over 47,000 fans at Lumen Field, with goals from Clint Dempsey and Gyasi Zardes.
With that as the most recent memory, this generation of USMNT stars will hope to pick up another vital win, with the potential to secure the top spot in Group D if they capture all three points and Paraguay wins or draws against Türkiye.
