Leagues Cup quarterfinals: Which teams will advance to the all-important semis?

This should be a close game featuring lots of goals, but Tigres undoubtedly has the edge. Its Correa-led attack focuses its efforts on wide play, and Miami's wide defenders—Spain's Jordi Alba and Uruguay's Marcelo Weigandt—aren't set up well to handle that pressure. Winner: Tigres

Toluca vs. Orlando City

Don't let the seeding fool you: this is a very close matchup and one that could easily tilt in either team's favor. But with the momentum the club has picked up in MLS over the past few weeks, Orlando should be in a prime position to win this. It's an excellent CONCACAF team under coach Oscar Pareja, the kind of team that can dominate on both ends of the field, and it's stacked with individual talent from top to bottom. When Pedro Gallese in goal, Alex Freeman in defense and Martin Ojeda, Luis Muriel and Mario Pasalic in offense can all switch on at the same time, this Orlando team is borderline unstoppable. Just ask Inter Miami: it found itself on the wrong end of an Orlando beatdown just a few days ago.

Orlando has stars all over the field, but its most influential player is one of its least heralded: 2025 midfield addition Eduard Atuesta. The Colombian arrived from LAFC with big expectations and he's delivered on all of them without making a fuss. While Atuesta was more of a defensive presence in Los Angeles, he's morphed into a true play creator in Orlando...and it's his thoughtful ball movement that sets up Ojeda, Muriel and Pasalic to score buckets of goals. Winner: Orlando

Seattle Sounders vs. Puebla

Three games, three wins, 11 goals scored and just two conceded. That's how Seattle finished the Leagues Cup group stage with the best record of any team in the tournament. And Seattle didn't just rack up stats like that against minnows: it beat Cruz Azul, a team that won the CONCACAF championship just a few months ago, by an eye-watering score of 7-0.

Seattle can beat any team right now, but it didn't get just any team in this quarterfinal: it got Puebla, the Cinderella story of the 2025 Leagues Cup. Making it to this stage is victory enough for Puebla. Seattle should have no trouble brushing it aside. Winner: Seattle

L.A. Galaxy vs. Pachuca 

Regular MLS viewers might be perplexed by this matchup. The Galaxy? Really? But aren't they historically awful this year? Yes. But despite being dead last in MLS, the Galaxy found a second wind in the Leagues Cup and cruised into the quarterfinals after beating Tijuana and Santos Laguna by a combined score of 9-3. Not bad for a team in crisis.

The Galaxy's reward for their better-than-expected group stage, though, is a nigh-unwinnable matchup against Pachuca. Nobody ever wants to face Pachuca: it's a small, intelligent, wildly underrated franchise capable of giving any team trouble on any given day. Pachuca's remote location (it's eighty miles north of Mexico City and sits at nearly 8,000 ft of elevation) means that it's had to develop its own players rather than attract international stars, and it's become one of the best clubs in the world at doing just that. Much of its starting lineup is homegrown: defender Alonso Aceves, midfielder Israel Luna and hyped teenaged attacker Elias Montiel all came through Pachuca's academy. Winner: Pachuca

The Leagues Cup quarterfinals will kick off on Wednesday, Aug. 20.